Lesson 6: Preferences of the Technology Generation

            Contents: In the field of education, it is important that critical differences in perceptions between old and young which create a generation gap should be taken into account:

	OLD GENERATION	YOUNG GENERATION
Single and multi-track activity patterns	Slow and single-track pattern of activities.	Exposed to a quick flicking video games, mobile phone texting and socializing through the web sites, etc. They are multi-track pattern of activities
Texts versus Visuals	They read books, went to library to do research and borrowed needed books.	They have greater affinity to visuals.
Linear versus Hyper Media	They obtained information in a linear, logical and sequential manner. It made them more logical, focused and reflective thinkers.	They follow a personal random access to hyper linked digital information, less superior to elders in focus and reflection. They easily get distracted and bored during classes.
Independent versus Social learners	Educational system gives priority to independent learning, prior to participative work.	They are acquainted with digital tools that adopt to both personal and participative work.it is based on experimentation, discovery and intuition.
Learning to do versus Learning to pass the test	Old teachers teach students in order to help them past tests and complete the course requirement.	Learners wish to acquire skills, knowledge and habits as windows of opportunity afford them to learn.
Delayed rewards versus instant gratification	Educational system consists of grades, honor certificates/diplomas. Including jobs and unclear rewards for performance.	Immediate gratification through immediate scores from games, enjoyable conversation from webcam calls.
Rote memory versus Fun learning	Content-based courses and measured by standard-tests.	Fun learning which is relevant and instantaneously useful to them.

      I love to read books. I like to read e-books. I prefer to converse with other people personally than talking to them in phones, e-mails and Facebook because I can personally see with my two eyes how they feel and their facial expression upon talking. I like the traditional way of teaching-learning. I love the new one. Well, everything has changed. But sometimes, technology gave me a hard time completing tasks at school because of the limited internet café. With just one click, everything is serve. You don’t really need to exert much effort in everything you because technology is there to do all the task.

            From the table, we can see the shift of preferences from the old generation to the new. It is really easy to identify the distinct characteristics of the two generations. Upon knowing all these different preferences, I realized that I still have so much to learn when it comes to integrating technology to instruction and to the learners of the new generation. There are a lot of things to consider especially on the side of the learners since they are the most affected in the development of technology in education. Technology has brought both positive and negative changes on the educational system. With the negative changes, we can still do something about it like, fully accepting technology as the new avenue to instruction, understanding our students and being on our best capability in order to address the needs of the learners in this new generation.

            With the information above, there is really a need to vary our teaching strategies that is appropriate to the learning styles of the students. Traditional way is more effective if will try to integrate educational technology in our instruction.