iTeacher

The British Library and the Joint Information Systems Committee just released a report that exposes the myth that the Google Generation (people born after 1993) are more Internet savvy than older adults.  The report, entitled Information Behaviour of the Researcher of the Future, indicates that while our youth are generally quite comfortable with using technology, they lack the basic Internet searching skills of their adult counterparts. 

In my own teaching experiences, I find this report to be highly accurate.  A myth exists amongst older generations that our children are incredibly Internet savvy.  While it is true that our children are comfortable and regular users of the Internet, many of them primarily use basic and simple features of the web.  The skill of doing smart Google searches must be explicitly taught and then reinforced.  Without proper education in web searching techniques, children will resort to typing entire sentences in Google, overlooking crucial keywords and abstaining from employing even basic techniques to narrow search results.

The first step in improving the information literacy skills of our students is to educate our teachers.  Once our teachers are competent in performing more advanced Google searches, they can pass these skills and expectations onto their students.  Without explicitly addressing this issue in schools, our students will continue using Google to find a needle in a haystack.