Friday is swimming training evening for Smallsteps, and most weeks I either get to spend some time with my own thoughts while waiting, or spend it talking to one of the parents. Tonight, it was a talk with a parent I have spoken with a few times, who is super-excited to hopefully soon get ADHD diagnoses for her two children (8 and 5), so she can put them on medication.
Lucky kids.
While I was talking with the parent, they had their youngest on a tablet watching some "educational" animation program, saying that it is good that they are quiet and they are learning something.
I dunno....
I am pretty judgemental.
I am yet to see much value in most of these programs kids consume. Yes, there is information given that they might be able to regurgitate, but does that qualify as educational? As far as I can tell, being able to recite phrases from a TV show doesn't really provide any practical value, except for maybe at a pub quiz.
I often say that it is not what you know, but how you use it that matters, but that is only part of the equation.
It is not what you know, but how you learn it.
The process of learning is incredibly important, and I wish that more of school was dedicated to how to learn rather than what to learn. If people really believed that children should have their natural talents and interests supported, then they should be teaching them how to learn, not expecting they will be taught what they want to learn.
See the difference?
Learning methods can be topic agnostic, so once a person has the skills on how to learn, and how to adjust their learning methods themselves, they can learn from any domain they choose to learn. And they needn't be beholden to the teacher, or forced to suffer a teacher who doesn't suit their own learning methods, or isn't interested at all. With so much variation in talents and interests of the children, and the teachers themselves, it is an impossible task to adequately provide for individual kids.
I think that parents are leaving their kids behind educationally, because they leave the formal education up to the schools, but most of what the kids learn about their style is through passive entertainment. Kids spend more time in front of screens than they do in a classroom these days, and the screen is not only their entertainment, it becomes their peer. And, peers have a massive influence on us as children, and later in life. The kids are building and reinforcing their learning process through repetition, in a way that doesn't give them the skills to learn *whatever they want throughout their life, it just teaches them to consume more - and more.
We as a collective society have a lot to answer for in terms of the way kids are today, which is for a large part, pretty terrible. Like it or not though, they are a reflection of their environment - the one *we and others before us have created for them in the name of consumerism for profit. Everything has been affected by the model, including the education system, and the degrading ability they have to teach anything applicable.
Schools should teach too many "things" other than the practical skills of maths, reading, writing etc. But, what they should teach is ways to learn and help students build strategies to be able to learn from multiple domains effectively and efficiently. The world of education was opened up to all once literacy rates increased and reading wasn't a skill only known by the wealthy and the clergy. It gave people the ability to learn for themselves. Now we have all the information ever collected at our fingertips, yet - we ignore it in favour of being passively entertained instead.
I could be wrong, but a couple decades down the track, despite all the advancements in technology, the people who will be the most successful will still be the ones who can actively think and learn for themselves. And the ones they will control, are those who can only learn through passive consumption, which means, learn what they get told.
We are raising followers.
How many great minds of the future will never be, because their parents hopped them up on ADHD medication, and sat them in front of a screen? With the ubiquity of the practice, I would say,
Many.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
What do you think would be better for the kid to do while their sibling is learning to swim? I'm sure they can't stay at home or in the car by themselves, its probably not a good environment for toys or drawing, and I think you could make the argument you'd learn more from a video than a book.
We have a lot of teachers in our family, and they spend so much time thinking about ways to teach kids problem solving - especially since memorization isn't as necessary with Google and ChatGPT has ruined essay-writing. I genuinely think teaching is so much more advanced than when I was in school, they've really embraced growth-mindset tools for the kids.
This is a great sentence! ADHD medicine should help kids focus and not get constantly distracted by every little thing. If the kids are getting hopped up, you accidentally gave them meth instead.
Absolutely it is. My daughter never had a phone or a tablet wherever we went, and we managed fine. We would talk with her, play with her, spend time looking at random things. You didn't grow up with a screen in your face every day either - what did your parents do with you?
They gamify everything. It doesn't lead to depth for most kids in later life, because the stuff that comes after the foundation, isn't fun.
They are extremely focused, drawing in all that information from whatever they are watching, as the rest of life passes them by.
Ahhhh, I see. So essentially you're saying the mother should be playing with their youngest kid instead of chatting to you and the other parents?
To be honest, my parents actually did leave us in the car a lot, so we'd just draw and read comics and maybe play with toys. I assume we didn't learn more than if we were watching educational programs - I have no idea how to quantify that.
