The class: living and learning in the digital era

Abstract

This article seeks to understand how, in a highly mediated society, a “digital thread” is established through the personal and social life and in the learning process of young people. For this purpose, an ethnography was carried out with students aged between 13 to 14 years, during a year. The interlinked forms of digital media that young people have used to find spaces of autonomy and personal action have been revealed, while their parents and teachers try to establish digital media in a normative way, shaping young people’s current achievements and future perspectives. This is related to the subtle stimulation of connections and disconnections, often motivating or problematic, present inside their homes and between home and school. The result is that digital media – although it does not necessarily determine the lives of young people – has become an important source of anxiety and conflict between generations.