Surveys of the Net Geners: How Do We Know So Much about Them?

Over the past decade as the Net Geners were maturing, graduating high school and college, and entering graduate school or the workforce, they were surveyed and studied by several researchers. In fact, this generation has been scrutinized, interviewed, surveyed, poked, and prodded more than any previous generation. Their characteristics have been reported in more than 30 books and scores of articles. The research evidence upon which many of those publications were based was drawn from the following 10 surveys:
· EDUCAUSE (Fraud, 2000; Oblinger, 2008b; Oblinger & Oblinger, 2005b)
· College Students’ Perceptions of Libraries and Information Resources Survey (OnlineComputer Library Center [OCLC], 2006)
· Greenberg Millennials Study (Greenberg & Weber, 2008)
· Higher Education Research Institute (UCLA) American Freshman Survey (Pryor et al., 2009)
· National Center for Education Statistics (NCES, 2002)
· Net Generation Survey (Junco & Mastrodicasa, 2007)
· The Net Generation: A Strategic Investigation (Tapscott, 2009)
· Nielsen NetView Audience Measurement Survey (Cashmore, 2009; Ostrow, 2007)
· Pew Internet and American Life Project (Horrigan, 2006; Horrigan & Rainie, 2005)
· Technological preparedness among entering freshman (Sax, Ceja, & Terenishi, 2001)

There's plenty of reading to do on this generation of students. If you want it boiled down, keep reading my blogs. I am trying to synthesize the pertinent findings from the above sources.

COPYRIGHT © 2009 Ronald A. Berk, LLC

"Everything Is Boring!"

“School is boring. Everything is boring.” Ring a bell? You have probably heard the “b” word from your students and your own kids many times unless you have been living in a snow globe. Who hasn’t? UCLA’s Higher Education Research Institute has conducted a national survey of nearly 250,000 college freshman at more than 500 colleges and universities for the past 44 years. One of their findings is that 40+ % of the students report “they are frequently bored in class” (Pryor et al., 2009). Unless the content is on their radar screens, it’s likely to be rated “boring.” That percentage keeps climbing every year in the U.S.
Our students are not the only ones bored. A survey of 211 British university students indicated that 59% found lectures boring in at least half of their classes and 30% find most or all of their lectures boring (Mann & Robinson, 2009). The least boring methods were found in seminars, practical sessions, and group discussions, where students could interact and actively participate. The use of PowerPoint® slides was the most important factor contributing to boredom. This has prompted some educators to “teach naked,” that is, without any technology (Young, 2009). However, this “throw the baby out…” mentality doesn’t seem totally warranted.

COPYRIGHT © 2009 Ronald A. Berk, LLC