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Constant Technology Use May Hamper Kids' Ability To Learn
hessian writes "Scholars who study the role of media in society say no long-term studies have been done that adequately show how and if student attention span has changed because of the use of digital technology. But there is mounting indirect evidence that constant use of technology can affect behavior, particularly in developing brains, because of heavy stimulation and rapid shifts in attention."
awesome link.
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/506466/given-tablets-but-no-teachers-ethiopian-children-teach-themselves/
This is almost as bad as rock & roll music.
while out?
seems to be generational but my younger friends (20's) are always checking their phones, even while I'm talking to them at dinner or a social event!
what the hell. since when was that good manners?
since never. but few seem to care.
additionally, look at the younger crowd as they walk on the public streets. if there isn't a pair of white wires coming out of their ears and their stand perma-pointed downward, then they are the odd one out.
this is directly related to attention span and constantly 'needing' to be connected.
time will tell, but I don't think this is a foward step.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
I lost my attention span with the "Page Not Found".
Maybe a link check is in order?
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
Not only is it behind a paywall/login link, but the article's URL isn't even correct.
It should be: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/01/education/technology-is-changing-how-students-learn-teachers-say.html
As it is, you chopped off the final "l", which gives a 404.
there may or may not be a problem. Please update us every hour. Thanks.
I used to be "smart", I could memorize things instantly, had photographic memory, could do mental math very quickly, problem solving was a breeze for me but then I was introduced to a computer. Everything about my brain has been rather -- dulled. I have a hard time to do everything that was previously said, but problem solving still remains my biggest strength even though it's not as good as it once was. I think we should rely on ourselves whenever we can, instead of being impatient and turning on a computer.
Instead of parking them in front of your TV or your smartphone & Netflix, why not interact with them? Read them a story? Make pictures with glue and macaroni? DO SOMETHING.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
...the so called "indirect evidence" is a couple of surveys of teachers. They've perceived a decline in attention span... so basically it's a bunch of anecdotal evidence put together, which makes it a bit more useful, but it's still just a poll.
I'm not skeptic about this and think it's important we look into it, but it's hard to suggest an absolute decline in kids's attention spans. How come they can concentrate for hours while playing a video game?
The only time my son seems to focus is when he is in minecraft and that is because he likes minecraft.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
I use technology the whole time and my attention span is
cause a rank of 32nd the usa can tell us the rest of the world that uses loads a tech and does so "intelligently".
The fact is unless your a lawyer or military guy what other jobs are there in the usa.
suiing everyone and killing them just UGH me around.
YOUR GOVT, and the RICH want YOU to be retards.....WHAT better way to control you.
Other sources seem to show that children exposed to technology might actually end up learning better than otherwise. http://dvice.com/archives/2012/10/ethiopian-kids.php
Or medication? I would blame the drug pushing pharmaceutical companies selling promises that the kid will behave if he just takes a pill...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I remember reading similar concerns when PBS came out with a radical new TV program called "Sesame Street." ;^)
It is much easier asking these questions than doing actual research and coming up with some answers. I think a lot depends on what they are doing with technology: if they are reading and learning or just goofing around and wasting time.
I taught college classes for a number of years. Eventually, it became very common for students to bring their laptops with them to class. Some of them followed my lecture notes and tried sample problems. Others read email, web sites, or played games with the sound turned off. As long as they weren't disruptive, I didn't try to stop them.
Of course, K-12 is very different than college, but when I was in high school, I carried a book with me to read when a class got boring. These days I carry several books on my phone in case I get some extra time. My grades were pretty good, so I didn't seem to suffer from not paying attention.
Essentially, the question seems to be: "Does the teacher have to keep the students entertained?" Perhaps it should be phrased: "Does the teacher have to keep the students involved?" Teachers that drone on endlessly, sometimes reading their lecture notes, will have problems. Those that interact with their students and have activities that involve the students will do much better. As always, anything that changes the current situation is suspect.
Constant technology use makes my brain produces a level of gamma waves -- those linked to consciousness, attention, learning and memory, or vagina -- never before reported in neuroscience!
Constant technology use has made us all idiots who only find work in fast food chains...
My aunt's current husband's mother's nephew's college roommate's sister's friend is Amish is she's a genius.
So, that proves everyone wrong.
Has anything else changed at the same time that might affect students?
Do the changes, if any, hurt or help their ability to learn in our current environment of constant torrents of information?
There's a claim about "ability to persevere in the face of challenging tasks". Do electronic games present challenging tasks that require perseverance? (Sorry, rhetorical question).
You mean constant access to an Xbox makes it hard for kids to learn?
Damn kids always expect me to get to the point. It's like they don't even care that I had to walk to school in the driving rain, with melon-rinds for shoes, carrying my little brother under one arm, and 90 pounds of textbooks and homework under the other, up-hill... both-ways. Ingrates.
It has to be the smartphones and laptops everywhere! Because kids did none of these things back in 1998
Or maybe it's that the availability of said technology more readily exposes people with predispositions towards chronic attention span issues.
It has certainly hampered my ability to take out the garbage or rake leaves in the backyard, as my wife will gladly tell you.
You are welcome on my lawn.
So does sitting in a near silent classroom listening to a teacher drone on and on and on, with little or no regard to if anyone is paying attention for hours a day, most of the year, 12+ years in a row.
TL;DR
Have gnu, will travel.
It's been widely proven that the proliferation of movable type has hindered our ability to remember campfire song handed down from our elder chiefs, like the one we need to know to remember when the salmon come back upstream, & no one has done anything about it!
