Just a few months ago I attended a training by an Apple rep. He insisted the use of iTunes (he called it the walled garden) and Apple's "rigorous" testing meant that all their apps would work on all their devices. No crashing. No incompatibilities.
From experience, husband's iPad 2 crashes more than my Toshiba Thrive.
Okay... as a mother of 7... yes 7 children... and from a family of 6 children -- now all geeks. When we were growing up, we had computers (one of the first Apple II)... and legos... and tvs... and chores... and friends... and sports. Some of us grew up to be engineers, others not. But the knowledge helped all of us succeed in our careers. My children started playing with the computers as toddlers on mommy's lap. (IBM XT machines and on) and currently all of them have their own --- the youngest has had his own computer (hand me down from older ones) since he was 3. (their funnest game, an old visual basic game that would flash the screen different colors and play a sound when you pressed a key)
They are also all "A" students... Student Body officers, football, soccer, wrestling teams (some were captains). They jump on the tramp, they play outside, they read, they watch TV, they play games, they visit friends. The computer is just another activity... not any big deal. Oh, and we have had our fair share of destroyed hardware. That's why the younger ones do NOT have newest/latest stuff.
Advantages -- required computer training classes in school (HS and college) are tested out -- freeing the schedule for other classes (fun or advance depending on the child)
-- in demand for jobs since they require very little training (true story, daughter is training new employee on the computer... "you can copy this part and paste it here" "what?" "highlight this, press ctrl-c...." "cool!" NEXT DAY.. "what were those keys again?" and the next... and the next...
The conclusion -- stop over thinking the problem! Let the kids be kids. Balance is so much more important than control. Don't push them into anything, but don't stop what they want to do!
Slashdot Mirror
Just a few months ago I attended a training by an Apple rep. He insisted the use of iTunes (he called it the walled garden) and Apple's "rigorous" testing meant that all their apps would work on all their devices. No crashing. No incompatibilities. From experience, husband's iPad 2 crashes more than my Toshiba Thrive.
Okay... as a mother of 7... yes 7 children... and from a family of 6 children -- now all geeks. When we were growing up, we had computers (one of the first Apple II)... and legos... and tvs... and chores ... and friends... and sports. Some of us grew up to be engineers, others not. But the knowledge helped all of us succeed in our careers. My children started playing with the computers as toddlers on mommy's lap. (IBM XT machines and on) and currently all of them have their own --- the youngest has had his own computer (hand me down from older ones) since he was 3. (their funnest game, an old visual basic game that would flash the screen different colors and play a sound when you pressed a key)
They are also all "A" students... Student Body officers, football, soccer, wrestling teams (some were captains). They jump on the tramp, they play outside, they read, they watch TV, they play games, they visit friends. The computer is just another activity... not any big deal. Oh, and we have had our fair share of destroyed hardware. That's why the younger ones do NOT have newest/latest stuff.
Advantages -- required computer training classes in school (HS and college) are tested out -- freeing the schedule for other classes (fun or advance depending on the child)
-- in demand for jobs since they require very little training (true story, daughter is training new employee on the computer... "you can copy this part and paste it here" "what?" "highlight this, press ctrl-c...." "cool!" NEXT DAY.. "what were those keys again?" and the next... and the next...
The conclusion -- stop over thinking the problem! Let the kids be kids. Balance is so much more important than control. Don't push them into anything, but don't stop what they want to do!