Digital Natives

  The line from the Part I article that resonated with me most was "Today’s students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach." What good is a system that doesn't meet the needs of its target population? I believe this singularity has been perpetuated because we are in a unique, short-lived window of time where the student were born into technology but the teachers were not. In this way, students are ahead of teachers in the technology curve- and in how they experience the world around them. I don't know a single teenager today who goes out of his/her way to read a print newspaper, but I know plenty of adults who insist upon obtaining their news in this way. 50 years from now, all teachers will also have been born into technology, and will thereby be instilled with the same technological upbringing- even if they are behind the latest app trend-- they will at least be on the same mental page. So we are in a interesting, but finite, period of time where we must push ourselves as Digital Immigrant educators to meet our Digital Native students on their level.  This does not mean that since this time will run out that we can simple do nothing and wait for it to end- we have an obligation to our students, no matter our differences.
  The parts that I disagree with is that as a general rule someone who is a Digital Immigrant is not failing to reach his/her students. I know many Digital Immigrant teachers who are more into technology like Spotify or Twitter than I am. It is about being aware of the differences between us and our Digital Native students and doing something about it that makes all the difference. 
  With regards to the second, Part II, article. I absolutely believe that brains are continuously molded and rewired by our experiences- from Depression to TV to drug use to being raised as an only child. All these things shape the way we look at the world. Therefore, no two students are alike, or have ever been alike. What has changed is the rate at which students' minds are affected- we are bombarded with media and more experiences earlier in our lives than we used to be. This can only serve to make understanding and continuing to meet the needs of a developing young adult harder and harder.