Is learning in the 21st Century significantly different to learning in previous years? One of the more controversial theories of the digital age is the claim that technology is changing (or rewiring) our brains (Greenfield, 2009) whilst some also claim that prolonged use of the Web is detrimental to human intellectual development (Carr, 2010). It could be argued that these theories stem back to the seminal claim of Marshall McLuhan (1964) that ‘we shape our tools and thereafter, our tools shape us.’ This belief was also the basis for the Digital Natives and Immigrants theory (Prensky, 2001), a persistent discourse that has greatly influenced the thinking of educators in recent years. A significant body of work has arisen around the Digital Natives and Immigrants theory, including descriptions of younger students as ‘the Net Generation’ (Tapscott, 1998), ‘Screenagers’ (Rushkoff, 1996), ‘Born Digital’ (Palfrey and Gasser, 2008), ‘Millennials’ (Oblinger, 2003), and ‘Homo Zappiens’ (Veen and Vrakking, 2006). The latter theory suggests that younger students learn differently, through searching rather than through absorbing, through externalising rather than through internalising information, are better at multitasking, and see no separation between playing and learning (Veen & Vrakking, 2006).

If these theories are true, and younger students do learn differently, the implications for education are profound, demanding changes to the way formal learning content is developed, delivered and organised, and a reappraisal of our conception of knowledge and what it means for education. There are, inevitably, objections to the Digital Natives position.

All of the above theories tend to characterise younger learners as being different to previous generations in their use of technology. These positions are countered by researchers who maintain that such claims are largely based on anecdotal and intuitive arguments, and that there is no significant difference in the way younger or older students manage their online learning activities (Crook and Harrison, 2008; Ito et al, 2009; Kennedy et al, 2010) and that the current generation of learners is far from homogenous (Bennett et al, 2008; Jones and Healing, 2012). Bennett et al (2008) also assert that there is no clear evidence that multi-tasking is a new phenomenon and exclusively the preserve of younger learners. Jones and Healing (2010) criticise the Digital Natives and Immigrants theory as too simplistic, and point out that a greater complexity exists in the way students of all ages use technology, based not on generational differences, but on agency and choice. There is yet further dissent. Vaidhyanathan (2008) argues that ‘there is no such thing as a digital generation.’ He suggests that every generation has an equal distribution of individuals with low, medium and high levels of technology competency. Vaidhyanathan is uncomfortable with the erroneous misclassification of generations and associated assumptions of technology competency levels, and warns: ‘We should drop our simplistic attachments to generations so we can generate an accurate and subtle account of the needs of young people – and all people, for that matter.’

Perhaps the most sensible advice comes from Selwyn (2009) who argues that contrary to the popularist beliefs expressed in the Digital Natives discourse, young people’s engagement with technology is often unspectacular (Livingstone, 2009). According to Selwyn, accounts of Digital Natives are often based on anecdotal evidence, are inconsistent or exaggerated, and hold very little in common with the reality of technology use in the real world. The Digital Natives discourse tends to alienate older generations from technology, and teachers can make dangerous assumptions about the capabilities of young people (Kennedy et al, 2010). Selwyn counsels: ‘Whilst inter-generational tensions and conflicts have long characterised popular understandings of societal progression, adults should not feel threatened by younger generations’ engagements with digital technologies, any more than young people should feel constrained by the “pre-digital” structures of older generations’ (Selwyn, 2011, p. 376).

Arguably the most useful explanatory framework for current online activities is offered by White and Le Cornu (2011), who have argued that habitual use of technology develops sophisticated digital skills regardless of the age or birth date of the user. They call these users ‘Digital Residents’ and suggest that those who are ‘Digital Visitors’ are less likely to be digitally adept because of their casual or infrequent use of digital tools.

References
Bennett, S., Maton, K. and Kervin, L. (2008) The ‘digital natives’ debate: A critical review of the evidence, British Journal of Educational Technology, 39 (5), 775–786.
Carr, N. (2010) The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains.
New York, NY: W. W. Norton.
Crook, C. and Harrison, C. (2008) Web 2.0 Technologies for Learning at Key Stages 3 and 4,Coventry: Becta Publications.
Greenfield, S. (2009) The Quest For Identity In The 21st Century. London: Sceptre.
Ito, M., Horst, H., Bittanti, M. and Boyd, D. (2009) Living and Learning with New Media. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Jones C. and Healing G. (2010) Net Generation Students: Agency and Choice and the New Technologies. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 26, (3), 344–356.
Kennedy, G., Judd, T., Dalgarnot, B. and Waycott, J. (2010) Beyond Digital Natives and Immigrants: Exploring Types of Net Generation Students, Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 26 (5), 332-343.
Livingstone, S.(2009) Children and the Internet. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Oblinger, D. (2003) Boomers, Gen-xers, and Millennials: Understanding the new students. Educause Review. 38 (4).
Palfrey, J. and Gasser, U. (2008) Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives.New York, NY: Basic Books.
Prensky, M. (2001) Digital Natives, Digital ImmigrantsOn the Horizon, 9 (5).
Rushkoff, D. (1996) Playing the Future: What we can learn from digital kids. London: Harper Collins.
Selwyn, N. (2011) The Digital Native: Myth and Reality. Aslib Proceedings,61 (4), 364-379.
Tapscott, D. (1998) Growing up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation. New York: McGraw Hill.
Vaidhyanathan, S. (2008) Generation Myth.The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Veen, W. and Vrakking, B. (2006) Homo Zappiens: Growing up in a Digital Age London: Network Continuum Education.
White, D. S. and Le Cornu, A. (2011) Visitorsand Residents: A new typology for online engagement. First Monday, 16 (9).

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[This is an excerpt from a forthcoming publication entitled: Personal Technologies in Education: Issues, Theories and Debates]

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Theories for the digital age: The digital natives discourse by Steve Wheeler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
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