Math students don't memorize their sine and cosine tables anymore, law students can barely speak Latin, and these young hot-shot doctors barely know a leech from a hole in the ground! But the real trouble started when they put one of those fancy schmancy crank-operated pencil sharpeners in every classroom. When I was in school we sharpened our pencils with a small knife and it worked just fine. Guess these kids are too lazy to do a little whittling.
To use that word everyone loved in the 1990's, it's a Paradigm Shift. The simplest example is the raw internet - once you grok that the internet is "always on" (service glitches aside), your entire life changes forever. You can do or not-do something on the internet, but it's now a choice that needs to be made every hour of the day forever. Try reading old literature sometime, with the perspective of looking for when characters were really rather bored with nothing to do - "kick the can" for 3 hours and then dinner - really?! Or the farmers sitting around the parlor when Ma didn't feel like playing the piano, so they all just sat there kinda listless. Eew.
I got a glimpse of all those changes when my power went out for Hurricane Sandy (and I was only on the edge of it!). I only managed to sit in the dark for an hour before I reached for my CD player, stash of AA batteries, flashlight, and a book. In the modern world, we don't just burn multiple hours doing nothing anymore.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
In the modern world, we don't just burn multiple hours doing nothing anymore.
Sure we do. It's called Slashdot.
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I'm sure they said the same thing about the technology miracle of post-WW2 that would revolutionize eductaion: the overhead projector.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
No wonder too many people have been misdiagnosed with ADHD. Maybe ADHD is not a bad thing after all.
In fact, in highly dynamic environments, such as Wall Street traders, having hyperactivity actually helps, couple with the use of anti-depressants and crack cocaine, (Yes, there are major drug abuse problems in the heart of the American economy.)
New Economic Perspectives
But does "hampering attention span" = "decreasing reaction time"? Are we seeing an adaptive process?
There is indirect evidence that the 24/7 news cycle is composed of about 1% useful news, and 99% filler. The bar gets lower and lower as to what is passed off as "news", including non-news items like this one showing there is "indirect evidence" that something happened. Or didn't happen.
"The simplest example is the raw internet - once you grok that the internet is "always on" (service glitches aside), your entire life changes forever."
Um, no. Once you grok that I was talking about what happens when you are out in the woods and there is no such technology available, your life will change for a few seconds.
"I only managed to sit in the dark for an hour before I reached for my CD player, stash of AA batteries, flashlight, and a book."
But there are 2 very visible reasons for that: (1) you were bored because with the power out in a modern home or apartment there usually isn't much to do, and (2) because you could. You had the player, you had the flashlight, you had the book.
Your argument does not impress me. My question was: how would you cope or adapt without those things? Would these claimed "brain changes" make you better or worse at getting along with your situation? Or is it all just a pile of sociological wishful thinking and bullshit?
Sure, we used to think that wanking made you go blind.
The simplest example is the raw internet - once you grok that the internet is "always on" (service glitches aside), your entire life changes forever.
No, it doesn't. Winning ten million on the lottery changes your life forever. The internet just makes a lot of things easier to do.
You can do or not-do something on the internet, but it's now a choice that needs to be made every hour of the day forever. Try reading old literature sometime, with the perspective of looking for when characters were really rather bored with nothing to do - "kick the can" for 3 hours and then dinner - really?! Or the farmers sitting around the parlor when Ma didn't feel like playing the piano, so they all just sat there kinda listless. Eew.
You seem to think that simply having access to all the stuff you can consume on the internet means you are doing something. You're not, any more than if you're watching TV mindlessly.
Stupid people have always got bored easily, and they still do if you give them a TV or internet connection. In "old literature" they probably engaged themselves with an actual book.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
If they're just checking for facebook updates etc instead of having conversation, then it's somewhat rude.
However, if they're waiting for an update on something important, then not quite as much.
Prior to cellular phones, if you were wanted to be sure you got an important call (medical issue, repairman, whatever), you had to hang around the house and not go out. That meant you have to either chance missing the call or not go out at all.
Cellular phones do spawn new social situations, but they're not all bad.
What pisses off my family is when that they can no longer come up with as much unchallenged B.S. as before. Before everyone used to take them at face value, but nowadays a quick check of google/wikipedia/etc often disputes some of the less-than-honest stories/concepts.
I wasn't coping. The key part of my note was "only able to take an hour of nothing". I had barely managed to think ahead and have my freshly purchased flashlight (I hadn't had one for years), my scavenged old AA's from the Big Box o' Stuff I dumped on the floor, and one of the 5 CD players from six years ago I hadn't needed. But I had all that because I am a pack-rat. I basically got lucky. If I hadn't had all of that I would have gone mildly crazy basically tossing and turning in bed until the power came back. That's all the indication that we don't like chunks of time we can't use anymore. Modern power makes Night Owl lifestyles possible, so when the power goes out unless you're a hotshot at body manipulation and can flip your sleep schedule on a dime, you're stuck with 10 hours of night and nothing to do.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Sorry, but you missed every single line of my point. A huge part of the internet is "talking to people out there" and getting answers back. You disagreed with me but your reply is there, which is precisely what I meant. Having lots of "old literature" on my shelves, the amount of time they spend in the stories actually reading is a bit grim. Much more of it is spent pining away at various things.
Meanwhile, with an internet connection, you can post notes and go to chat rooms and talk to people at all hours of the day, which is darn near impossible for any number of reasons in local small town life. Then there's that "instant research" capability that answers the kind of silly questions that used to occupy people for days. "Where is Bath, England?" "I dunno, is that near London?"
So yes, lots of money ALSO changes lives, but so does the net. I'll skip the xkcd comic about IQ because you have seen it already.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
THAT is an answer. Thank you. But personally -- even though I make my living on the internet -- I find the opposite to be true. I can go on a camping trip for 2 weeks with no phone and enjoy the hell out of it.