are saying, “What’s a Google?”
Why in the world do I have to remember this when I can
Google the answer in three seconds on my cell phone?
These same kids who can’t remember the names of the states and their capitals can instantly and with enthusiasm tell you the lyrics of 1,000 songs or the characteristics of 100 game characters. It’s not that most of these kids have ADD or ADHD, and it’s not that they’re disabled; it’s that they’re bored, just not interested, just not listening, and increasingly tuning us out. They have no patience for old ways of teaching and learning.
The fact that they have no patience should not be surprising. Adults have no more patience for unengaging materials than kids have, and they have no hesitation in making that known. The problem is that many educators just don’t get it. They don’t understand how different kids are today—and the digital generation is not just a little different, they’re completely different.
And as we said earlier, today’s learners are not the same learners that schools were originally designed for, and today’s learners are certainly not the learners that many of today’s educators were trained to teach. They are different and, as a result, we are increasingly trying to fit round pegs into square holes, and using standardized tests to measure nonstandardized brains.
The starting point is that we must reconsider how to reshape at least a part of the current classroom learning experience—the way we teach, the way students learn, and the way we assess that learning —and start to address the digital learning styles and learning preferences of the digital generation.
So now we have a pretty good picture of the gap between the adults in control of the school system, who grew up in a predominantly nondigital world, and the digital kids who are growing up in a radically different world that includes the rapidly evolving online digital world. Now that we have described both sides of this gap, it becomes clear that this gap is really more like a huge gulf. Kids today are living a substantially different life than anything we have ever seen before.
This idea that young people are different began to surface in the late 1990s with comments from some parents and teachers. In the few short years since then, the notion that kids are different has progressed from subjective observations to objective research that confirms the early suspicions. As we have just outlined, there are now empirical studies from reputable sources that document the startling changes the digital experience has had on the way young minds operate. This has had a significant impact on the way young people learn that we will explore more fully in the next chapter.
Summarizing the Main Points
There is a rapidly growing gap of understanding between the young people sitting in classrooms and the adults who teach them and make decisions about what they will learn, where they will learn, and how they will learn.
Connecting with students is a key to effective teaching. Because of our own experiences growing up, we have a problem letting go of our past assumptions about teaching and learning.
The world young people experience today is a very different place than the one we grew up in.
Our students are the digital generation, and our generations are primarily nondigitally oriented.
In the past few years, we have learned a great deal about how the brain and mind function.
Neuroplasticity is the reason for the ongoing reorganization and restructuring of the brain in response to intensive inputs and constant stimulation.
Video games, assorted digital devices, and digital bombardment have had a profound effect on the digital generation.
A new field of study called neuroinformatics has emerged during the past several years.
Digital bombardment is having a powerful effect on the way the digital generation processes information.
More than 60 percent of students are either visual or visual kinesthetic learners. The digital generation processes information differently than the people of our generation, and there appears to be a growing gap between the younger generations.
Some Questions to Consider
How are our students the same or different than they were 20 years ago? How are our teachers the same or different than they were 20 years ago? How are classrooms the same or different than they were 20 years ago?
where I think I need to be?
What message do parents and community members need to hear?
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