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After indulging in this week’s reading “It’s Not Minisformation. It’s Amplified Propaganda”, I become aware of the impact social media has in shaping others’ learning, misinformation or not. I must owe my “wow” to the unfamiliar terminology utilized in the text referred to as “ampliganda.” To my discovery, I later realized it was used as a tern to describe the shaping of society’s perception through amplification. Owing to the extensive amount of time, I indulge in the true riches of social media, going forward I will be more cautious in what I decided to flood my brain with and the information I consume. As previously discussed by my fellow classmate Mia, I also wonder if the act of sharing or reposting would be considered a propaganda act. I’m curious to see if in the foreseeable future there will be restrictions or solutions to counteract the effect of and instead uplift the powerful, just voices on social media.

This week’s assigned reading and video flooded my body with emotions. Growing up, I really struggled with school. Having naturally excelled in other pursuits, I was left feeling discouraged and dreaded the thought of returning to school. I remember the exact day (November, 5th), just shortly after the school year began when I was asked to stay behind after the dismissal bell rang. I, along with two other international students was handed a letter, which I was firmly instructed to give to my parents. After being questioned by my friends, who waited outside the door, I felt pressured to open the envelope. Inside read, “Tianna’s progress in the fourth grade is of concern, and we’re hoping to receive your parental support to enroll her in an education assistance program.” To date, I can still remember that exact feeling, watching the shocked reaction made by my friends. My heart dropped, my face went beet red, and the strength it took to hold back my tears was incomparable. The negative stigma associated with these programs, made me feel hopeless as I knew I couldn’t face the criticism made of by my peers. However, the following school year, I was enrolled in grade 5 with a teacher named “Ms. Magic”, and let me tell you, she was truly magic in her ways to ensure every student felt worthy, supported and destined for greatness. To date, I owe my current academic standing to her, for she gave me the courage, self-worth and motivation to tackle my educational barriers head-on. She felt no need to separate me from my classmates or supply me with simpler material, instead, she played to my strong suits, giving me the confidence to work at my weak points. More teachers should learn the techniques utilized by my grade five teachers who was able to achieve the best outcome for me, in the not so easy circumstances. I don’t agree with the current structure set out in schools, by isolating children with educational disabilities from their classmates. By continuing this approach, we are facilitating a “them vs us” dynamic. I must owe the “wow” moment to Shelley Moore, for standing up to shortcomings in educational instruction for those living with learning disabilities. Furthermore, after indulging in “Shelly Moores: Transforming Inclusive Education” video, I wonder if her bowling analogy will help to create conversation and discussion amongst teachers, to empower teachers alike the education to providing solutions suitable and inclusive to all.

In my showcase post, I will be elaborating and providing further insight into the “Wow and Wonder” I constructed in week 4, in an attempt to further my understanding of the prevalence of inequality that surfaces in the media to date.

In the article “Visitors and Residents: A new typology for online engagement” it showcases a new continuum of ‘visitors’ and ‘residents’ in place of Marc Prensky’s digital ‘natives’ and ‘immigrants’. Through analyzing the critiques of Prensky’s typology, I was quickly made aware of the far from suitable language utilized, demanding the action of other academics to dismantle the current distinction of digital users. Prensky refers to ‘digital natives’ as students who are all “native speakers” in the digital language found in computers, phones and Ipad’s (White & Cornu, 2011). Though his “theory”, does not align with the actions of the entirety of our population. For the reason that, regardless of age, some individuals choose to forego their cellular device and refrain from daily digital use. A women named Rachelle, a student at Royal Roads University refutes the theory constructed by Prensky, explaining that “[her] son is not computer literate, and he has no passion for being apart of social or professional digital platforms (Rachelle, 2018). However, according to Prensky’s theory, her son should be well versed in digital networks and be classified as a “digital native” owing to his age. However, this is simply not the case for her son, and for many globally.

I must owe the “wow” factor I experienced to my complete utter shock, that one could confidently divide users in the digital world into two categories, according to their age.  Not only does Prensky fail to recognize the issue behind using the term “digital native” and “digital immigrants” but he is also notorious for casting generalized presumptions determined by age, focussing solely on the technologically adept youth.  However, it should be noted that amidst a global pandemic, when online learning was the seemingly only option, teachers and students were forced to shift to distanced learning. With that being said, less than 10% of K-12 students had experience with or acquired the proper technological skills to successfully adapt to a new learning network (Yan et al., 2021). This lead to many students feeling overwhelmed and dissatisfied with their grades. More importantly, it proves that one’s age doesn’t translate to one’s technological capabilities, referring to the inconsistency in the ‘digital native’ defined by Prensky. To my disbelief, Prenski gave further proof of his ageist and ableist beliefs, through directly labelling the elderly population as “handicapped learners”(White & Cornu, 2011). It was quite relieving to hear the critiques made by academics alike, to devalue the pertinent of this dichotomy. The alternate continuum created to replace ‘digital natives and immigrants’ with ‘visitors and residents’ allows for both children and adults to consume a vistor or resident technological identity, regardless of age. In addition, it positively addresses the freedom one has to transition from a visitor to a resident over their lifetime, by making use of the the innumerable instructional resources found online. 

