Are they really digital natives?

I am starting to wonder how many of my kids are really "digital natives." It seems to me that an awful lot of them really don't know what's on the Internet (besides myspace) and they don't really know how to transfer skills in one program or website to another. My kids were totally confused by blogger. Is this normal? I sort of overestimated their ability to figure out how to use a site because I thought they'd spent their lives on the computer so.... I'm just curious. Is this something the rest of you see often? Kids who fit into that "digital native" category, but really aren't digitally native? I'm almost wondering if it's something adults are pushing onto the kids because we can see what's out there to use. Thoughts?

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Permalink Reply by Tom Liam Lynch on December 12, 2008 at 6:34pm

That word "assumptions" has come up a few times in a few posts. I think it's the right one, too. Adults sometimes mistake, in my mind, students lack of intimidation for excess of knowledge and skills. I don't think this is the case at all. No more than a student's ability to read and write conveys their deftness at literary analysis. While the former is necessary for the latter, it would be naive to mistake the two. This is why new literacies deserve their own place in schools' curricula, not simply relegated to the periphery, but infused into pedagogy.
- TLL