Digital Immigrant

I think I would fall more into the category of a digital immigrant. I remember getting my first computer in middle school but I think it only had DOS on it. Then a year or two later we got a newer computer with the internet. Still I do not remember using it much for school. We still did our research papers the old fashioned way at the library using books. I do remember using it a little more in high school but still not as much as I see my nieces and nephews using it. However, with that said I don’t feel that I am completely I the dark about computers and technology I do know how to get around most things enough to use them effectively.

I have also wondered about how much technology we let our student use in class. For example, calculators were not used in classrooms until high school. Now our calculators are so advanced that they can do things in seconds that use to take people hours. The question I have is do we teach our students how to use calculators effective and efficiently or do we continue to teach them how to do everything by hand so they know how to do it. When I look at a graphing calculator I get a little confused. I know how to do all of the basic functions of it and even some of the more complicated but what I know about it only skims the surface of what they can do. So, if we spend more time teaching our children how to really use ALL aspects of a graphing calculator we might be doing them a bigger justice then by spending most of the time teaching them how to do it all by hand.

Another thing I found interesting about the first article is how the author talked about the difference in language.He states "As educators, we need to be thinking about how to teach both Legacy and Future content in the language of the Digital Natives Yes the language has changed and is different between the generations, but we as teachers need to find a way to bridge the gap between the two." We can still teach the same old information or what he calls the lagacy information, but we need to use different language to teach it. The Marine Corps knows how to do this perfectly. In boot camp the males and females are trained completely separate. We both learned and trained to do the same things but they approach certain things differently. When we are on the rifle range the instructors with the male recruits will focus on killing while with the female they use words like hurt or wound. They are teaching us the same techniques they just use different strategies. That is what we as teachers need to strive to do. We need to teach the important old information but we need new strategies to make it more appealing to this new generation.

In his second article he states that some feel that we are sugar coating learning with the use of games. But if that is what it takes to get our children to learn and retain it then I think it is something we should use. I think that it may even help our children make connections between learning and real life. Dont get me wrong, we should not use video games, T.V. and the computer for all learning but if we can integate it into our classrooms we will be doing our students a favor by letting them relate it to their lives outside the classroom. I think technology has a place and needs to be in the classrooms because it is not going away and is only going to become bigger and better. We need to be preparing our students for the future and technology is our future.