Digital Immigrants and Digital Natives

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Name of Theory: Digital Immigrants and Digital Natives

Name of Theorists: Marc Prensky

Biography of Theorist:

  Marc Prensky is an author, inventor, visionary, futurist, and designer. He was born in 1946 in

New York City. He has received masters degrees from Oberlin College, Yale University, and

the Harvard Business School. He is considered a pioneer when it comes to researching the

digital age. Marc started his career in education as a teacher in Harlem. He has taught all levels

of education, from elementary to college. Not only has Marc been instrumental in the

development of teaching tools in K-12 but he has also worked in the corporate world as a

corporate strategist and product development director. Marc is a trained musician and has also

acted on Broadway.

  Most of Prensky’s research has been focused on helping teachers effectively teach the 21st

generation. This includes developing teaching tools that motivate students who are used to being

“plugged in” to computers, internet, and computer games. Technology is a major focus in the

classroom today and Marc has done a fabulous job of creating tools that will assist teachers. His

most recognizable research article is titled; “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants”.

  Prensky has published numerous articles and is the author of three books; “Digital Game

Based Learning”, “Don’t Bother Me Mom-I’m Learning”, and “Teaching Digital Natives:

Partnering for Real Learning”. He is an expert in designing computer learning games and

specializes in utilizing games in education.
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Description of Theory:

  As educators, we are now dealing with the first generation that is growing up in the digital

age. They have experienced technology like no other generation in the past. Their lives are

spent with cellular phones, digital television, computer games, video games, ipods, and

numerous other technological devices. According to Marc Prensky (2001), today’s average

college grads have spent less than 5,000 hours of their lives reading, but over 10,000 hours

playing video games (not to mention 20,000 hours watching TV). Computer games, email, the

internet, cell phones and instant messaging are integral parts of their lives. Since students have

changed so much over the years, we must change our way of teaching. In order to understand

this generation, we first must define them. Prensky refers to them as Digital Natives who speak

the digital language of computers, video games, and internet. Prensky also believes that 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 to teach a population that

speaks an entirely new language (2001).

  Since these students are considered digital natives, Prensky describes the rest of the

population Digital Immigrants or those that didn’t grow up in the digital age but have adapted to

it. 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 (2001). Students learn differently today and teachers need to adapt to these new

technologies and teaching methods used in the classroom.

  Prensky (2001) states that children are raised with the computer “think differently from the

rest of us. They develop hypertext minds. They leap around. It’s as though their cognitive
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structures were parallel, not sequential.” There are many ways in which Digital Natives have

changed according to Prensky (2004). Some of these are as follows.

  1. Digital Natives communicate differently. Communication is done primarily via email,

      text, instant messaging, and chat. No longer are students communicating face to face or

      by telephone.

  2. Digital Natives are sharing differently by using blogs, webcams, and camera phones.

  3. Digital Natives buy differently. They are using ebay, craigslist, and online shopping.

  4. Digital Natives have a desire to create. They are using avatars, building websites, and

      utilizing social networking sites.

  5. Digital Natives are meeting via chat rooms, wiki sites, and skype instead of the old-

      fashioned face-to-face meetings.

  6. Digital Natives learn differently. According to Prensky (2004), when a student is

      motivated to learn something, they have the tools to go further in their learning than ever

      before-far beyond their teachers’ ability and knowledge, and far beyond wh at even adults

      could have done in the past. The Digital Natives exploit this to the fullest, while ignoring,

      to a larger and larger extent, the things they are not motivated to learn, which ,

      unfortunately, includes most, if not all, of their schoolwork.

  7. Digital Natives are socializing by way of social networks and chat rooms.

  8. Digital Natives are evolving differently and they are creating and learning short-cut

      behaviors that meet their needs at a much quicker pace.

  A Harvard Law Professor by the name of John Palfrey wrote a book entitled, Born Digital:

Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives. This book has extensive research on this

generation and how they function. He interviewed teachers, administrators, librarians, and
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psychologist who educate and work with this generation. According to Palfrey (2009), digital

natives go through stages when absorbing information. The first stage is “grazing.” Instead of

sitting down every morning to read the paper, for example, digital natives go through the day

absorbing information via a Yahoo reader, RSS feed, Facebook and the like. A subset will take

the second step, the “deep dive,” where they are looking for further analysis by clicking on a

hypertext link, hearing a podcast, or seeing what their friends think. This stage is like actually

reading a newpaper article instead of just the headline. The third step is the most engaged, the

“feedback loop,” where they engage the information on a deeper level, critique it and share it by

posting it in their Facebook profile or on Twitter. Palfrey continues on to state that the biggest

fear is that students will only use these tools to go through the first or second step. Students that

are getting the most educational benefit and absorbing the most information are going through all

three steps.

   Technology will be changing the way we teach and the way our students learn. Educators will

have to take the appropriate action steps to be effective teachers to this generation. They must

dive into the world of technology and become learners themselves.

Prepared by: Jennifer Duncan

References:

Palfrey, J. (2009, November/December). Educating Digital Natives. Retrieved from

        http://www.districtadministration.com/article/educating-digital-natives

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants. On the Horizon, 9 (5), 1-6.

Prensky, M. (2004). The Emerging Online Life of the Digital Native: What they do differently

        because of technology, and how they do it. Retrieved from http://marcprensky.com/