Prensky’s article, “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants,” talks about those born into technology and those who learn technology. The generation of today, or “D-Gen” as Prensky states, are considered to be Digital Natives. Teachers who have been around for a while and were around when technology started to increase were considered Digital Immigrants. One thing that stood out in his article is what he called “Legacy vs. Future.” It reminded me of Dolgin and his argument of “Traditional vs. Progressive Education.” “Legacy content includes reading, writing, arithmetic, logical thinking, understanding the writings and ideas of the past, etc – all of our “traditional” curriculum. It is of course still important, but it is from a different era. Some of it (such as logical thinking) will continue to be important, but some (perhaps like Euclidean geometry) will become less so, as did Latin and Greek.” (Prensky, 4). This is more of the traditional approach. The basics. Taking it one step at a time. Prensky continues to describe the “Future” content as digital and technological. It is what “wakes up” our students of today. Move over the traditional approach of blackboards and textbooks, bring on the iPads and laptops. He further discusses that Digital Immigrants do not want to move forward and it wouldn’t make sense to have Digital Natives move backwards. Therefore, Prensky concludes with the statement that “...if Digital Immigrant educators really want to reach Digital Natives – i.e. all their students – they will have to change.”(Prensky, 6). The Digital Immigrants will succeed and will continue to succeed with the support of their administrators.
Although you are teachers of middle or high school, whereas I am an elementary school teacher, I feel that we still have the same ideas when it comes to teaching. Afterall, isn't the only different thing the topics we are learning? The use of technology is extremely important in classes whether you are 5 or 15. I remember teaching math, in my three years of experience, in a classroom that has a chalk board. My coordinator, a math teacher of 20+ years, had a smart board in her classroom. Did she use it? Unfortunately not. It was hanging on her wall as a piece of art would. The kids were bright enough to know what it is and constantly asked "why can't we use it?" What was their teacher's response? "You will learn better like this(pointing to the work she provided on the chalk board)." How could you deny children the use of technology? These kids, whether 5 or 15, are born into technology. It flows through their blood. As the terminology states, these kids are considered the D or N-Gen.
The future does represent the legacy. The legacy is in everyones system. The legacy represents the basics more than how you teach it. The future takes that legacy and incorporates it into their progressive forms of education. This is what we need to do as teachers. We need to constantly update our forms of teaching. How do we do this? By learning. Teach yourself, go to a seminar, a professional development workshop, any which way you can teach yourself take the opportunity. When you believe in teaching by the future, then your administration will have a reason to follow you.
