Week 8- Article 2

Article 2- This article is from the British Journal of Education Technology and was written in 2008. The article discusses the debate of 'digital natives', and looks at other theorists views on the digital divide. I find it hard to criticise this particular article as I found myself agreeing with many of the points raised. For example the issue of what a digital native actually means, some had said that "Young people of the digital native generation possess sophisticated knowledge of technologies, and also that their learning differs from other generations", this article points out that there is little evidence to prove this. It does however question whether education is currently equipped to meet the needs of these digital natives, which I disagree with. This point presents the idea that digital natives (reliant on the Internet) need new forms of learning processes perhaps with the use of technology, however it is clear that traditional teaching methods are still effective and I do not think these need to change in order to "meet the needs of digital natives". If anything I think we are too reliant on technology in teaching for example, when a PowerPoint does not work in a lecture the lecturer cannot always function without this aid, what happened to good old fashioned teaching??!!