DIGITAL NATIVES VERSUS DIGITAL IMMIGRANTS?

There are two types of distinction that have to be made in relation to the so-called digital divide. The first operates on a planetary level and concerns the division between countries or blocks of countries where high bandwidth internet is available on a wide scale, and other countries where the rate of internet social penetration is still low. What I am equally interested in another type of divide that is said to exist within countries that boast high internet coverage. If you consider the level of expertise in and ease with information and communications technology among the populations of those countries, it is commonly said that there is a distinction between the younger generations of those countries and the older ones. The point is that younger generations have an innate understanding of and practice with information and communications technology, while the members of older generation cannot find their ways as easily and as intuitively as the younger ones. This is often referred to the distinction between digital natives and digital immigrants.

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In the first part of this blog, I will try to explain, illustrate and also analyze this distinction. I will then argue that the labels ‘native’ and ‘immigrant’ do not always convey an accurate representation of this alleged divide. Finally, I want to critically examine the distinction from the point of view of the wider divide and show that this categorization fails to capture the complex and evolving realities in the countries where information communication technology has a lower level of penetration.

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Let’s first take the distinction at face value. Mark Prensky was the first to coin these labels when he referred to twenty-first century students a ‘“native speakers” of the digital language of computers, video games and the Internet’. Digital immigrants, he adds, are “[T]hose 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’. Without wanting to complicate matters, we can possibly say that what we have here is a pair of variables, one of them socio-biological, which is age, and the other one sort of linguistic, which is intuitive knowledge of and ease with the internet, computers, and other media of storage, retrieval and distribution.

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Basically, the argument is that in societies where high-speed internet connection is taken for granted, younger people are sort of born and bred into the digital medium. They are if you will natives of the medium, or, to follow Prensky’s metaphor, native speakers or users who navigate their ways easily and intuitively in electronically ubiquitous environments. Let’s think, for the sake of clarification, of information and communications technology as a language in its own right, with its own vocabulary and rules for figuring out how to use correctly it to make things work. This language, call it, digilingua, has stabilized enough and has spread among a significant fraction of the population. In fact, some members of this population use so fluently and so naturally that you might argue that it’s their native language. They don’t need to consult any dictionaries, glossaries, or do-it-yourself manuals to find out how a software program or an electronic machines works. They won’t ask their teacher either because they know that their level of competence in this language is probably higher than that of their teacher. To cut a long story short, they are, so to say, native digilingual speakers.

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Those native digilingual speakers who were born using this medium are generally aged 2-25 years. Here, I am choosing the year 1982 (2007-1982) as a cut-off point somewhat arbitrarily to sift those that were born in the era of computers and information and communications technology and those that were born before the advent of computers on a wide scale, that is those who were born before 1982. What this means is that those who were born in the past 25 years or so are native digilingual speakers. They stand in binary opposition to those who started learning digilingua just as it was evolving. Those would be the digital immigrants. They are sort of permanent learners of the medium, and as Prensky (2001) argues, they speak digilingua with an accent. This means, among other things that by the time they have started using and learning the new medium, they have already gone beyond what is called the critical period, and they will never speak digilingua like a native speaker; there will be perennial errors and imperfections in their knowledge of the language, and they will not able to develop the feel, the intuition, the ease and richness characteristic of native speakers of the language. Even their brain, Prensky’s argument goes, might be differently formed. So, if you are a person, say from Europe, North America, Japan, Korea, or Australia, and are aged forty, the label ‘digital immigrant’ applies to you. If you’re five or fifteen, you definitely are a ‘digital native’.

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On to my second point about the rigor of this distinction. There is, of course room for sustaining this definition, at least for a while. Prensky makes the point that contrary to what adults would do when they purchase an electronic gadget, which is to look for the operations manual, children would in fact just hop into it. They would be able to put every cable or cord in place and start the system almost anticipating the instructions, and even without looking at them; the next logical steps sort of come naturally to them , much like native speakers who do not hesitate so much about how to use a word or continue a sentence.

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Well, well, well, not quite. This distinction will appear to stand on shaky ground if think in terms of expertise. Who is more of an expert than the other? Is it the person who uses gadgetry so easily or the person who has invented this gadget? Which of the two was contemporary to technology as it was being designed, publicized, piloted, and made available on a wide scale? It wouldn’t be off the mark to claim that someone who has witnessed the rise and spread of technology might be able to better understand it than someone who just takes it for granted. Let me illustrate this idea. If we think of consciousness as a mental theater that events and things actually populate, it will be easy to see that a digital immigrant is someone who used to have certain pre-technological ways of transacting and operating. At some point, this immigrant started to realize that there were alternative ways to get things done. They then start to follow up on that, and gradually adopt and adapt some new ways. At the same time, a young person is someone whose birth came after technology invaded most facets of life. As this person’s consciousness was being formed, there was no question for them about whether or not to use the gadgetry around. By default and without the least bit of hesitation, they would just use what is on offer without questions, reservations or hesitation. In effect, it may be legitimate to claim that use and manipulation of electronic gadgetry is naturally imposed upon that person. Thus, the older person who slowly moved into adopting that technology is better framed and better placed to understand it, evaluate it and contextualize it.

