A paean for technology-free(?) childhood
(Credit: Matt Asay)Technology keeps making its way into younger demographics, a trend that is likely to continue for the foreseeable future. I caught my 3-year-old trying to send "text messages, Daddy" the other day.
I guess I should teach her the difference between cordless and wireless.
To be globally competitive, the United States does need to inculcate high-tech training earlier in life for would-be developers, and companies like Red Hat have targeted youth as young as high-school age with training programs.
But I don't want my kids immersed in technology too much, too soon. I was a literature major, and still prefer reading Dostoevsky to Ars Technica, much as I enjoy the latter. Technology can assist in learning, of course, including with literature, but I also feel that something is lost when our experience is intermediated by technology, because the rhythm of technology moves much faster than old-world academics and maturation.
Nick Carr wrote about this in his insightful "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" article in The Atlantic, and took a barrage of criticism for it. But there's some truth to the notion that the Internet's immediacy makes us impatient with books or anything that doesn't deliver information in soundbites and searches.
I make my living from software, so I'm not advocating that we dump it anytime soon. Rather, I'm just hoping (and parenting toward that hope) that my kids will grow up playing soccer rather than manipulating FIFA09 on their Wii; that they'll read Tolkien, Austen, and Dahl rather than Nick.com; and that they'll text less and write more prose. We still need people who can do those things.
Matt Asay is general manager of the Americas and vice president of business development at Alfresco, and has nearly a decade of operational experience with commercial open source and regularly speaks and publishes on open-source business strategy. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.
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You know a lot of this is up to you as the parent. It's up to you to see that they play soccer, read books, write more/text less. She's 3 years old. What you teach her today will have more and longer lasting effect on her than anything you can do in the future. Stop blaming outside influences for her education, or lack thereof, and start taking some responsibility for her development.
I think the most damaging aspect is that it prevents people from actually thinking and making logical connections.
Kids, though, do need time away from technology. Our house, luckily, has a yard with paths through bushes up and down the hill, open fields, trees and rocks and "stuff" to help keep them occupied and while they don't know about text messaging they are learning about the internet and that just about everything is available at www.<anything>.com! Ugh!
Thank goodness for DansGuardian content filter! At least it may catch comething before I have time to click the close button!
However I dont know what impact it would have on my character. I am a person of technology who puts humans first.. the machines should be an extension of the mind.. a servant not the ruler. If I grew up immersed in technology I would not perhaps have the views I have now. It kinda bothers me that everyone seems to be holding and using a gadget all the time? everywhere! People roam along silently or talking on gismos, and they never have the time to interact or even look each other in the eye. Sure they are interacting with someone on the phone or internet via the gadget but they are not interacting with the people around them. Its like they live in a bubble. I love technology but when do people stop people people and start becoming cyborgs?
ping back from http://computerboom.blogspot.com/2008/11/paean-for-technology-free-childhood.html