Yesterday I read this article highlighting studies that liken screens to "electronic cocaine" or "digital heroin." Today I'm chewing on it as an educator, a mother, and a person. I'll start on the educator level because this is, after all, a teaching blog. I work in a 1:1 environment where for the last several years all of my students have carried their own personal laptops to class. This has been transformative for me as a writing teacher because I no longer have to schedule time in the computer lab for students to work on essays. The use of Google Classroom, class blogs, and websites like Padlet and Quizlet have streamlined the way we communicate in my classroom. The list of benefits goes on and on, but still, I've seen the drawbacks. And of course I think some learning activities just work better with the low-tech version. Maybe it's just of my age, but I still prefer to read an article on paper. Each year we're told to print less, but I just can't require my students to read and annotate Orwell's "Shooting an Elephant" on a screen. A handful of my students might prefer to use a digital note-taking system, but according to anecdotal evidence, the majority still prefer to underline and take notes in the margin the old-fashioned way. Similarly, our daily quickwrites are done by hand because I want my students to learn to silence their creative critic. Instead, I want them to focus on producing without the constant temptation of the delete key. And I could devote an entire blog post to the distraction element. I have a student who consistently opens up a window on his browser devoted to looking at hunting rifles. Every day when work time is given that involves the tech device, this student is shopping for the latest and greatest weapon. Our school does use Lan School to help with this issue, but at the end of the day, I'm still working with teenagers with developing brains. They are prone to be distracted, and for several of them who are already addicted to their cell phones, I feel like placing them in front of devices all day long and asking them to stay focused is a ridiculous request. Don't even get me started on YouTube. Yes, I see many educational merits, but I also see study hall students waste entire class periods watching mindless videos of cats scared by cucumbers and teens playing pranks on each other. (Disclaimer: I LOVE cat/cucumber videos.) As a mom, I face similar tensions. Sometimes I feel like the only parent of middle school students who don't have cell phones. At the same time, I enjoy seeing and hearing my kids interact with my husband as they all play Clash of Clans together. And of course I would be lying if I said I don't mind the occasional hour of silence on long car trips when my kids are watching a movie in the backseat. (Chris and I can actually listen to NPR or have an uninterrupted conversation.) But I don't want my kids to become junkies. I don't want their lives to be ruled by the screen, so I try to achieve balance. How do we know? My sons (5th and 6th grade) are also in 1:1 classrooms. The newness has worn off a bit on my oldest, but for my youngest, it's still exciting. Pretty much every afternoon I have to redirect him away from the "dinosaur game" that fills his empty moments in the classroom. I don't for one second discredit his classroom teachers. I think they do a phenomenal job, but again, when we're dealing with kids with undeveloped brains, distraction is often the name of the game. Then I think about my own personal love/hate relationship with screens. Some of my best friends were made through adoptive mom blogging, and while we can occasionally see each other in real life, the majority of our day-to-day connections take place on Facebook. I can't imagine what this parenting journey would have been without them. I get teaching resources and access social activist Tweets that change the way I see the world. I read a daily devotional that gets me centered each morning. All of these aspects are incredible valuable. But of course there is the downside. I found myself meaninglessly scrolling through my newsfeed way more than necessary this summer, so much so that my husband and I made an agreement that our handheld screens would be put away on Sundays. I've also made a commitment to stay away from all social media besides Twitter during school hours. But again, is this enough? Am I achieving balance? I don't want to miss my life because I'm looking at a screen. I don't want to my encouraging my sons' potential addictions. But I also know we're living in an ever-changing world where technology is king. How are you as an educator or parent handling this highly addictive material that is constantly at our fingertips?
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September 2020
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