Examples from Today's newspaper- The world of our digital natives

I am back from vacation and now entering the stress full preparation for the opening of School Aug 29 ( teachers are back on the 20th). I am still in the process of synthesizing what I have learned this summer and finding a way to translate this into something the teachers can grab on to and run with….

This morning when I was reading the paper I was immediately struck by two more examples of how our students view of the world is different than their teachers. In the Buisiness section of the “Daily News” (Los Angeles) there is an article about the changes in TV viewing. What caught my attention was the following quote about Chris Anderson the editor of Wired magazine. ( Bold is mine)

“Chris Anderson’s children don’t know what a channel is. (He) uses computers to record TV shows the same way a TiVo does. His kids can search for their favorite shows..and when they see a show listing on the computer... the only way they know what channel it has ever been on is if they have little logos or signage superimposed on the show.”

Part of the point of the article is that TV schedules no longer matter. And so again we see how different the world of the digital native is … ( I suspect that the ubiquitous availability of programming may also play a role in our flat world)

The other morning article that caught my attention is an example of the half life of knowledge. How many planets are there in the solar system???? 9 this week and probably 12 next week (with an official ruling due). This has also caused a us to consider the definition of a planet. Hmmmm