Overprotecting our youth can be disastrous for their education
It is disturbing to see how technology-phobic parents and teachers can impose restrictions on all of our kids which can result in missed education opportunities, or worse strange behavior towards technology and the Internet.
One such example appeared on the BBC News web site today, where they report that teachers have called for web sites such as YouTube to be shut down as part of efforts to prevent pupils and staff being bullied. Wow - how dangerously stupid! I mean, cannot they just adapt new techniques to avoid bullying online instead of calling for the shutdown of those sites? I bet you the next thing they will do is to prohibit access to YouTube and sites like it for all the kids in the their schools - a really dumb move.
That is exactly what happened to my son. He has been to computer camp over summer for years now. The first year they let them do whatever they wanted on the web. Then they started prohibiting online games during recess times. It got progressively worse to the point that this year they can no longer go on the web. A computer camp without being allowed to surf the web - that is almost as bad as a tennis camp without tennis courts. What are they thinking?
I can just see some worried parents who have no clue what the web is all about, outside of the sensationalized (and disgusting) stories of the pedophiles who find their victims online as promoted by Dateline NBC and other such programs, asking the school to not allow their child to access the web for fear of being stalked or being approached by bad people. This being a very litigious society, the school lawyers are probably choosing to have all access prohibited rather than just limiting access to those kids whose parents are clearly clueless. And the unfortunate result is that kids like my son, who have been online since they were still in diapers, and who have learned how to stay out of trouble online, much like we were brought up to stay out of trouble offline, can no longer enjoy their computer camp and have to give up the learning that they are yearning for.
Sure there are bad people online, and while I am not sure how the online percentage of bad people compares to bad people in the real world, I suspect that the number is actually lower. But it does not matter, even if it is higher we cannot rob our children of the education that will make them competitive to meet the needs of a few Luddites. We have to develop methods to teach them how to stay out of trouble online the same way we thought generations of people to stay out of trouble offline.
[Tags: YouTube BBC online access education predators]
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September 25th, 2007 at 2:21 am
It seems to me that we are both on similar pages regarding child Internet safety and measures that have been taken to increase safety. I come from a family where my parents were there to educate me on safety in the world, about strangers, about giving out personal information to anyone and anywhere, and other areas that concern my well-being. Basically, as you mention, they taught me how to “stay out of trouble”. When I hear about all the restrictive measures that schools and parents use for children on the Internet, I sometimes ask myself “Have the parents not educated their kids well enough to trust in their better judgment?” While I do understand that this is a difficult topic, I believe that kids are not the ones to blame for being victimized online. As do you, I feel the problem here is that parents need to know how to teach their kids how to use common sense in all areas of their lives and to learn how to sense when something smells like trouble. They should teach their kids how to become intelligent, both cognitively and emotionally.
One thing that stood out to me was when you mentioned that some children develop “strange behavior towards technology and internet” because of the restrictive measures that are placed on their Internet usage. I was wondering what kinds of behaviors you are referring to. Because if I were a kid of parent who was overly controlling over the Internet, I’d find a way to use it one way or another.
Lastly, you make a wonderful point in saying that restricting Internet access to children is restricting them from a plethora of information that could limit them in the future. Although I believe that parents should better educate their kids, maybe it’s the parents who need educating.