More Mythbusting Evidence

Two British researchers have just completed a study of undergraduate students that found "many young students are far from being the epitomic global, connected, socially-networked technologically-fluent digital native who has little patience for passive and linear forms of learning." Instead, the study found that students use a limited range of technologies for both formal and informal learning and that there is a "very low level of use and familiarity with collaborative knowledge creation tools such as wikis, virtual worlds, personal web publishing, and other emergent social technologies."

The study was conducted by Anoush Margaryan and Allison Littlejohn at Glasgow Caledonian and Strathclyde Universities in the UK. Here is a summary of their findings. A full article is in the works.

This study investigated the extent and nature of use of technologies – primarily communication technologies, social software and mobile devices – by undergraduate students in two disciplines, social work and education, in Glasgow Caledonian and Strathclyde Universities in the UK. The study included a questionnaire survey of 160 students, followed up by in-depth interviews with 8 students and 8 staff members at both institutions. The findings show that many young students are far from being the epitomic global, connected, socially-networked technologically-fluent digital native who has little patience for passive and linear forms of learning. Students use a limited range of technologies for formal and informal learning. These are mainly established ICTs - institutional VLE, Google and Wikipedia and mobile phones. Students make limited, recreational use of social technologies such as media sharing tools and social networking. Findings point to a very low level of use and familiarity with collaborative knowledge creation tools such as wikis, virtual worlds, personal web publishing, and other emergent social technologies. The study did not find evidence to support the claims regarding students adopting radically different patterns of knowledge creation and sharing suggested by some previous studies. This study reveals that students’ attitudes to learning appear to be influenced by the approaches adopted by their lecturers. Far from demanding lecturers change their practice, students appear to conform to fairly traditional pedagogies, albeit with minor uses of technology tools that deliver content. In fact their expectations were that they would be “taught” in traditional ways – even though many of these students were engaged in courses that are viewed by these Universities as adopting innovative approaches to technology-enhanced learning. The study didn’t find age differences in patterns of technology use – the young students were just as likely to be conservative in the extent and nature of technology use as the older ones. Margaryan, A., & Littlejohn, A. (2008). The myth of the digital native: Students’ use of technologies. Presentation at an Academy Horizons Seminar, Caledonian Academy, Glasgow Caledonian University. Available online at http://www.slideshare.net/anoush/myth-of-digital-native-students-use-of-technologies-presentation

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: digital_natives seminars)

Tapscott Strikes Again

Don Tapscott who was largely responsible for starting the "net gen" hype back in 1998 with the release of his book, Growing Up Digital, has followed that up with Grown-Up Digital. I haven't read this book but I did give my assessment of Growing Up Digital in an earlier posting. Judging by the jacket cover hype for this new work, the techno-utopic viewpoint is much the same:

"Grown Up Digital reveals:.

• How the brain of the Net Generation processes information .
• Seven ways to attract and engage young talent in the workforce.
• Seven guidelines for educators to tap the Net Gen potential.
• Parenting 2.0: There's no place like the new home .
• Citizen Net: How young people and the Internet are transforming democracy.

Today's young people are using technology in ways you could never imagine. Instead of passively watching television, the Net Geners are actively participating in the distribution of entertainment and information. For the first time in history, youth are the authorities on something really important. And they're changing every aspect of our society-from the workplace to the marketplace, from the classroom to the living room, from the voting booth to the Oval Office."

This book is based on a $4 million private research study that involved a survey of over 11,000 young people so one hopes it is more credible than the first book but it's hard to take a publication seriously when the hype is so over the top and at odds with the other research that has been done on this topic.

Open Education Furthers the Discussion

It is heartening to see that the concerns expressed in this blog about Net Gen hype have been taken up by Tom Hanson and his Open Education blog. Tom has posted a three-part series that features the critiques mentioned here. He concludes:

"It is time to drop the digital natives’ hype and recognize that the debate should not be about digital natives versus digital immigrants. The debate should be about how to use technology to effectively enhance the learning experience for students."

And I would add that, in doing this, we need to be sure we understand who are learners are and that our use of technology meets their needs, and is not based on a preconceived and inaccurate notion of an entire generation.

An Eloquent Critique of Generational Stereotyping

"Talk of a "digital generation" or people who are "born digital" willfully ignores the vast range of skills, knowledge, and experience of many segments of society. It ignores the needs and perspectives of those young people who are not socially or financially privileged. It presumes a level playing field and equal access to time, knowledge, skills, and technologies. The ethnic, national, gender, and class biases of any sort of generation talk are troubling. And they could not be more obvious than when discussing assumptions about digital media."

