Impact on Culture

One of the most controversial topics out there currently is how technology has made our teenagers different from their predecessors. Have you ever heard of adults saying, "Back in my day, we didn't play on iPads or gameboys. We spent all our day playing outside." Unfortunately, I was one of those people too. I would express myself this way when seeing kids spending all their day playing video games and not even interacting with their own siblings. I would think, "What is happening to society? We are all going to be illiterate in 10 years from now!"

But, when we talk to teens about their technology usage, I feel that they compare it to their phones or tables being like their heart-without it they can't survive. In a Huffington Post article, it was expressed that "social networks -- and the gadgets they run on -- aren’t a distraction from real life, but a crucial extension of it.” Huffington Post article. Adults may frown on this but they do not really fathom what the younger generation is feeling with or without technology. In a way, I feel that adults underwent this same issue during their day when TVs and radios were introduced. The grandparents must have probably made the same comments as to how people would stop reading out of newspapers and books because the younger generation was too immersed in TV viewing and radio listening. Well, that young generation of TV and Radio users survived and they turned out just fine. Wouldn't it be the exact same result with the teens of the Digital Age?

Teens get a sense of belonging when they have technology in their lives. My tech professor shared an excerpt in class last time out of the same article above, Huffington Post article which really expressed a teen's viewpoint on technology and how it shapes her life. 

“Not having an iPhone can be social suicide, notes Casey. One of her   friends found herself effectively exiled from their circle for six months because her parents dawdled in upgrading her to an iPhone. Without it, she had no access to the iMessage group chat, where it seemed all their shared plans were being made. "She wasn’t in the group chat, so we stopped being friends with her,” Casey says. “Not because we didn’t like her, but we just weren’t in contact with her.”

After having read this excerpt, I really thought about how hypocritical we can be with our younger generation sometimes. I remember being given a computer with dial-up connection for the internet in the late 90s. I would spend countless hours on the internet searching random stuff and chatting with strangers on group chats for N'Sync and Britney Spears. Isn't that what our teens today are doing, except for the fact that they use different social media? What is the huge difference between our time period and this new generation? We survived; I am pretty sure they will too.

It all comes down to how efficiently teens use the technology they have. If they use it correctly, they will get so much out of it! But, it is up to us to guide them on how to use it.

Cognition and Development are Affected by Media

Have you ever wondered how you ever learned to do things such as balancing yourself, walking or learning to analyze the meaning of life? Many studies conducted by famous psychologists such as Piaget and Vygotsky proved that we when we are young is when our brains begin to develop and this tends to occur starting at the brain stem and ends in the frontal lobe where we conducted our higher order thinking skills (Cox, June 2015). 

Jean Piaget, for example, arranged a child's development into four different stages. These stages are known as the sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational. 

           Sensorimotor 0-2 years old: child uses sensory and motor skills to 
                   explore surroundings. object permanence

           
           Preoperational 2-6 years old: no logical reasoning yet. words and 
                     pictures are used to represent things egocentric

           Concrete operational 7-12 years old: no longer egocentric. other's 
                    opinions are taken into account; child can think logically and the 
                    concept of conservation is understood.                                     

           Formal operational 12 years-adult: can use higher order thinking skills 
                     to analyze and think abstractly.

All these developments certainly do not happen overnight therefore our brains are not fully developed until we are between 25-35 years old. Even when we reach this age range, it has been found that the brain is still developing. It is a never ending process which is supported by Vygotsky's theory of Zone of Proximal Development or ZPD. The ZPD is in effect when an individual can master a task if given the appropriate scaffolding and support by a more knowledgeable other, usually a teacher or an expert in that specific content, who provides the means to acquire new knowledge and skills. 

Though we know the stages of development, how can children develop more knowledge in today's world- the digital age? Technology usage, of course. However, many articles still only focus on the negative impact technology is causing in our youth from lack of social skills to physical health issues such as obesity as stated by Kaveri Subrahmanyam in The Impact of Home Computer Use on Children’s Activities and Development. As we continue to discover more ways that media usage can help students learn better by providing concrete research, more people will be willing give the technology the credit it deserves.  Subrahmanyam also wrote about how parents are buying their children computers because they think it will help their children academically. I think the problem is that parents just don't know all the tools and resources out there that can actually provide their children with appropriate learning techniques. Many parents are still under the impression that the point of computers, laptops, or tablets is to just surf the net or to write papers. If they actually took the time to learn about educational apps that can further aid the child's brain development by encouraging them to use their higher order thinking skills, then their view on media will change for the better. 

A site that my Ed Tech professor mentioned that is quite helpful to children, and has different activities depending on their grade level, is UEN Educational Interactives for your Kids. I tried a few of these and it is safe to safe that I was a bit addicted to them for a few minutes. I am going to have my 4 year old try these and see how she enjoys them at the same time that she is improving her cognitive development. Go check it out!

