When a discussion about how to educate our youth is held today, it is very rare that the idea of including more technology is not presented. It is a strong belief that schools today should allow students more access to technology if they are truly going to become educated adults. The Leading Education by Advancing Digital Commission, also known as LEAD, gave an online survey to determine how much of the country truly supports education and technology.
According to this survey:
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96 percent of teachers and 92 percent of parents believe that schools’
integration of technology in teaching and learning is important to the
education of American students today.
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54 percent of teachers and 64 percent of parents believe that the role
of technology in educating students will become much more important
during the next 10 years.
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61 percent of teachers and 63 percent of parents responded that the
country is somewhat or far behind the curve when it comes to American
public schools’ use of technology in education.
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82 percent of teachers and 71 percent of parents believe a greater use
of technology would be helpful in connecting learning inside and
outside of the classroom.
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89 percent of teachers and 76 percent of parents would choose to spend
$200 per student for an Internet-connected device over $200 per student
for new science textbooks.
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82 percent of teachers believe that they are not receiving the
necessary training to use technology to its fullest potential in the
classroom.
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95 percent of teachers and 90 percent of parents believe that home
access to high-speed Internet gives students a big or moderate advantage
when it comes to classroom performance.
Despite the results producing such high percentages, I do not find the results very shocking. We are in a technology boom and I do believe that the internet can allow an educators access to essential tools to drive the curiosity of their students. Children of today are more technologically advanced then ever before and it does add a lot of pressure on schools to properly educate students. However, with the ages of kids accessing social media websites are we educating the correct people?
Facebook, like many other social media websites, have age limits for access but you can see from the chart above that it has done little to restrict their access. Even though it is very easy for children to access these website without parental knowledge, we do find that many parents assist their children in the joining of these websites. I feel we are at a point where in addition to making the children aware of the dangers, it is our responsibility to educate the parents as well but how can this be done?
http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/11/tech/gaming-gadgets/kids-online-safety-steinberg/
It definitely our part to educate students about how to portray yourself online, but in terms or students who are that young we definitely need to do a better job of having a community discussion with parents and teachers about social media.
ReplyDeleteGreat post by the way!
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