Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants

When reading this article, it is a little difficult to get beyond the rather insulting tone the author takes with his generalizing statements about what digital immigrants will or won't do or learn. The statement about how difficult it is going to be for the digital learner to cope with the digital immigrant professors is surprisingly and unnecessarily negative. However, I did eventually get beyond his style of commentary and appreciate what he had to say about how digital immigrants need to change the way they educate digital natives so that maximum learning can take place. Teaching subjects by making them fun, interactive, and in game form is a great idea--but I think, based on the textbook, that students expect more than that from their classes. On the college level, students want their professors to have knowledge and passion about their subjects, teamwork, and social interaction. Therefore, the games would be part of, but not the whole, educational experience. I think that digital immigrants can certainly learn to meet the expectations of the digital native, but that natives can learn to be patient as change is taking place. And that is true even if their brains do work differently! (brains are adaptable also!)