Your kids are tech savvy -- are you?
Tech Beat -
By Gregg Foster
Published Tuesday, August 8, 2006
Last Father's Day I was treated to a very special PowerPoint presentation titled, “Why we appreciate dad.” The program was put together by a team led by my 11-year old son Riley, who was joined by my 7-year-old son Will and my wife Beth (you'll have to ask her how old she is). The presentation was relatively short and well organized. The slides were easy to read, interesting, and related well to the presenters' comments. All in all, it rated much higher than many adult-prepared presentations I've had the privilege of enduring.
At first, of course, I merely concentrated on the content of the presentation. To be honest, it was one of the best Father's Day presents I've ever received. It was a real gift to sit quietly and have my kids run through the various topics, complete with family photos pasted in from our digital camera files. They also used photos and animations from various web-based sources to illustrate their particular points. It was funny, moving, and, in a few cases, a bit too accurate in describing some of my more peculiar personality “traits.”
Later, however, the rational mind took over and I thought about the broader implications of what I had just sat through. It's amazing how far we've come since I was a kid, when high-tech meant having the crayon sharpener included in your box of 64 colors. This advance creates great opportunities for our children and, at the same time, real challenges for parents. For example:
Our children's ability to access information vastly exceeds that of the previous generation and is growing exponentially. It was not that long ago that research meant spending long hours in the university library scanning books and periodicals (if they weren't checked out) and making copies of pages to be taken home, organized, and excerpted on index cards. The research process involved lots of logistical tedium that did not necessarily produce better results. I contrast that to now, where my kids regularly use Google to conduct research or to satisfy a particular curiosity. Do you need to write a report on Bartholomew Dias? No problem, just search his name and you have all the information, maps, pictures, etc. you'll ever need. Want to see where we are going on our vacation? Check it out on Google Earth. What used to take me hours in the library as a college student can often be done in seconds via the web.
Our children's access to information means that we parents need to be vigilant. To my chagrin, I realized that I was not fully aware of my children's skill in accessing the resources of the World Wide Web. I needed to pay more attention to what they were doing while using the family computer. I immediately set all of the parental controls to their strictest level. You can do this via your preferences on your web browser and, in addition, through the preferences link on Google's home page. This will reduce the prospect of your kids accidentally being exposed to inappropriate content or images.
Parents need to be educated. If some of the sentences in the previous paragraph do not make sense to you, then go out and get yourself educated now. There are plenty of examples of kids getting themselves in trouble as a result of their web-based activities. In many of these cases the parents had no idea what their kids were up to. There are many sites that discuss how parents can make sure their children are safe when using the World Wide Web. Two decent examples are: http://yahooligans.yahoo.com/parents/ and http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/children/default.mspx.
Beyond educating ourselves on safely using the Internet, it's also important that we educate ourselves on the specific applications that our children are learning. Don't be surprised if your kid asks you to help them create their on-line presentations or graph the results of experiments they are tracking in a spreadsheet program. What will your answer be when they ask?
The bottom line is that our children will benefit from very powerful learning and communications tools that are way beyond that we had access to not that many years ago.
A good place to find out about local technology resources is the Redwood Technology Consortium. Drop by one of the monthly meetings. They are free and the public is always welcome. Where and when are the RTC meetings? Visit the website to find out, at www.redwoodtech.org.
Gregg Foster is the executive director of the
Redwood Region Economic Development Commission (www.rredc.com) and a member of
the Board of Directors of the Redwood Technology Consortium.