Digital natives and identity development: What does this mean for parents and educators?

When it comes to the digital world, there is far more to consider than screen-time. Like it or not, digital tools are indelible parts of the physical landscape, and this has implications for our relationships with technology. Developmentally, teachers have a learning curve in terms of how to think about technology in classrooms. Culturally, parents and teachers a like have a learning curve in terms of thinking about how to best prepare today’s youth for tomorrow’s workforce. If we want to see equitable distribution of women and men in the STEM workforce, what do we do, and when do we do it?

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To develop their essays, students responded to one of the following prompts:

Kids today are digital natives who thrive on-line, right?

To increase female represent in STEM fields, all we need to is encourage girls to call themselves scientists, right?