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Well, I don’t know. I hope I am not making this argument just to defend my position as a digital immigrant who came to adopt it deliberately and consciously. After all, I have seen many people my age who refuse to have anything to do with it. Ah, but hang on. Actually, this distinction doesn’t even apply to me. I have lived most of my life in environments where the use of internet and computers is not available on a scale as wide as it is in the technologically advanced countries. I am of course not in the business of personalizing this issue. Rather, what I want to do is to examine the distinction from a unique point of view. The first ground on which this distinction is weak stems from its limited range of applicability. What I mean by that is that it is reductionist in its categorization of reality. The world, humanity, those who have technology on a wide scale, and those who have it to an average extent, and those who have very little (if any) of it, are not included or representedin this binary opposition. It would perhaps be a more accurate description of technological reality to think about knowledge of and ease with information and communications technology as a continuum, with, at one end those for whom technology is second (or is it first) nature, and those whose knowledge is lagging very much behind at the other end. The continuum would serve to characterize individuals and not whole societies. To be sure, there are pockets of people in the technologically developed worlds who are still on the sidelines of digital revolution. They may not be many, but they are not statistically insignificant. Likewise, there are, possibly in countries with very low per capita incomes, certain individuals and groups who are on a par with their counterparts in the most developed of worlds. It is the material and social conditions of people that determine where they place themselves on this continuum, and not necessarily their geographical belonging.

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Further, I submit that this gradated technological competence continuum may not necessarily be a function of age, with the younger generations being better performers than the less digitally-savvy elders. The fact of the matter is that the leaders of change, innovation, and technology are to be found among all ages groups, possibly more among the generations that Prensky refers to as digital immigrants.

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By way of summary, it looks as though there is room for rethinking the digital native/immigrant divid. To be sure, the age factor can yield certain clues, but it is oblivious of certain facts relating to creativity, innovation and leadership. Neither is the digital divide between countries that are technologically advanced and others that are at some level of development, beginning or intermediate, an accurate representation of reality. A view of technological competence as a continuum of competencies seems to be a more tenable and defensible position, leaving open the possibility of upgrading one’s skills, deepening one’s understanding and bridging one’s lacunae of technology at social as well as individual levels.
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मैं REFEREENCE

Marc Prensky. 2001. Digital Natives Digital Immigrants. In The Horizon. NCB University Press, Vol. 9, No. 5, October 2001. Retrieved from the World Wide Web, December 28, 2007: http://www।marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf

WHAT AM I? TEACHER OR TECHNOLOGUE?

HOW A TEACHER IS COPING IN THE ERA OF DIGITAL LITERACY

This time, I really want to do some open and candid thinking about my position as an academic in today’s technologizing world. Well, here I am, an associate professor of applied linguistics, mostly interested in English language teaching, sociolinguistics, teaching methodology, and research methodology, among others. Quite apart from all other considerations having to with image and how one wants to be perceived, the one issue I want to deal with is the following: for at least the past five months, I have been trying ‘doggedly’ to upskill on technology as much as possible. I am more and more inhabited with e-learning, and as I visited University of Georgia in Athens some two years ago, and the International Korean Cooperation Agency, Seoul, last June (2007), I received ample training in technologies relating to virtual learning environments. Ever since, it has been my express intention to host my course in a course management system, and indeed, I spent the best part of this past summer getting to know about Moodle. I’m happy to say that I have my courses there, and I can think of that as one of my accomplishments. Here is where I want to raise an issue that I find burning, to a great extent. As I have allocated time to get to know about the various technologies involved in creating a more or less successful online course, I find that I have spent in parallel very little time on my areas of interest.

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What does that mean? Well, the content that I have uploaded in the Moodle virtual learning environment LE is one that I have basically prepared during the past three to four years. It has never remained quite the same, because my knowledge of my areas of interest has grown, albeit in slower steps that I would have liked. The fact of the matter of is that much of my time has been siphoned into technology. In a word, I will say that though I strive to produce learning content that is up to my expectations in terms of quality, substance, relevance, and depth, I find that I am more and more preoccupied with technology. Which brings me to the main point: instead of the teacher who should seek to be more and more versed in his field of specialization, I have found me more and more like a technologue. I’m going to have to find alternative ways of expressing this concern, because my spellchecker here flags the word ‘technologue’. What the term means in French is ‘someone who specializes in technology’ (www.mediadico.com). That however is not my job. There are plenty of people in town, engineers who work for various commercial and educational establishments whose job description it is to design systems, solve technology problems, and prepare nice tables and graphs using smart softwares.

