Digitalise this!

It is interesting to see how Prensky (2011) reflects on his earlier writing from 2001. He addresses critics of his earlier concepts and develops a new idea of Digital Wisdom ("Digital Wisdom and Homo Sapiens Digital", 2011) . He made a distinction between Digital Immigrants and Digital Natives, describing the former as those who "adapt to their environment, but always retain, to some degree, their "accent", that is their foot in the past." (Prensky, 2001). For the metaphors "natives", "immigrant" and "accent" he was praised by some and criticised by others.  Prensky (2011) agrees that being a Digital Native is not so much about capabilities or knowledge of digital stuff. Whether you were born in 1984 or in 2004, these things need to be learnt in one way or another. The distinction, he claims further, is more about culture. It is about younger generation being comfortable with using digital technology. It is about the fact th

According to Blake (2008), "there are four misconceptions when the word technology  is mentioned in circles." The first one that he mentions is that technology is viewed as a monolithic concept, i.e. is either all good or all bad. As language teachers, we are mostly end users of the tools offered (unless of course somebody is a web designer or a programming whiz), and personally I do not see these tools as inherently good or bad. What decides about their usefulness (or otherwise) is the purpose for which they are used and the way we use them. If we do it for the "wow" effect, then there is a danger of a failed learning outcome. So it is up to us educators to choose a tool which is the most suitable for our students to facilitate their learning. We should decide what to use it for and in what capacity. We must not overlook the role that our students play in this equation. They need to be presented with the possibilities of what is "out there" and given cho

I cannot honestly say that there is only one driver for technology enhanced learning or that it is always the same driver. It is more of a flexible notion that keeps changing from semester to semester, if not from class to class. It definitely started as curiosity, and I must say I am still fascinated by new discoveries I make almost daily through web surfing. Does it always work? Of course not. I get frustrated when students cannot accomplish a task because the internet suddenly went down. But as teachers, we are/should be always equipped with plan B. So, curiosity was the first step. It soon turned into necessity . My students need a lot of feedback on their writing which I cannot always do in class or even during my office hours due to the lack of time and busy schedule. I decided to try Google Docs and multiple add-ons. From that I moved to Google Forms as the way of testing their reading skills and revising vocabulary. Here the driver was sustainability . Instead of using large a