Jovanie Gomez's List: Digital Immigrant

• Digital Immigrants

• Marc Prensky

   

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• So what does that make the rest of us? Those of us who were not born into   the digital world but have, at some later point in our lives, become fascinated   by and adopted many or most aspects of the new technology are, and always   will be compared to them,
• There are hundreds   of examples of the digital immigrant accent.
• They include printing out your email (or having your secretary print   it out for you - an even "thicker" accent); needing to print out   a document written on the computer in order to edit it (rather than just editing   on the screen); and bringing people physically into your office to see an   interesting web site (rather than just sending them the URL).  I'm sure you can think of one or two examples of your own without   much effort.
• "Did you get my email?" phone call.  Those of us who are Digital Immigrants   can, and should, laugh at ourselves and our "accent."
• our Digital Immigrant   instructors, who speak an outdated language (that of the pre-digital age),   are struggling to teach a population that speaks an entirely new language.
• B

  ut Digital Immigrants typically have very little appreciation   for these new skills that the Natives have acquired and perfected though years   of interaction and practice
• . These skills are almost totally foreign to the   Immigrants, who themselves learned - and so choose to teach - slowly, step-by-step,   one thing at a time, individually, and above all, seriously.    "My students just don't _____ like they used to," Digital   Immigrant educators grouse. "I can't get them to ____ or to ____.    They have no appreciation for _____ or _____ ." (Fill in the blanks,   there are a wide variety of choices.)
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  Digital Immigrants don't believe their students can learn   successfully while watching TV or listening to music, because they (the Immigrants)   can
• Digital Immigrants think learning can't (or shouldn't) be fun.
• . They are used to the instantaneity of hypertext, downloaded   music, phones in their pockets, a library on their laptops, beamed messages   and instant messaging. They've been networked most or all of their lives
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  Unfortunately for our Digital Immigrant teachers, the people   sitting in their classes grew up on the "twitch speed" of video   games and MTV
•   They have little patience for lectures, step-by-step logic, and "tell-test"   instruction. 
• Digital Immigrant teachers assume that learners are the   same as they have always been, and that the same methods that worked for the   teachers when they were students will work for their students now
• Often from the Natives' point of view   their Digital Immigrant instructors make their education not worth   paying attention to compared to everything else they experience - and then   they blame them for not paying attention!   

   

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• They will have to confront once again   the Immigrant/Native divide, and have even more trouble given their recent   experiences
• In the first place,   it may be impossible - their brains may already be different.    It also flies in the face of everything we know about cultural migration.
•   But how many Digital Immigrants are prepared to teach it?  Someone once suggested to me that kids   should only be allowed to use computers in school that they have built themselves.
• It's not actually clear to me which is harder - "learning   new stuff" or "learning new ways to do old stuff."
• They wanted the traditional   pedagogical language of "learning objectives," "mastery",   etc. (e.g. "in this exercise you will learn"); our goal was to completely   eliminate any language that even smacked of education.
• A frequent objection I hear from Digital Immigrant educators   is "this approach is great for facts, but it wouldn’t work   for 'my subject.'" Nonsense. This is just rationalization and lack of   imagination.
• It's just dumb (and   lazy) of educators - not to mention ineffective - to presume that (despite   their traditions)

  the Digital Immigrant way is the only way to teach,   and that the Digital Natives' "language" is not as capable as their   own of encompassing any and every idea.   

   

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• So if Digital Immigrant educators really want to   reach Digital Natives - i.e. all their students - they will have to change.    It's high time for them to stop their grousing, and as the Nike motto   of the Digital Native generation says, "Just do it!"    They will succeed in the long run - and their successes will   come that much sooner if their administrators support them.

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• Reconsidering Digital Immigrants…
• You are terrified of your own children, since they are natives in a world where you will always be immigrants. Because you fear them, you entrust your bureaucracies with the parental responsibilities you are too cowardly to confront yourselves. In our world, all the sentiments and expressions of humanity, from the debasing to the angelic, are parts of a seamless whole, the global conversation of bits. We cannot separate the air that chokes from the air upon which wings beat.

• Those born before 1960 had the hardest time adjusting to change. They were the ones who would suddenly stop in the middle of the street as if they had vertigo when som shop window flared or called out, or get that haunted, bewildered look when the PIDA readers changed again, or the newstanks swapped to a different format.

   

  It was a very specific expression: hollow-cheeked, eyes darting, looking for somewhere to hide. I had seen that same look on the faces of war refugees, or the foreign-speaking parents of native-speaking children. Older people were immigrants in their own country. They had not been born to the idea of rapid change – not like us.
• Talking about digital natives and digital immigrants tends to exagerate the gaps between adults, seen as fumbling and hopelessly out of touch, and youth, seen as masterful.
• The importance of the distinction is this: As Digital Immigrants learn – like all immigrants, some better than others – to adapt to their environment, they always retain, to some degree, their “accent,” that is, their foot in the past. The “digital immigrant accent” can be seen in such things as turning to the Internet for information second rather than first, or in reading the manual for a program rather than assuming that the program itself will teach us to use it. Today’s older folk were “socialized” differently from their kids, and are now in the process of learning a new language. And a language learned later in life, scientists tell us, goes into a different part of the brain.

