Teenaged Internet tutors’ level of interactivity - by sharing tacit and explicit knowledge with older learners

Abstract

Younger people, i.e. teenagers without any pedagogical training and work experience play an important role in teaching computer skills to older adults. The present study is based on 14 cases in which a teenager teaches an older adult to use a computer on a topic of the latter's own choice. Both interactive as well as non-interactive techniques used by the teenagers will be analysed, as well as their dependence on the whether the tutor is a user of the chosen website, whether he/she has made preparations for the tutoring session, and the combination of these two attributes. As a result, we saw that any kind of previous experience the tutor had with the content taught (as an everyday user or by independent exploration prior to the tutoring session) decreased interactivity of tutoring process. At the same time, the risk of over-demonstration emerged in such cases. For further research, some hypotheses to test the idea of a reciprocal learning model in which an older learner would be a resource person for the young tutor on interactive tutoring techniques are proposed.

Perceived benefits from non-formal digital training sessions in later life: views of older adult learners, peer tutors, and teachers

“…Among relatives and friends (e.g. Mori & Harada, 2010), teenaged tutors (e.g., Tambaum & Normak, 2018) provide informal support for older adults in learning ICT skills. In this paper, we focus on older adults´ digital skills learning in non-formal contexts.…”

Focussing on tutoring skills instead of learners’ disadvantages in teenaged tutors’ training for intergenerational learning programmes

“…As described above, young tutors following their natural style of instruction do not always adopt the pace that the learner requires. In previous research we observed that most of the techniques that young people used were non-interactive: explanations and commands predominated (Tambaum & Normak, 2018). The pace of the most frequently employed techniques was determined by the tutor.…”

“…The need for preparatory training for teenaged tutors has been mentioned by several authors (Strom & Strom, 2012;Tambaum, 2017;Tambaum & Normak, 2018). Teater (2018) in her qualitative research found that young people who were not prepared for intergenerational practice did not know what to expect from the interaction with older people and were concerned about what they should say.…”

“…Young tutors should learn about the function of learners' mistakes in the instructing process, and they should be trained to avoid intervening in some circumstances (Tambaum, 2017). There is also a need to introduce interactive tutoring techniques to teenagers and to increase their awareness of the hazards associated with sharing tacit knowledge (Tambaum & Normak, 2018).…”

“…It has been shown that in an IGL framework in which teenagers serve as naturalistic tutors (Chi, Siler, Jeong, Yamauchi & Hausmann, 2001;Graesser, Person & Magliano, 1995) facilitating the acquisition of older individuals' e-skills, young tutors tend not to consider age-specific needs (Tambaum, 2017;Tambaum & Normak, 2014). Without preparation for the session they tend to use a rather authoritarian and prescriptive style (Tambaum & Normak, 2018), which can disempower the learner (Tambaum & Normak, 2014) and should be avoided due to age-related cognitive and social changes. An unaddressed need for extra time was observed during steps that required older learners to divide their attention (Tambaum, 2017).…”