Read the full article from Siva Vaidhyanatha.

Todays Teens: Anything But Masters of Technology

Once again, the strong research seems to contradict the prevailing view of the digitally-literate Net generation. I came across this study out of Great Britain, thanks to Tom Hanson at Open Education.net which casts doubt on the idea that teens are better with technology than adults.

"The study sought to determine just how good young people were with information technology and thereby determine what schools and libraries should in turn focus on when teaching students. To make their determinations, a log of British Library web sites and search tools was analyzed along with a “virtual” longitudinal study based on literature reviews from the past 30 years."

Read the Open Education.net posting on the study or download the full study.

Net Gen No Sense

We just completed surveying staff and students at the on the use use of technologies for teaching and learning. We had over 400 student responses (out of 3000 full time equivalent students) and the picture was very clear. They are not making use of the web 2.0 tools in any great way in their personal lives. Interestingly we had one student ask a question along the lines of a question example given in a previous post. "What's a Wiki?".

This is a blog so I can be a bit lazy! Students are using technologies in their daily lives with texting obviously being at the top of the list. They use other technologies that make their lives easier; booking tickets online; booking travel online; internet banking; shopping online. Oh, and they're not all social networking with a number of students saying that it was a waste of their time. I thought that I detected something along the lines of contempt for the social networking scene from some students. It was almost as if social networking was for those with nothing better to do with their lives.

No, it wasn't a rigorous three year study but it did provide a very good snapshot of where our students sit in relation to Web 2.0. The interesting question then concerns what the findings mean. Perhaps it's a good thing that they're not using Web 2.0 in their daily lives because that lack of use might provide an opportunity to use Web 2.0 in education without students coming to the tools with a whole load of pre-conceived notions about their purpose (social rather than educational). However, teaching and learning must determine the choice of the tool (or not if a tool is not needed).

Check out the representation of a personal learning environment form a PhD student

http://mohamedaminechatti.blogspot.com/2007/06/my-plepkm.html

Take a good look because there's some serious learning at the center with the technologies etc. situated around the core activity of learning.

Born Digital

Yet another book has been published that addresses the so called "digital generation gap".

Here's the publisher's description of Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives by John Palfrey and Urs Gasser:

"The most enduring change wrought by the digital revolution is neither the new business models nor the new search algorithms, but rather the massive generation gap between those who were born digital and those who were not. The first generation of “digital natives”-children who were born into and raised in the digital world-is now coming of age, and soon our world will be reshaped in their image. Our economy, our cultural life, even the shape of our family life will be forever transformed. But who are these digital natives? How are they different from older generations, and what is the world they’re creating going to look like? In Born Digital, leading Internet and technology experts John Palfrey and Urs Gasser offer a sociological portrait of this exotic tribe of young people who can seem, even to those merely a generation older, both extraordinarily sophisticated and strangely narrow. Based on original research and advancing new theories, Born Digital explores a broad range of issues, from the highly philosophical to the purely practical: What does identity mean for young people who have dozens of online profiles and avatars? Should we worry about privacy issues? Or is privacy even a relevant value for digital natives? How does the concept of safety translate into an increasingly virtual world? Is “stranger-danger” a real problem, or a red herring? A smart, practical guide to a brave new world and its complex inhabitants, Born Digital will be essential reading for parents, teachers, and the myriad of confused adults who want to understand the digital present-and shape the digital future."

Now, I haven't read this book so perhaps I should withhold my comments but the language in this description suggests its more of the same: sweeping unsubstantiated generalizations about an entire generation.

However, somebody who has read the book suggests otherwise. Dana Boyd writes:

"If you're an academic and you choose to pick up this book - and I strongly encourage you to do so - try to read it in context. Because it is deeply grounded in research, it might be tempting to see it as an academic book with too few citations. I'd encourage you to resist the critical reflex that comes with being piled higher and deeper and appreciate the ways in which scholarly work is being leveraged as a tool for cultural intervention. I think that JP and Urs have done an astonishing job and believe that they deserve our deepest gratitude. I for one am VERY thankful of their efforts to make change based on what we know instead of what we fear."