Your daughters school education is completely gamified? I didn't know that. I don't actually have any interaction with school aged kids, so I'm only hearing teachers perspectives.
Mom's shape to stay quiet when we were girls were: interacting with other boys; Talking with her about life, school, or what we read; read; A Rubik's cube ... there are, but, pitifully and sadly, parents do not want to be parents, they do not want to look for healthy alternatives (which are not a phone).
That is pretty sad that the parent is excited about the diagnosis. It sounds more like they are looking for an excuse card than an actual solution to their problems. Even though I am older I was one of the few kids who grew up with a computer in our house. It may have not been connected to the Internet or as interactive as what they have today, but it was always there. Despite that, we still spent a lot of time in books, working on worksheets. My parents were pretty good about reading to us and helping us learn though. I get not everyone has that. How did the audition go by the way?
Observing the girl at least, I don't think she has ADHD - she seems like a normal kid (normal in my world).
Sure, but it seems many don't have it now, because the parents have better things to do than raise their own kids.
The audition went well, however, I don't think she will get in.
You are right in what you say. Children should be taught to learn in different ways and find different solutions. This way their creativity develops. Previously, there was an education system based on rote learning. Oh my God, what a terrible thing. It was like raising a flock of sheep.
I actually think that this is what is happening on screens now - there is very little practical, just passive consumption and repeat.
Thank you for sharing your detailed and thoughtful thoughts, my friend @tarazkp. As a teacher with over 45 years of experience, I can assure you that it is incredibly important to discuss the impact of how we learn rather than just what we learn. I hope more people realise the importance of teaching effective learning methods and encouraging critical thinking rather than passive consumption, as is happening and on the rise.
Unfortunately, I don't think learning how to learn is on any of the curriculums, and it definitely isn't taught through the crap people watch on screens.
I wonder why she was so excited to get them on meds? So that they could be like "the other families"? So that she wouldn't have to feel so bad for the kids having more energy (normal) and being (seemingly) outta control? I try to steer clear from people who are overly happy about getting themselves or their family members on meds of any kind.
These drugs are certainly rotting our youth. I do think there will be outliers and "greats" in the next few generations who slip through this mass of dumbed and zombified followers, as in all generations. Remember, 100 years ago they didn't have these medications, nor the Internet, and yet still the vast majority was of followers and zombies. Ours are different zombies, but the truth is, in any generation, the large majority will be followers, not leaders.
She wants her free time. She can't handle them, and wants to be able to spend time on her phone too. Her words. I don't think the kids are out of control at all.
But, what will be needed to be great? An outlier will depend on the masses too - they might not need be that far out to seem great.
Self-learning is important. My mother grew up in a small village and read the entire school library. She learned Polish on her own and at 20+ worked as a guide for Polish tourists in Moscow.
And during my school years, I read a lot of books and magazines in our city library :) Working with a large amount of information develops our brain and we grasp new information more easily.
In my family, parents taught us how to read before school. I am not sure if it was an advantage, but back then, I read a lot. Now, I can't read at all. Sad.
But you can write. On Hive it's more productive than reading :)
I seem to recall that this is not the first time when you were in similar situation. I guess history repeats itself.
or there are just many bad parents.Today is a sad day. I once again got a message from hivewatchers. They said that another person who frequently comments my posts is a scammer/ plagiarist. His comments seemed genuine... shame.
Nope - same woman. She is a strange one and the irony is - she works in the medical industry...
Lots of dicks out there...
The phrase we are growing followers struck me and I can't completely blame you, I myself have prejudices about current educational methods based on a sort of education I would say from fast food, consumerism made up of quick videos and interactive programs and also in courses It's like this for adults now, in my opinion in this way we lose not only the pleasure of learning, researching but also that of studying, of research, today we are used to having everything immediately, there are people who do their homework with chatgp...
What is worrying is that children are being conditioned to consume rather than create or think.
Building self-learning and creative thinking skills is key to their future success, but it is an aspect that is often forgotten in traditional curricula.
There is something that catches my attention, and he is a child with TDHA using a phone I don't think it's the best to reassure him or anything like that. I feel that the phones, computers and tablet are moving the children from reality, preventing them from finding solutions to problems, that have communication, action, emotions management and endless. In fact, there are studies that explain all the damage that makes the use of phones in children.
How hard these are the new children's toys.