Week 1

It is fascinating to learn how and why Net Geners/Digital Natives think, learn, and process information fundamentally differently than Digital Immigrants (those of us who did not grow up using computers, cell phones, iPods, etc). Today's teachers are struggling to teach a population that speaks an entirely new language. Today's students learn by being connected. They don't just want to be lectured or talked at. They crave interaction. They have never known life without the ability to interact and connect with others immediately. Many students are bored and want to be listened to more. There is almost an urgency to know what is going on all the time in many different areas of their lives. This can be referred to as CPA or Continuous Partial Attention.

Students want their teachers to have technological and pedagogical knowledge and skill. However, many of today's teachers are either unwilling to learn to use or afraid of the new technology that is now available for use as teaching tools. One tool, PowerPoint, is being used more and more frequently by teachers with mixed reviews from students. Students praised PowerPoint's ability to help teachers convey specific information, but expressed frustration when teachers simply transferred their lecture notes to PowerPoint.

Interaction is of extreme importance to digital natives. How they interact with each other, with technology, and with life in general is different from that of digital immigrants. Today's students want to be heard. Blogging has become a way for students to be heard. It is a fast and effective way for students to interact and learn from each other and the rest of the world. Blogging enables students to develop a personal learning network (PLN). Blogging also redefines the audience for student writers, thus encouraging better writing and a more well-developed thought process.

It is, however, of the utmost importance for teachers and parents who have children using the internet as a learning tool, to make sure that it is being used in a safe manner. Sometimes
children innocently publish personal and unsafe information about themselves on the internet, putting them in danger. There are ways of protecting children with filtering tools and close monitoring of their use of the internet.

I feel that the singularity of technology has given educators only one option. Technology is here to stay and it is such a huge part of today's students' lives that we, as educators will need to incorporate as much of it as we can into our curriculum to give students the edge they need in today's fast-paced world.