How 21st Century Children Learn

By Clyde James

Rapid social and economic changes are forcing modern societies to find ways to cope simultaneously with economic competition on a global scale, the demand for competencies in the population, the provision of health and well being across the population, and the maintenance of the social fabric for nurturing, socializing and educating the next generation.

Changes in the means of communication have influenced cognitive activity significantly - how we think, what we know and how we learn. The impact of the advances with that of the industrial revolution has transformed the social organization of industrial societies. There is a reciprocal relationship between technological change and social transformation. Technological development creates the need for changes in the way society functions and these in turn influence technological innovations. 21st CENTURY- instantaneous global communication, unlimited knowledge storage and retrieval, sophisticated technologies for data analysis and simulation, artificial intelligence - learning society or a knowledge-driven society...

Factors that are affecting Modern Societies:

  • Technological developments and social transformation.
  • The nature of educational institutions.
  • The shifting understanding of the nature of human development (Keating '96).

Education is fundamental to the success of any modern society. A society's ability to foster new skills, new concepts and new patterns of learning depends on its ability to renew educational institutions and practices... The Rapidity of human development and the development of human societies is explained taking the 100,000 years as the time lapse for the emergence of fully modern humans as 1 year- in November we moved into small urban centers on old years day we started the industrial revolution and only a few minutes ago we launched experiments in instant global communication, information technology and multicultural metropolitan communities.

Revolutionary periods in human development (social transformations)

  • AGRARIAN - agriculture
  • INDUSTRIAL - manufacturing
  • TECHNOLOGICAL - information and communication / knowledge

Modes of teaching and learning evolve in response to major social and technological changes. Example - the rise of book learning over apprenticeship. From Agriculture to manufacturing (labour intensive). Literacy and numerical skills were rare in agrarian and industrial, but have increased in affluent modern societies.

Major transformations affecting human society

  • Language and complex social communication (100-50K years BP)
  • Intertribal communication and cultural exchange (40K years BP)
  • The agricultural revolution and settled urban civilizations (10K years BP)
  • The industrial revolution (0.5 to 0.1K years BP) from steam to electrical
  • The Digital revolution (NOW!)

20th Century Children as Students

  • Classrooms - rows of desks facing teacher
  • Teachers - give information
  • Passive - sat for most of the time read more text
  • Listened more than spoke
  • Curricular and instructional practices were set in transformation mode.

The physical setting was conducive to the passing on of information via teacher or the textbook.

20th Century Students

  • Accepted what was taught.
  • Regurgitated Information on request.
  • Learning-rote, passive
  • Accepted whatever knowledge that was handed down to them without much questioning.

They sat in class - the teacher taught - they listened - they went home and studied. They regurgitated the information in much the same way as it was given to them. Students were given many exercises. Repetition was the way for them to learn a skill. Practice without any connection to the real world.

21st Century Children Do we know them?

Typical elements of change:

  • language
  • styles
  • clothes
  • body adornments

We always say "Hmmmmm that couldn't happen in my day". They speak differently. Cool, Sometimes We swear we are on Venue or Mars. They dress differently - half-naked or half clothed- which one. They live in Jeans, preferably ones torn at the knees. That's Cool Check out the tattoos, ankle chains and strange looking stuff. Girls cut off all the hair at their temple and the boys growing theirs. Boys wearing two earrings.

Thinking and Learning -- 21st Century Children are outstandingly and fundamentally different. It happened like an earthquake. No warning. Shook up everything. We get warnings from Hurricanes, they happen we go back to our lives. There is no going back on this one. The change is too drastic. Life will never be the same again.

What is causing this difference? The continuing development and rapid dissemination of digital technology which began in the last decades of the twentieth century.

21ST Century Children -- Today's students represent the first generations to grow up with this new technology. Today's students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach.

Commonplace features of modern living computers video games digital music players video cams cell phones TV Graphics (vs words) Colour (vs black and white) computer games e-mail the internet instant messaging Virtual communities Virtual classrooms etc, etc.

They have spent their entire lives surrounded by and using technology, computers, etc. are integral parts of their lives.

Some evidence from research Today's average college graduate has spent fewer than 5,000 hours reading. BUT OVER 10,000 hours playing video games, AND NOT TO MENTION 20,000 hours watching TV. Our children today are being socialized in a way that is vastly different from their parents.

The numbers are over-whelming:

  • Over 200,000 emails and instant messages sent and received.
  • 10,000 hours talking on digital cell phones.
  • Over 500,000 commercials seen all before leaving college.

The fundamental effect of digital technology How the brain gets wired for learning!!

It is very likely that our students' brains have physically changed -- and are different from ours - The old idea that we have a fixed number of brain cells that die off by one by one has been replaced by research showing that our supply of brain cells is replenished constantly. The brain constantly reorganizes itself all our child and adult lives, a phenomenon technically known as neuroplasticity.

Today's Students Process Information Differently

It is now clear that, as a result of this environment which exists everywhere and the sheer volume of their integration with it, today's students think and process information fundamentally differently from their predecessors. These differences go far and deeper than most educators suspect or realize.

"Different kinds of experiences lead to different brain structures."

WE CAN SAY WITH CERTAINTY THAT THINKING PATTERNS HAVE CHANGED. Learning is the laying down of neural networks as a result of Inter-cell impulse transmissions in the brain. Persistent processing of digital information establishes a blueprint for learning that is based on images and visual (sight) impulses rather than words or verbal (sound) impulses.

"Linear thought processes that dominate education systems now can actually retard learning for brains developed through game and Web-surfing processes on the computer." Marc Prensky

Today's Students are a "new" specie

They were born into the digital world.

Today's Students are The Net Generation or the N - gen. The Digital Generation or the D - gen. Some refer to them as the N-(for Net)-gen. The Net Generation. D-(for digital)-gen - Digital Generation.

Digital Natives

Today's children are native "speakers" of the digital language of technology.

Marc Prensky calls them Digital Natives. Our students today are all "native speakers" of the digital language of computers, video games and the Internet.

Digital Natives think differently - develop Hypertext minds, Click of a mouse, Touch of a button. Children raised in today's world think differently from the rest of us. They develop hypertext minds.

Digital Natives want everything "now", Multi-task, seem to have parallel cognitive structures, network. They thrive in "mess". It's as though their cognitive structures were parallel, not sequential... Technology has made it possible for them to work anywhere. Factors that will promote learning - Visual/imagery, Projects, Responsibility for learning. We need to teach them visually - images and actions. Assign them group projects with clear instructions - multi-tasks, parallel learning; problem solving. They must be made responsible for their Learning - learning is personal response, intrinsic to learner..

To which group do you belong? Digital Natives? Digital Immigrants? or Digital Aliens?

About the Author:

Teacher with over 29 years experienced. Married with wife and Three Children This article speaks to each parent who has child/children attending school..

Article courtesy of www.goarticles.com.