Digital Learners: A Peek into their Minds Noahlyn Maranan Faculty Department of Social Sciences

"Digital natives" "Digital Youth" "New millenium learners" "The net generation" "Net Gen" "The gamers generation" "the generation M" "Millineal generation" "Millenials" "Next Generation” "First Digitals"

"Born Digital" "Echo Boomers" "Screenagers" "Bebo Generation" "Google Generation" "MySpace Generation" "Gen Y" "Generation Z" "Generation I" "Internet Generation" "iGeneration"

The N-Gen Mind Curious Assertive and self- reliant Accepting of diversity Contrarian Smart & Media-savvy Intrinsically motivated

The N-Gen Mind Global perspective Self- esteem Multiple selves

“Hyperlinked mind” N-geners process info in a non- linear/less serial way

“Patchworking” as metaphor to how young people use info and accomplish tasks (Ryberg & Dirckinck-Holmfeld) Nature of study: qualitative, used participatory observation Findings: Participants used ideas and materials from many sources and presented in a "multi-modal" manner.

“Attention span of a gnat” Multitasking / Parallel processing;

Immediate gratification -instant rewards and feedback

Does the youth today think differently from the rest of us?

used to "twitch speed” skilled at multitasking and parallel processing used to random access of info prefers graphics over text

active is better than passive work and play are increasingly blended w/ a sense of connectedness much less patience w/ experiences that lack obvious pay-off

1. The popularity of these claims lead to "academic moral panic " (Benneth, 2008)

2. There's a need for empirical studies to validate these claims/ideas re the digital mind (Benneth, 2008; Nassah et al, 2010)

√ Does multitasking or parallel processing advantage or disadvantage the youth nowadays?

√Do learners really learn from playing video games?

From an article by Tsai, F. et al. (2012):

√ Does the current generation of young people really process information at a “twitch speed”?

Study on cognitive tempo (Kenny, 2009) tool: MFFT-20 Findings: Three times more students are categorized as impulsive types compared to those who took the test over 2 decades ago.

Experimental study by Kenny (2002 as cited in Kenny, 2009): IV: presentation speed DV: Recall of the video's context Findings: Those who viewed the video at a faster pace tend to remember more the context of the video than those who viewed it at a much slower pace.

√ Cognitive preference for materials presented in graphics than materials presented in text?

√Digital brain?

"neurons that fire together wire together "neurons that fire together wire together...neurons that don't fire together don't wire together"

Gary Small's "iBrain: Surviving the Technological Alteration of the Modern Mind"

Torkel Klingberg's “The Overflowing Brain: Information Overload and the Limits of Working Memory”

Nicholas Carr's “The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to our Brains” ; or: “The Juggler's Brain”

Palfrey & Gasser's “Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives”

3. Who is the "digital native"? (Helper, E.J. & Eynon, R, 2010)

4. The generalizations masks differences brought about by various factors such as age, wealth, SES (Benneth, 2008)

From Li & Ranieri (2010):

Acknowledgement: Graphics created by Mr. A. Pasquin