Pre-University Experience of ICT and Self-Access Learning in Japan

Information and Communications Technology (ICT) can play a key role in self-access learning and the organization of self-access centres (SACs) (Reinders & Lázaro, 2007). The generation of young people currently at university has been labeled “digital natives” (Prensky, 2001), yet it would seem that many of these “natives” in Japan seem to lack the necessary ICT skills to use in the university context (Castellano, Mynard & Rubesch, 2011; Williams, 2011). This paper assesses the current situation of Japanese young people’s pre-university ICT experience and its implications for self-access learning. Do they actually lack the necessary skills to engage with self-access in an ICT context? Or does the reality in fact show that this perception is wrong and if so why? This paper will answer the questions through original research (N=105) and reference to the literature, globally and in Japan. It finds that students have more competence than previously believed and ventures some reasons for this previous misperception.