Blog #1

Computers are an important part of the educational experience because they present the student with a means of being constantly able to interact with and receive feedback from their instructor. Also computers provide the student with an almost limitless access to important data for research and studying. I agree that it will have some negative effects on students such as their ability to properly spell words. Furthermore, they might have trouble learning new vocabulary because they feel that they can always just look a word up. However, this can be avoided by assigning work using paper rather than the computer. 

The ISTE standards are very helpful to get all students on track and make sure that they have certain skills to survive in this digital age. One of the standards that I found interesting was the one about Digital Citizenship. It stated that, "Students understand human, cultural, and societal issues related to technology and practice legal and ethical behavior". This standard is particularly important because it acts as a safeguard against cyber-bullying and teaches students to be responsible for what they put online. I think that the Technology operations and concepts standard falls out of my current skill set because I don't know everything about operating certain functions of a computer so I would need to develop my skills before attempting to help someone else.

I do not agree that the term digital native should be used to label my entire generation. Not only are there economical factors that lead to differences in technological proficiency, but there are individual factors that contribute to whether a person is digitally experienced. However, I think that it is easier to use technology as a digital native because it becomes almost second nature. For digital immigrants they often times have to put in more effort to acquire some of the same skills, but I think that most teachers do a good job of adapting to new technological skills. I think that my future students will definitely be more proficient than me but I will just have to work harder to reach a level to where I could equal or surpass them.