Ask HN: Is the Rising Generation More or Less Computer Literate? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Is the Rising Generation More or Less Computer Literate?

6 pointslr4444lr4 comments

I've witnessed two opposing narratives:

1) Kids today are more computer literate because they are exposed earlier to computers than ever before, which are more accessible and embedded in every day life, including in peer-reinforced activities. They intuit the common interactions, allowing them to pick up new systems quickly. For children, computers are like a new "language" which their agile minds are better suited to learn than for older people.

2) Kids today are less computer literate because the predominant uses are increasingly abstracted around humanized GUIs, and even "advanced" actions are procedurally simplified to steps that require only a basic literacy with much less an understanding of the underlying structure than you had to know in decades past to do basic things. A similar situation happened with cars: many fewer today know how to drive manual shift because automatic transmissions predominate (this might be a U.S. centric statement, but you get the drift) whereas once you had to learn in order to use a car at all.

Perhaps this question will get more anecdotes than data, but I was surprised in this day and age how hard to was to find quality studies beyond skills like "can you check your e-mail", when news cycles increasingly whip up a moral panic about automation wiping out massive numbers of jobs.

Curious to hear other (especially international) perspectives.

I talk about this all the time with my fiancé, who is head of IT for a foundation school in the UK (think, 4 to 6 year olds).

An interesting thing is your 2nd narrative (e.g. kids aren't computer literate because interfaces are so simple) has actually had a knock on effect to non computer skills.

For example, they noticed 5 years ago that childrens ability to pick up writing skills (fine motor skills with a pencil) was diminishing. At the same time, the school had purchased a bunch of tablet computers. They noticed kids could easily point a finger. And have since done a survey each year with parents to assess how many kids have tablets at home.

Year in year, the ability for children to learn to use a pencil has diminished, and the number of kids with tablets at home has increased.

In summary, simplified computer interfaces have made kids/parents lazy in developing fine motor skills and it's affected their ability to learn to write.

I think the children are good at using computers. Also, many are good at programming computers - but at a more superficial level than some children were a generation ago. A generation ago, you had to know much more to achieve the same effect, so people had either deeper knowledge or none.

At least here in Finland it has was the assumption among educators that once you give children computers, smartphones etc. they become good at using them (diginatives was the term). Kids would know how to search information from the net and it would help learning. Schools bought computers and tablets but did not increase ICT education.

Going light on teaching ICT skills backfired. Finland is now below average in computer skills for the youg and young adults.

Now it turns out that most kids don't learn to use computers unless you teach them. They can do just enough to play games and communicate with others. They don't necessarily know how to use email or search data efficiently.

A definition of computer literacy is required. That would probably go a long way in helping to answer the question.

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