My Thoughts on Technology's Impact on the Brain

We have all heard the misconceptions on how technology can be quite detrimental to our brains but that depends on how we use the technology. I was very skeptical for a long time regarding anything positive that technology could potentially contribute to the development of our brains. In her book, Susan Greenfield, "asserts that the digital revolution exploits our biological propensity for mindlessness. She cites laboratory studies finding that social networking and video gaming trigger dopamine in the same manner as junk food and Ecstasy...Because cyberspace lacks causal sequence, is devoid of immediate consequences and gives instant access to information without guidance, our attention spans shrink, deeper thinking declines and interpersonal bonds wither." This was quoted in Matthew Wisnioski's article found here How digital technology is destroying your mind. Just like Greenfield's findings, I always found myself thinking about technology the same way. 

But, we live in an age where the average amount of technological devices a human owns are at 4 currently. I am one of those people fits into that statistics and have decided to focus on the positives in having so much technology around me which I use daily. If we are going to have that many devices, then we might as well use them to the fullest! The new generation of young people who are using technology have shown us, through research that has been conducted that technology isn't so bad after all. For example, In his article, How Digital Technology Has Changed the Brain, Taspcott notes that "scientists are beginning to document the traces that the Internet leaves on sensitive young brains. People who play a lot of action video games, for instance, process visual information more quickly than people who don't, according to a seminal 2003 article in Nature." The "Net Generation" as Taspcott refers to young people who have grown up in this phase of the digital age, doesn't really read as much out of books anymore as we used to in the past. Many think it is a waste of time. With the facility Google provides us it is much quicker and easier to type in a question and have an answer for it in less than a 1 minute.After having read the above mentioned article, even I prefer to turn to technology when researching anything. I don't have time to waste and if it is online then why not use it. 

Not only are we able to spend less time looking for information but it has been found that people who utilize technology more often are able to task switch and won't get distracted as they are interacting on social media at the same time they are listening to music. Taspcott says, that this generation of people can, "keep up their social networks while the concentrate on work- they seem to need this feel comfortable. I think they've learned to live in a world where they're bombarded with information, so they can block our the TV or other distractions while they focus on the task at hand." I identify with these findings as well since I am constantly task switching to check all my social media in the middle of doing others things.

So how do we use the new information about how great technology is in our own classroom? There are many ways that we can implement this great tool with our students such as through digital stories, infographics, and other visual means developed through tech. All of these affect the students' brains by sending the information they gather from all their senses and synthesizing it into one full picture which all occurs in the parietal lobe. The more ways we can present them with new information, the more neuron connections there will be; hence they will remember more and be able to apply it to their daily experiences. 

Stay tuned to see how to further implement tech in the class because technology isn't so bad after all!

My Media Usage

My Shocking Media Usage



Never in my life, would I have ever thought that I would be so enveloped in using technology. Obviously, I have not really been utilizing it for important things lately- like research. Instead, I have been obsessing over my Instagram feed, taking selfies and uploading those, hashtagging my little life away and reading some rather ridiculous statuses on Facebook. 

It wasn't until I had to complete an assignment for my Ed Tech Class, that I had to record how often I use media in a day. In my particular case, media consists of my phone. I can do everything on it, from socializing to streaming Netflix. Still, I felt that since I have a family to take care of, schoolwork to complete and a full time job, that I would not be a heavy media user. Boy was I wrong! 

In one day, I checked my Instagram alone 25 times. That in itself is ridiculous! I estimate that I spend five minutes every time I check it so looking back, I waste 2 hours of my precious day liking everyone else's selfies. That's Instagram alone without including Facebook which is another 1.5 hours of my day. Here I am thinking of how I could have used 3.5 hours of my day playing with my child, completing a homework assignment or even just enjoying the warm weather. 

As I type this blog, I feel the urge to check Instagram yet again and see if anyone else has liked my latest picture. The more likes the more beautiful my pictures are, right? Right. The time I spend on this kind of media is passive because I don't feel that I am learning anything from it if all I am doing is scrolling down the feeds liking pictures or statuses. 

Though I do admit I must check into a Media Anonymous group, I have to give credit to technology for helping me teach my students better by giving me ideas on how to present new information to them. It has also aided us all, in my classroom, to transmit our knowledge through different apps that make it easier and more entertaining for everyone to attain the information. 

I may not be the next Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg, but I feel that I use media for the most basic things- to keep in contact with family and friends, to search for the latest fashions and to research topics to be able to complete school projects. Hence, when compared to today's children and teens, I feel that I am right there with them too as they use media for similar things. As far as adults are concerned, I think that most mid-aged adults use media in some way- many use Facebook to reconnect with high school or college friends. It has been my experience that the older generations, are anti media since they feel it is nothing but a waste of time and neurons. 

I can see both the good and bad side of media and technology, but the good is currently in the lead. I feel that if we can be more disciplined when using media, limiting ourselves to only 30 minutes a day of maybe just social media, our lives can be better spent doing more active things. Not all media usage is passive, of course, but it is up to us to be more disciplined and choose to use it actively and learn from it.

This week, I am going to challenge myself to limit my usage of media by half. I will record how my daily routine has changed, whether I am happier or not, and if I missed out on anything important. 

Will you do this too? Will you challenge yourself to shorten the time you spend watching "funny" youtube videos and instead find something that can be more edifying? I dare you!