Furthermore, it is with curiosity that I,  as well as Mia (a member of my learning pod) wonder how might Prensky respond to the criticism made by others academics in regards to his strong voice, confidence and beliefs that contributed to his illustration of the entire populations engagement in the web. Mia further notes that “It is ironic how Prensky argues that older folks were socialized differently than younger ones in relation to technical proficiency, since the nature of how Prensky was socialized may have given him ageist conscious or unconscious biases.” I thought this argument made by my classmate was especially powerful, for the majority of critiques stem from Prensky’s pre-existing biases. Additionally, I wonder what his main objection (if any) would be to the new proposed continuum ‘vistors’ and ‘residents’. 

One of my fellow classmates, Emily Lehoux bravely added to this discussion, sharing her personal experience reading through Prensky’s typology. Being that she comes from mixed K’omoks and settler, she was able to provide me with direct insight to the offence, anger and shock she was faced as a person of indigenous herritage. It’s saddening to hear that to date, despite our attempt to reconcile with the original inhabiters of our land, we still continuously make strikes leading to indigenous individuals feeling isolated or less than. Though I am far from able to speak on behalf of the indigenous community, I do understand the impact our actions and words hold, allowing me to be a more vigilant character in my future academic career.  

With all this being said, the much critized typology outlined by Prensky proves there is value to showing these kind of articles to students, in an attempt to further the conversation and discuss apparent biases and prejudices amongst many well-educated professionals. 

After soaring the world wide web, I came across this photograph of what looks like an elderly man and his grandson, sitting on a couch with eyes intently viewing the screen of a lap top. The displayed photo is yet another attempt to prove age does not classify one’s technological adaptability or capability. 

References:

Rachelle. 2018. “The Role That Technology Plays In My Life: The Visitors and Residents Typology Map”. Royal Roads University. Malat WebSpace.

White, D. S., & Cornu, A. L. (2011). “Visitors and Residents: A new typology for online engagement“. First Monday.

Yan, L., Whitelock-Wainwright, A., Guan, Q., Wen, G., Gašević, D., & Chen, G. (2021, May 4). “Students’ experience of online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic: A province-wide survey study“. British journal of educational technology : journal of the Council for Educational Technology.

This week’s article truly owned mine, as well as some of my other fellow classmates’ eyes to the dominating existence of inequality that surfaces on the internet. I must owe my “wow”, to the definitions brought forth by Prensky as he structured his definition of users on the internet into two categories. He first seeks to label the elder population as handicapped learners, who often result to the internet as a secondary solution as opposed to first. Prensky follows by defining digital natives, as students today that are “native” to the language of continually advancing computers, videos games and the internet. It’s quite relieving to hear the criticism made by other authors, to devalue the pertinent of this dichotomy. I “wonder” how Prensky would respond to the criticism drawn from his ideology of utilizing digital natives and digital immigrants to group the entire populations’ engagement in the web? Further, I’m curious what his main objection would be to the new proposed continuum “visitors” and “residents”.

This week, the Siemens article “Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age”, really stood out to me. I must owe the “wow” factor I experienced to an unfamiliar term I read referred to as the “half-life of knowledge”. To my discovery, I learned it refers to a particular time span from where the knowledge was first learned to it becoming obsolete. According to the American Society of Training and Documentation, within the last 10 years, our knowledge has doubled, and is continuously doubling every 18 months! One of the learning trends showed that “many learners will move into a variety of different, possibly unrelated work fields over the course of their lifetime”. This truly made me wonder, why is it that now more than ever, individuals are changing their careers? I wonder if one of the significant reasons that individuals are more likely to change their work-fields multiple times throughout their life span is due to technological advancement. For example, companies are being more enticed to replace human workers with robots, for the reason they are cheaper, can work 24/7, and make fewer errors. The transportation industry (taxi & bus drivers) is currently one of the most vulnerable professions, owing to the new technology of self-driving vehicles. For that reason, millions of vehicle operators will be left jobless in the foreseeable future and forced to retrain and search for a new occupation. In relating back to the article, this example is proof of the importance of continual education, especially when job security is becoming far more uncertain.