I stumbled on some interesting postings in 2007 by Charles Nelson in his Explorations in Learning blog. In Myths of the Digital Generation and Myths of the Digital General Part II, Nelson takes aim at some of the same unsubstantiated claims and sloppy research that Net Generation Nonsense does:
On multitasking
"Yes, youngsters multitask faster, but it's not new. And I would expect them to do it faster even if they hadn't grown up with it. After all, multitasking, like other physical and mental abilities, is age-related: it declines with age. The fact that "digital natives" multi-task "well" is a factor of age as well as being "digital.""
"The fact that youngsters like to multitask and that they can do it better than oldsters says little about well they learn while multitasking. And the research says otherwise."
On technology-induced changes to the brain
"Prensky's interpretations are speculative extrapolations from research findings that the brain continues to adapt and is malleable, and that people think differently according to their experiences."
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1 comment:
Multitasking is not new.
The father of a friend of my mothers (which puts the date back to about 1920-30)was able to recieve (and write down) a morse code message with one hand, while sending out a completely unrelated morse code message with the other hand. I'd like to see someone do that now ...
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