With time at a premium these days I’m finding it more and more difficult to carve out opportunities for slow blogging, and yet research opportunities and significant works continue to emerge seemingly daily. So I’m attempting to find ways to stay on top of my never ending stream of thoughts and ideas. Today is particularly frantic, so I’m opting for a video blog post in the first instance with the intent of returning to the subject in a more considered way once time permits.
I’m in the midst of reading a white paper titled “Living and Learning with New Media: Summary of Findings from the Digital Youth Project” and have been struck by some significance of the findings of the study. The results point to a dynamic and complex ecosystem of interaction amongst young people that I believe we would do well to consider in discussions on elearning and new media – and in particular the manner with which education should seek to foster engagement and lifelong learning amidst young people.
According to the document:
“This white paper summarizes the results of a three-year ethnographic study, funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, examining young people’s participation in the new media ecology…The study was motivated by two primary research questions: How are new media being integrated into youth practices and agendas? How do these practices change the dynamics of youth-adult negotiations over literacy, learning, and authoritative knowledge?”
In reading the 58-page paper I’ve found myself continuously struck by the levels of engagement, depth and complexity that occur amidst young people in the absence of interference from formal organisations. The paper highlights a few key areas of participation amidst digital youths, characterised by both “friendship-driven” and “interest-driven” networks, and “genres of participation” that range from the largely social “hanging around”, to the more interest-driven “messing around” to the extremely engaged “geeking out.”
In particular, the by-products and examples of “geeking out” cited in the paper draw into question some of the criticisms of open-ended experimentation as “a waste of time.” It may be the case that such organically developing exploration does not fit neatly within time-sensitive curricula, however the results of several of the examples in the document are nonetheless very tangible, very significant learning outcomes.
The paper can be downloaded in PDF form from: http://digitalyouth.ischool.berkeley.edu/