I certainly agree with making change based on evidence but that is the problem with the net generation discourse. It argues for radical change based on flimsy evidence. If Palfrey and Gasser do have the evidence then we're moving in the right direction but I'm not sure what to make of this part of Boyd's recommendation for this book:

"Combatting pre-existing images requires more than accuracy, more than nuance. It requires either a new more-sticky image or a reworking of the original image. By working inside the frame of "digital natives," JP and Urs seek to ground that concept through a realistic image of practice. Reclaiming a term does not relieve it of all of its baggage, but it is a service to discourse if you can accept that the term won't just disappear by ignoring it. Once it's grounded, nuance becomes possible in entirely new ways."

A Critical Review of the Net Gen Evidence

According to three Australian researchers, our skepticism of the grand claims made about the "net generation" and the supposed impact on education is well-founded. According to Sue Bennett, Karl Maton and Lisa Kervin, the claims that this generation of learners is so different from previous generations that a fundamental change to our educational systems is needed "have been subjected to little critical scrutiny, are undertheorised, and lack a sound empirical basis"(p. 776).

In their article in the latest issue of the British Journal of Educational Technology (Vol. 39, No. 5, 775-786). The three researchers from the University of Wollongong and the University of Sydney review the evidence and analyze the debate. They conclude that "...rather than being empirically and theoretically informed, the debate can be likened to an academic form of a 'moral panic'" (p. 775).

Abstract
The idea that a new generation of students is entering the education system has excited recent attention among educators and education commentators. Termed `digital natives' or the `Net generation', these young people are said to have been immersed in technology all their lives, imbuing them with sophisticated technical skills and learning preferences for which traditional education is unprepared. Grand claims are being made about the nature of this generational change and about the urgent necessity for educational reform in response. A sense of impending crisis pervades this debate. However, the actual situation is far from clear. In this paper, the authors draw on the fields of education and sociology to analyse the digital natives debate. The paper presents and questions the main claims made about digital natives and analyses the nature of the debate itself. We argue that rather than being empirically and theoretically informed, the debate can be likened to an academic form of a `moral panic'. We propose that a more measured and disinterested approach is now required to investigate `digital natives' and their implications for education.

The full article is accessible online through library e-journal databases.

Thanks to George Siemens for alerting me to this article.

Goodbye Net Gens, Hello First Globals

When a product is no longer selling, businesses will often "re-brand". Take the same thing and call it something different. Does the same thing happen with ideas? Say goodbye to Net Gens and hello to.....First Globals.

In a newly-released book (The Way We'll Be: The Zogby Report on the Transformation of the American Dream) John Zogby highlights the emerging influence of the First Globals, whom his book calls "the most outward-looking and accepting generation in American history." First Globals, he says, are more socially tolerant and internationally aware.

According to Zogby the First Globals are causing a "fundamental reorientation of the American character away from wanton consumption and toward a new global citizenry in an age of limited resources."

And of course, there are implications for higher education. According to an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education, "these days...students are much more likely to have experienced other cultures firsthand, either as tourists or because they have immigrated from someplace else. Whether college for them is a traditional complex of buildings or an interactive online message board, said Mr. Zogby, there is a different student on campus."

Now, I haven't read this book but I'm always skeptical when I hear sweeping claims being made about paradigm shifts at "lightning speed", "transcendent change" and when educational innovation is compared to microbrewed beer, automobile sharing, and DVD rentals by mail.

Zogby's claims are based on data from polls conducted in 2007 of several thousand Americans.

Read the Chronicle of Higher Education review of the book.

The Way We'll Be: The Zogby Report on the Transformation of the American Dream

The Net Generation and Web 2.0 Technologies

Research conducted at three Australian universities suggests that the Net Generation are not big users of Web 2.0 technologies, or were not, in 2006. Gregor Kennedy and his colleagues surveyed over 2500 first year students at the University of Melbourne, University of Wollongong, and Charles Sturt University in 2006. As well, follow-up focus group interviews were held with 46 students.

The results show that these Australian students were infrequent users of Web 2.0 technologies. More than 80% had never produced a podcast or contributed to a Wiki. More than 70% and never kept their own blog and more than 50% had never used a social networking site, read someone else's blog or downloaded a podcast.

Furthermore, the focus group interview revealed a considerable level of ignorance about these technologies. "For example, when one student was asked how a blog could usefully support her studies, she responded by saying: 'What’s a blog? I don’t know what it is'. Similarly, in focus group discussions about podcasting, two students from separate focus groups reported being unfamiliar with any such technology or service" (p. 522).

The authors conclude, "these research results indicate that we must be wary of overgeneralising the distinctive features of this generation, as individuals or as a group, their lifestyles or their learning styles based on assumptions about technology use or preferences" (p. 522).

Read the full article here.