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Kids and Tech: Failure Might Be The Best Option | Edutopia
I think this the a great article. It is so hard to teach children to be responsible with all the new technology that is out there because we can not possibly cover every situation. But when do we as educators take the time to teach them? Maybe it is best to let them mess up and then teach them what is correct, those teachable moments that so many teachers like to talk about. But how do we catch them? There was an incident in our school recently where two girls had photographed themselves top-less and were sharing it with other students. Once they were caught how was it handled? I wish I knew. Did we take them time to talk to them about appropriate use of technology or did we just punish them for doing it? I think one great way to educate properly, would be to start with educating the parents. They grew up in a different world then their kids are growing up in. Once they know how to better handle things we can work together to make sure that children are being able to use the technology appropriately.
This reminded me of an incident at my school of cyberbullying. (Ok, not the same as at your school, but still relevant!) I thought back to how it was handled, and I wasn't happy. Basically, I (as a counselor) talked to a number of the students involved as we uncovered the information. The assistant principal also spoke with them. We were not offering guidance or punishment at this point; we were instead trying to figure out if a threat was real! Once it became evident that a threat had occured, the police came in and gave a "lecture" to the main suspects in the case. I know this did not work, as my students told me later in the day how the two main bullies were bragging about things at lunch. I once again called the bullies down to my office to try to have a "teachable moment", but I am pretty sure I made no impact. This is why I think parent education is the key as well. If this behavior is acceptable at home, we cannot stop it in the schools...
ReplyDeleteI think it is important to remember that every student is different and it is difficult to punish or teach in the same manner. I do think that it is important to try to teach before the student has to learn things the hard way. It is a lot more meaningful when a student learns something first hand instead of taking a teacher's word for it or reading about it, but it is worth while to prevent most issues.
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