Educating Students in the Digital Age

Soon, in just a couple of years’ time, the average student who arrives to our universities will belong to the generation whose very first gasp for oxygen in this world, would have been made visible to the online world to see and have an opinion about. Social media has completely revolutionized the way its regular users perceive and make sense of their surrounding and of themselves; it is common now to see individuals who are more concerned with life as it happens on the screen of their mobile phones than what is going on in the place where they are physically sitting, walking or standing.

It is easy for us to conclude that these people are born knowing how the world operates from day one.”

But although for us, the generation who was not born with an electronic device stuck in the palm of our hand, all this may sometimes appear like the end of the humanity as we know it, for them, the new generation, born in the area of endless communication, is a simple and normal way of life. And as we observe them taking over our place, these technological advances we now regard as “revolutions”, will become just what they are for our younger generations: taken-for-granted, everyday life.

In this scenario, we, educators, are faced with exhilarating, but challenging paradigms. The excitement many of us experience thinking about the numberless pedagogic possibilities opened by the abundance of resources and information available on the internet can, at the same time, stimulate our teaching creativity, and make us seriously question whether or not we have a role to play in the field of education at all: When we witness the speed and ease with which our students make use of the resources they have, it is easy for us to conclude that these people are born knowing how the world operates from day one. Some have gone as far as predicting that universities (and all forms of schooling) will one day disappear altogether and be replaced by virtual learning. And they may.

In this respect, we may be led to believe that the student survival guides available from YouTube, the plethora of websites devoted to different aspects of study abroad and the ever-growing number of blogs and Facebook groups dedicated to share experiences, hints and tips for those embarking on schemes of this nature means students do not require any more help. But ironically, communication, the same system that is empowering our young people to that extent, is also allowing us to assess their changing needs and to learn the new roles educators can play in all this.

Anyone who has taken the time to have a long conversation with their students, whether it is by email, discussion forums, or my preferred one, a face-to-face chat at the good old university café will soon be reminded of the reason why the human species undergoes one of the longest childhoods in the natural world: because minds take time to develop, time and experience, and confusion, and attainment, and fear, and joy, and error…  Our university students, bright and resourceful as they can be, are minds in development who do not hesitate to reply that it is “structure”, “motivation” and “some guidance” to learn how to make sense of what they often regard as “too much information”, what they regard as the most welcomed and valuable contribution from us, their tutors or better said, facilitators, to their university life.