“Don’t Teach Your Kids This Stuff. Please?”
I prefer old-school paper and ink for myself, but I’m in complete agreement with his statement. And I envy the generation that came into the world right after my Gen-X cohort; they were born already marinated in tech-savvy. They knew it because the collective consciousness had just finished learning it. Anything beyond word processing I had to figure out as a twenty-year-old in 1993.
Technology doesn’t evolve backwards; computers aren’t going to go away, and the kids who are comfortable swimming through the digital landscape will have an easier time now and a decade on. Teach them how to be safe and smart on the Net the same way you taught them to ride a bike, cross the street, and deal with strangers. Keep in mind that newness is usually met with fear and anger. Suck it up and let your kids learn something.
Scott McLeod from Dangerously Irrelevant wrote this:
dear parent
teacher
administrator
board memberdon’t teach your kids to read
for the Web
to scan
RSS
aggregate
synthesizedon’t teach your kids to write
onlinepen and paper aren’t going anywhere
since when do kids need an audience?no need to hyperlink
make videos
audio
Flashno connecting, now
no social networking
or online chat
or comments
or PLNs
blogs and twitter?
how self-absorbed
what a bunch of crapand definitely, absolutely, resolutely, no cell phones
block it all
lock it down
keep it outit’s evil, you know
there’s bad stuff out there
gotta keep your children safedon’t you know collaboration is just another word for cheating?
don’t you know how much junk is out there?
haven’t you ever heard of sexting?
of cyberbullying?a computer 24-7? no thanks
I don’t want them
creating
sharing
thinking
learning
you know they’re just going to look at porn
and hook up with predators
we can’t trust themdon’t do any of it, please
really
’cause I’m doing all of it with my kids
can’t wait to see who has a leg up in a decade or two
can you?
Posted by Alexa Harrington
It’s true that technology is not going away, and it’s important to demonstrate the power of technology to kids. The Adobe Foundation and The Black Eyed Peas Peapod Foundation recently unveiled a new public service announcement called “Plant Inspiration.†Check it out here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQ9WFXs34T8 . The PSA promotes the launch of Adobe Youth Voices, a non-profit that stresses the power of technology to engage middle- and high school–age youth.