• There are hundreds of examples of the digital immigrant accent. They include printing out your email (or having your secretary print it out for you – an even “thicker” accent); needing to print out a document written on the computer in order to edit it (rather than just editing on the screen); and bringing people physically into your office to see an interesting web site (rather than just sending them the URL). I’m sure you can think of one or two examples of your own without much effort. My own favorite example is the “Did you get my email?” phone call. Those of us who are Digital Immigrants can, and should, laugh at ourselves and our “accent.”

   

  But this is not just a joke. It’s very serious, because the single biggest problem facing education today is that our Digital Immigrant instructors, who speak an outdated language (that of the pre-digital age), are struggling.
• Digital immigrants compute with an accent: they talk funny.
• Digital immigrants are being defined by what they lack with cultural difference seen as an obstacle they must overcome if they are going to fully assimilate into the modern age.
• Digital immigrants are seen as imposing old world standards on the inhabitants of a new world and of getting in the way of their sons and daughter’s opportunities to achieve.
• we should recognize what digital immigrants bring with them from the old world which is still valuable in the new, rather than simply focus on their lacks and inadequacies.
• real digital immigrants can probably outcompute most of the so-called digital natives.
• At one time, the digital immigrant metaphor might have been helpful if it forced at least some adults to acknowledge their uncertainties, step out of their comfort zone, and adjust their thinking to respond to a generation growing up in a very different context than the realm of their own childhood.
• “if Digital Immigrant educators really want to reach Digital Natives – i.e. all their students – they will have to change.” Yet, I worry that the metaphor may be having the opposite effect now — implying that young people are better off without us and thus justifying decisions not to adjust educational practices to create a space where young and old might be able to learn from each other.

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• digital immigrant
• a person born or brought up before the widespread use of digital technology: chances are many digital immigrants will find managing online privacy a daunting prospect

• Think you’re a Digital Immigrant? Get Over It!
• describes this affliction as a flawed mindset that insists on Professional Development before integrating technology.
• “this is not how we were born. As children we all learnt to play with our toy, draw with our crayons, and as we learnt we made mistakes.
• It is how we were born to acquire skills, to learn.”
• He goes on to explain the thing that makes the learning fun and easy is the technology.
• He shares this because the reasons he’s most often given by others for educators not embracing technology is that educators are fearful of it, or they are not comfortable with it.
• These teachers are often self-classified as what Marc Prensky has coined as “Digital Immigrants” or those not born into a digital world of their students who are “native speakers” of the digital language of computers, video games and the Internet.
• For me ‘Learned Helplessness’ is the attitude that many of the self-described ‘digital immigrants’ adopt.
• still surprises me to this day when I hear teachers bleat out with a certain sort of pride that they are a ‘digital immigrant’
• He does this through the development of his Personal Learning Network which he shares had nothing to do with being a digital Native, because he is not.
• “A good teacher can be just as effective without technology.
• Explaining that technology is but a tool for educators and students to use.
• Teachers do not need to be technology experts to allow students to use it to retrieve information, collaborate, create, and communicate.
• Technology continues to advance and many educators are not even familiar with what possibilities are available. If technology requires a new form of literacy, many of our educators are illiterate.
  
• Those stuck in the past... those who are not developing their own personal learning networks... those not taking ownership for their learning... are doing a great disservice to our students and themselves.

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• Digital Immigrant
• classify people born before the introduction of digital technology.
• the popular technology for them was radio, television, newspapers, books, and magazines
• Digital Immigrants are adapting to the digital technology introduced during their life time.
• some Digital Immigrants created the digital technology used by Digital Natives

• Different Types of Digital Immigrants

   
• If you are a Digital Immigrant, it does not mean you are automatically technically inept.
• You can actually be very technically astute.
•  Digital Immigrants will have to deal with Digital Natives, as illustrated below by Rupert Murdoch.
• Avoiders.
• This group does not adapt to new technology quickly, if ever. For example, my father-in-law still gets the newspaper, orders cigars through the mail, and uses the USPS to deliver letters to his friends. He is happy with his life.
• Reluctant Adopters.
• This group is aware of new technology and adopts to it at a slow pace. In many respects, I fall into this group. For example, I still have a second generation phone. It took me 10 years to finally get a DVR, even though I knew it would change how I watch television as soon as I saw it. I am happy with my life.
• Eager Adopters.
• This group enthusiastically adapts to new technology. They embrace it. For example, Jeremy Johnson, one of the organizers of the Big Design Conference, falls into this group. He seems to be plugged into every device, network, tech trend, and so on. Jeremy personifies an Eager Adopter. Jeremy is happy with his life, too.
• Getting the Most from Digital Immigrants
• who is an Eager Adopter,
• who is a Reluctant Adopter
• Digital Immigrant needs coaching from a Digital Native.

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