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If I were to try to catch up with this technician/engineer, this computer guru, I will never be on a par with them. They know so many tricks and their fingers are so dexterous on the keyboard. I can’t possibly compete with them, nor do I want to. And yet, having given up for a while my interest in my academic fields of specialization, I find I am becoming a sort of Jack of all trades, possibly master in none. There is on the one hand the great urge to be able to prepare academic content that is updated and relevant to my students. On the other hand, the demands of producing a good online course are such that I need to develop as much of a horizontal and vertical understanding of the technological gadgetry involved in designing a course. Under normal circumstances of, say, two decades ago, my consolation would have been that, okay, I have to learn something about these emerging technologies, for a while, and then, at some point, I will have gotten beyond that, and I can continue to privilege my areas of academic interest. The only thing is that in today’s technological whirlpool, there is no saying that you will allocate some time to learn about today’s technology to be able to allocate the rest of your time or life to academe. Changes are occurring at this very instant in learning technology, and I owe it to myself to continue, nay, to persevere in updating my technology skills, almost day in, day out. And if I were to do that, chances are that I will fail in the other call. Eventually, in today’s academic environment, it seems that there is more and more coalescence between academe and technology. This is not only true for teachers, but also for students. In order for my students to have access to the content, they have to find their way in the medium. And thus, the same applies for me. The medium, or the channel, is determining the content. In fact it is determining it so much that we could possibly argue that it is over-determining it, meaning that the distinction we like to make between technology as channel on the one hand and content as substance or matter to be dealt with on the other hand is becoming blurred.

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This is an initial take on the issue, which I still grapple with; as much as there are innovations in the field of educational technology, I am positive there are new ideas being tossed around in the fields of applied linguistics. Which one should get the upper hand, and which one should get the best of me, or which one should I get the best of, is another way of putting the question.

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I think I would like to resolve this matter, at least for tonight, by saying that the changes that have taken place in the field of learning and instructional technology are irreversible. I don’t think we are entitled to saying, ‘well, let’s just take a breather, to evaluate the situation and see where we’re going’. We are going straight into more of the same, and I bet that in a few years time, the instructional landscape will be unrecognizable to those who wish to turn a blind eye on technology, and pretend to teach as if nothing had happened on this front.

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Where is my solace? For now, I think I am happy in the realization that there is ample room for marrying my academic profile with my technological penchants. Learning of all types, including language learning, skill learning, has always been at the core of linguistics, theoretical and applied. Institutions of learning that were created and continue into today on the basis of walled classrooms have played their part, and to a large extent, my colleagues and I are the by-products of our ‘walled’, face-to-face schooling experiences. Now that a new paradigm is ushering itself in, with or without our consent, a new or at least modified understanding of learning has to be sought and investigated. Call it online learning, e-learning, technologically-assisted learning, internet-based learning, computer-mediated learning, what you will. A description of this new environment, together with an understanding of its actors, its tools, its advantages, as well, as of course, its limits, has to be embarked on. Eventually, much in the way institutions of learning are having to reinvent themselves, as a result of technology that have invaded our very private lives, so too, my field of specialization, and any field of human knowledge, will have to mutate and renovate itself, short of becoming extinct or irrelevant.

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Ali H. Raddaoui

University of Sfax, Tunisia

Night of December 22, 2007.

KNOWLEDGE MAKING IN THE NEW ERA

I wish to begin by thanking Hajer for her post to my previous blog. I hasten to add that I like its genuine nature. What Hajer seems to be doing is to put part of the blame on students themselves for being lazy. I would like to take issue with this interpretation. My impression is that at our students are every bit as serious and as studious as students in many parts of the world. When they are not focused on my online course, it doesn't mean that they are wasting their time, doing nothing. Quite the contrary, they may be reasoning as you have in the following way: 'Well, this teacher's course notes are available. That's all I need. What I got to do is make sure I collect other course notes in the meantime'.
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Though I understand this attitude, I sort of feel short-changed, for when I make my course notes, readings and assignments available online and on paper, I reason in a different way. Between myself and my soul, I say: 'Let students have the full course from the very beginning. Why should I trickle this course, one lecture a week or something. My students will be better off because they won't have to wait for my next lecture. They can read the whole thing, do the assignments, complete the readings, and further search for additional information to make them ahead of the teacher, and ahead of the game.' If things happen otherwise, it unfortunate but understandable.
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I think the whole point of e-learning is that learning is not about what the teacher makes available for students, by way of lecture notes or even readings. Lecture notes on any course that you can imagine are now widely and freely available. Just click on MIT open courseware, and you will find an array of courses all free, for all students and people all over the world. Other universities have followed the steps of MIT. In a word, knowledge is available, everywhere. What matters is not only the acquisition of this knowledge, but also, and more importantly the ability for students, teachers, and regular citizens to contribute to this knowledge. Thus, it is not through learning by heart the notes that I have made available for you that I am going to be able to make a difference in my students' lives, but through imparting unto them the message that they too have knowledge, that this knowledge is worthy of being shared and formalized.
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In order to reach this goal, you as well as I have to understand that the ultimate goal of the schooling enterprise as we know it has changed. Over are the days when the teacher came to school with two or three pages of notes that he/she shared with students and went home, 'happy and content', as we say in Arabic, that the job is done, and that the students have had their dose of knowledge for that day or that lecture. The new goal is now such that learners, young and old, have to do apply a measure of independent learning through seeking knowledge and information from all possible and available sources. This is the first goal. The second will be, henceforth, to work toward producing and authoring knowledge, and as we shall see in a future blog, this is being done, more and more, with online and offline collaboration, working on your own and within a group, to generate new knowledge that is reflective of what you collectively and individually know at this point.