What do you make of the (divergent) positions of Spiegel and Prensky? What do you hear each of them saying about who youth are? Where do you stand on the “digital native” terminology?
Prensky started an important conversation with his work understanding youth and technology, but I think that later scholars' contributions, like Spiegel, clarify his beginnings. First, Prensky's nomenclature of "digital native" and "digital immigrant" is not necessarily apt. Assuming peoples' skills and interests based on when they were born is a fundamentally incorrect evaluation of them and misses the point. Spiegel argues that there are a variety of learners, young and old, whose online interactions are varied and may actually require different names as a result. She offers other scholars' contributions like "digital gamer" and "digital creator," and her own "digital socialites" to explain the reasons in which people use the Internet. Each sphere is predicated on a different set of motivations and skills insofar as a "digital gamer" is interacting entirely differently than a "digital socialite," who is using the online space primarily to communicate. To follow Prensky's thinking and assume that all young people are "digital natives," or people who are entirely comfortable and adept with the online sphere is thus incorrect. Especially in the context of schools. If students are gaming, creating content, and/or communicating via online platforms with friends, they might not automatically know how to use the digital space in a way that is conducive to school. Their age does not automatically mean that they know every facet of the digital space. The terminology "digital native" implies this, therefore I disagree with it and follow Spiegel's thinking more. I think that Prensky's view of youth is narrow and not inclusive of a variety of learners from a variety of backgrounds, whereas Spiegel begins to consider these things. For example, some students may not have access to Internet outside of school, so becoming a "digital native" would be pretty difficult. Even further, I completely agree with Spiegel's observation that the "digital native" and "digital immigrant" conversation creates a moment in which educators "acquiesce to [students'] interests and encourage them to communicate in the only way they know how to instead of asking them to try other modes or use other platforms," (p. 13). This is not preparing students for the real world, and is only hurting them in an effort to engage them better. Spiegel offers a variety of ways to instead engage learners, that applies to each variety of young learner online. Lastly, I believe that Spiegel's terminology trumps Prensky's because of the usage of words like "native" and "immigrant." In Prensky's argument, teachers as "digital immigrants" need to assimilate to their students' world by using their language, appealing to their interests, etc. This rhetoric is harmful because it reinforces that immigrants must assimilate to the natives of that space.
