The Hierarchy Of Digital Distractions

I was introduced to the amusing diagram by Dave White during his excellent keynote at the Plymouth e-Learning Conference.

See the full version.

Have a look and see whether it fits your life, not sure about the linking to video of kitten frolicking. Is that distracting? Possibly!

Digital Natives: The Great Debate

So do you consider the concept of digital natives and digital immigrants relevant to the work that you do?

The 8th and 9th April at the Plymouth e-Learning Conference there will be a (great) debate on digital natives.

This forum will explore methods for categorising learners approach to online platforms and how this can influence edtech/pedagogic strategies. It will focus on Marc Prensky’s famous ‘Digital Native & Digital Immigrants’ trope and the more recent ‘Visitors & Residents’ idea proposed by David White.

Questions the forum will consider:

• Which of these systems is a more effective guide when attempting to provide appropriate technologies in configurations which encourage participation?
• Is it possible to see ‘generational’ or age based trends in approaches to the web or is this an over simplification?
• Does categorising learners along these lines act as a useful guide for edtechs/learning techs or are they just conceptual toys?

The two systems will be promoted by members of the panel after which the discussion will be opened to the audience.

The forum panel will be Tara Alexander (Lecturer, Health and Social Work, University of Plymouth), David White (Manager/Researcher, University of Oxford) and Steve Wheeler (Senior Lecturer in Education and Information Technology, University of Plymouth).

I have the task of chairing this session. There are some great speakers and the topic is controversial, people have many varied views on it. Should be both fun and stimulating.

Visitors and Residents

When I was at FOTE 09 a few weeks ago I stayed overnight and went out for a meal at a terrible Italian restaurant; one of the problems I have visiting different parts of London is that I am merely a visitor and unlike the local residents do not know the best places to eat. I remember visiting London a few years ago and my sister-in-law who lived in London at the time (a resident) took me to a wonderful local pub with fantastic food. The more I visit London the more confident I get with getting about (on foot and on the tube) and knowing which places to avoid and when and which places to seek out and try. First time visitors to London know it differently to those that visit more often and likewise people who live in London will know some places better than others. Visitors and residents know London in different ways and the same can be said for those who use digital and online tools and services. I really don’t want to use the term digital world as I don’t think it is a useful term.

Last year we discussed the concept coined by Dave White of Visitors and Residents and how this relates to how people interact and use the online and digital tools and services out there.

Dave has made a video of the presentation he gave at ALT-C 2009 and it makes for interesting viewing.

You can read more on his blog.

Most people should by now realise that the age demarcation of the digital native and digital immigrant is a flawed concept and should not be relied upon. Projects and research have again shown that young learners are not digital natives and often have issues with digital and online technologies.

From the MoLeNET programme for example.

The experiences of several MoLeNET projects suggests that not all young people are the “digital natives”…

“We came to this project with an unspoken belief that young learners would innately understand how these devices worked, we quickly came to understand that, while they can use them well on a superficial level, more demanding tasks stretched their knowledge of the technology”.

The key lessons to remember is that you can’t assume that younger learners will be confident in how to use new technologies, likewise also don’t assume that older learners will not know how to use technologies.

If you are an online resident it can sometimes be difficult to remember that a lot of people are merely visitors and that they may not fully undertstand the local customs, practices or best places to go.

e-Learning Stuff Podcast #018: Digital Literates

James Clay, Kev Hickey, Shri Footring and Lisa Valentine discuss Twitter, digital literacy, digital identity and other stuff too.

This is the eighteenth e-Learning Stuff Podcast, Digital Literates.

Download the podcast in mp3 format: Digital Literates

Subscribe to the podcast in iTunes.

James is joined by Kev Hickey and Shri Footring. Lisa Valentine joins us later in the conversation.

Shownotes

• Digital Literacy Debate – The purpose of the debate is to try and move forward on issues surrounding Digital Literacy. The focus of the debate will be the UK education sector, but international attendees and contributors are more than welcome. Recently, Digital Literacy has gained a lot of traction within academic and educational technology discussion within the UK, and is generally thought of as A Good Thing. However, some important questions have yet to be addressed.
• James, Shri, Kev and Lisa all use Twitter, but some of us prefer Jaiku.
• So what is a hashtag?
• Pat Parslow’s comment on the term digital native.
• Marc Prensky’s new paper on digital wisdom.
• Dave White’s blog a post about residents or visitors to the online world.
• The e-Learning Stuff podcast on the whole digital native, immigrant, visitor, resident, naturalised debate.

Photo source.

The digitally literate learner and the appropriation of new technologies and media for education

Interesting presentation from Professor John Cook, from his Inaugural Lecture.

e-Learning Stuff Podcast #004 – natives, immigrants, residents and visitors

This is the fourth e-Learning Stuff Podcast, natives, immigrants, residents and visitors.

Download the podcast in mp3 format: natives, immigrants, residents and visitors

Subscribe to the podcast in iTunes.

In this show, James is joined by Nick Jeans, Dave Foord, David Sugden and Lisa Valentine and they discuss the concept of the digital native, the digital immigrant, resident and visitor. Apologies for the poor audio quality of Nick which we’re blaming on his Skype connection.

Shownotes

• My original blog post can be found here.
• Marc Prensky on Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants.
• Dave White’s blog a post about residents or visitors to the online world.

It’s definitely not for girls

One of the nice things that you do with YouTube is see the statistics for your videos.

For the Digital Divide Slam at ALT-C 2008 I with Steve and Joss produced a short video entitled, “It’s not for girls” looking at the digital divide in respect to gender.

Looking at the stats for it (as it is currently my most popular video) I was amused by the gender stats, click the image for the larger version.

Should be taken with a pinch of salt really as the stats only cover the last few days and not the whole demongraphic of who has viewed the video.

So what about the video, well here it is again.

Colleges, universities and the digital challenge

The JISC and the Guardian jointly published a feature on the digital challenge facing libraries.

Academic libraries are changing faster than at any time in their history. Information technology, online databases, and catalogues and digitised archives have put the library back at the heart of teaching, learning and academic research on campus.

There are some interesting articles in there.

My job role is managing both e-learning (ILT) and the Libraries in my college, something which is happening more often in FE, I know Trafford College has a similar position and another college in the South-West is advertising a similar position soon.

I do believe it is important that the e-learning and learning resources functions within an FE College if not managed by the same person, the relevant managers should be working closely together. Libraries need to embrace the digital challenge not try and fight it.

And before you ask, no, embracing the digital world, does not mean getting rid of all the books!

Britain enjoying ‘digital boom’

From a BBC News article:

The net, mobile phones and MP3 players are revolutionising how Britons spend their time, says Ofcom’s annual report.

It reveals that older media such as TV, radio and even DVDs are being abandoned in favour of more modern technology.

It also shows that women, in some age groups, are the dominant web users and older web users spend more time online than any group.

Among children it showed that web and mobile phone use is growing at the expense of video games.

Some may not believe that DVDs are old technology already! However with places like Tesco selling DVD players for £17 and with the advent of HD-DVD and Blu-Ray, downloadable films and the growth of YouTube, we must start to think of them as an old technology.

I find it interesting that the internet and the web are no longer just the playground for the young male geek, but now that women and older people are starting to use the web and are in some cases the largest group using the web. This does mean that we have real opportunities in education to continue (start) using the web to support and enhance learning.

As for children moving from games to using the web and mobile phones more, does this mean with some in the education sector looking at games for learning, have they missed the boat already and should start loo king at other areas and ignore games?

As for the growth in mp3 players (read iPod) is it time we started in FE to podcast more?

Some things to think about.