Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants

After reading the article I found that the digital natives are those that grew up with technology like video games, cell phones, computers. They have more knowledge about how these things work and why. They also are used to learning with them. The digital immigrants are those that were raised with out technology and are used to learning from trial and error, books, and imagination. This is affecting how students learn now because the ones teaching them are the digital immigrants. They are having a hard time adjusting to the new age of technology.  They want the kids to learn their way, using books for research and not the computer. Now, we have the technology that lets us search at our finger tips.

For me I fall in the middle of these two categories. I was born with no technology but radio and tv, along with the Atari game system. But the technology was not as advance as it is now. I did not have my first computer till I was about 11, so that meant book reports or research projects were done at the library. It has affect my learning in a good way I believe because I have more ways to figure out different problems. I think that my kids though are missing out on the beauty of having no computer and figuring things out with trial and error.

They say that thinking patterns have changed. For Instance, writing arithmetic and logical thinking are Ideas of the past. Having this knowledge is not bad but needs to be translated to more modern times. Adapting materials to the language of the digital natives. They say that math is another example where calculators are to be used, but they should be teaching how they should be used. Or even better when they should be used.

For this course I would say it is doing a great job of implementing technology to the course work, I think that having auditable text books would be great, that way we could listen while we are doing other things and still have time to study and do what is needed for this class.

Relationships and Communication

I am going to share the relationship with my friend . We started our friendship back in 2016 during the campaign season. I was helping my husband with the campaign he was managing and she was running for a position. We quickly became a working relationship, helping each other out with the campaigns. Now, looking at this through the Knapp's Relational Model for Coming Together you see that we were in the initiating stage. This begins with finding what we have in common, campaign season and responsiveness, if we were not able to respond we would quickly tell the other person. I think you can look at it like, this is the person you are considering being friends with, what things do you have in common? Are they willing to respond to you? Are they receptive. 

We kept in close contact through the campaign, scheduling door-belling together and coffee, getting to know each other more on a personal level than that of a working relationship. We talked about our husbands, kids and animals at home. Self-disclosed our lives in short. I would not say that it was too much information but it was enough for the other to get an understanding of who you are and what kind of person you are. By the end of the campaign season we invited her over for a party at our house, now is where our relationship turned from working friends to friends. We hung out together and she even stayed over at the house. Our personal relationship was intensifying. 

After this night we began to hang out more and text more. Amy and I are still friends to this day. We live in different cities but we get together as much as possible. Our relationship is in the bonding stage and I think it will stay there for a long while. We have not yet had an argument or any part of the stages of coming apart. So for now I would say we are bonding and that stage can last for a long while. I do know if we do not see eye to eye, we will talk about it but I think we would both work hard for it not to fall apart and keep our friendship. 

At first we communicated through Facebook, that was the easiest point of contact for her since she was running her own campaign. I would message on there a date that we could go doorbelling together and what location. Soon it turned in to asking how she was and what were her plans for the following weekend. The Online communication did cut out the awkward silences, and made it easier to plan our events together. Even now, we hardly communicate by talking on the phone or even in person. We use text messages, even adding in lighter forms of communication with emoticons and GIF's. 

Self-disclosure

According to our text self-disclosure is the process of making intentional relationships about yourself that other people may not know and that is including private, sensitive, or even confidential information. (pg 42.) Now that there is a background to what that means, why do we share this information online, to others we do not know. When we share this information online we are sharing information about our personal lives to people we call our friends on the internet. When we do this, it could be used against us like the story of Megan Meier who took her own life because a social media “friend” stated she was not good enough for anybody and used her life and updates against her to make her feel like she was not good enough. They used the personal information, or private information and made her feel like she was not enough. This is a bad side to sharing too much information on the internet.

There are also self-discloser information that some may feel like it is okay to post online, for instance in the story Are We Sharing too Much Online? There is a person that posted his cancer diagnosis on Facebook. The comments that he received about his treatments were uplifting and helped him and others. It even helped him fight cancer harder. Posting about deaths in the family can also make you feel comforted because you get the responses like Oh I am so sorry, or we are praying for you. For instance, I recently lost my grandfather on Easter, I posted it on my Facebook, not because I wanted comments or posts it was to share with far away family members. But by doing this I did get a lot more comments stating they are sorry and they were here for me if needed. It was nice to hear, even when that was not the purpose of the post.

There are two sides to everything the good and the bad, the dark and the light. It is more about moderation, know how to safely put information on social media sites that do not put you or your family at risk for scams or bullying. In our text book it states that you can “Improve your interpersonal Communication Behaviors” (pg. 49). “By being aware of the role perception plays in relationships…. provide clear verbal and non-verbal cues”. By using these two steps online it will help you in a big way.  

When we are online we tend to feel more comfortable talking to others because we are behind a computer, that is when we share too much information. Be discrete in the information you are offering online. So be clear and make sure you think about what the internet will know about you after you press post. When I post online, I try to keep information about where I am at to myself. I do not post about my health usually, no financial problems.

Social Networking and Communication

Social networking sites can distort reality that we are in, at times most people post information that makes them look good so they would get praises and comments that would make them feel better. Even though it stimulates your self esteem it could be worse. It brings bullies out, ones that will make fun of a photo that you post or how you may look, so not only you get the nice comments but their are the ones that disappoint you too.

According to an article on CNN, Facebook helps your self-esteem, it states "A new study suggests that spending time with the online you--the one with hundreds of friends, the witty status updates and all the unflattering photos untagged-- might help your self-esteem". In addition to that it continues to state that it shows the best side of you, so when you are feeling down you can pop on and post a cute pictures and it can bring up your self esteem. 

Which proves that when you post online on social media, you are bringing out the best side of you but hiding who you are the other parts of the time. Giving you a false pride. Even though the article states that Facebook is good and can provide a good sense of self esteem. In my opinion it can also give you false rise in your self esteem that will deplete after your off of Facebook.

An ideal number of friends or connections, I would say that is up to the individual, for me I keep it to those who are family and friends, I use discretion when choosing who can become my friends on Facebook. When someone is a bully to me or anyone else I will delete them off, personal preference for me is not to have negative news feed on Facebook. Having too many friends or just adding everyone who requests to do so, could bring your self esteem up but then when they lose their interest your self esteem would not be on their mind. 

Cited Sources:

Gross, Doug. “Study: Facebook Helps Your Self-Esteem.” CNN, Cable News Network, 1 Mar. 2011, www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/social.media/03/01/facebook.self.esteem/index.html.