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Is Technology 'Dumbing Down' Our Kids?
From hand-held video games, to cell phones, to instant messaging and laptops, technology is everywhere. In light of this, parents and educators have long-standing concerns about the correlation between technology and learning, worrying about everything from loss of language skills, to attention deficits, to an overall impact on intelligence. So, is technology ‘dumbing down’ our kids?
“I don’t believe that technology can make someone dumber or smarter,” states Naomi Hupert, a senior researcher at the Center for Children and Technology in New York. However, Hupert is careful to point out that there are some valid reasons to be concerned about the impact of technology on children. One is that we don’t yet understand its overall impact and how it will affect us 20 or 30 years down the road. Another concern centres on usage. “Depending on how you use it, your outcome varies,” explains Hupert. Your child may learn a new language by using a CD-ROM or spend the same time shooting at “criminals” in a video game.
Language and Writing 
Does technology have a negative impact on the way we communicate, read and write? Reading expert and author of Proust and the Squid: the Story and Science of the Reading Brain, Maryanne Wolf warns that the reading brain may be lost to the digital culture. “We must work as a society to preserve the development of particular aspects of reading, both for this generation and for generations to come,” writes Wolf about the onset of technology.
These days, many children and teens use texting (text messaging) and instant messaging to communicate with friends and family. And, even if you know what ROFL or LTR mean, the vast amount of acronyms, slang and new spellings used in texts can be bewildering. Hupert’s not convinced this negatively affects language. “It doesn’t mean that if you ‘text’ that you will write the way you text,” says Hupert. “People often learn various dialects and slang…[and we understand that there are] certain ways of writing that are appropriate for some environments and not for others.”
Analogous to this, Maryanne Wolf points out that 2,000 years ago Socrates warned against the use of the written word because it was a superficial way of learning. The same thing happened with the invention of the printing press and the typewriter. All along, humans have managed to rewire their brains to adapt to new technologies and ways of communicating.
Social Skills and Attention Span
According to a study from California’s Kaiser Family Foundation, 8 to 18-year-olds spend about 6.5 hours a day consuming digital media and much of that time is spent media multitasking. Can that be good for kids? Shouldn’t that time be better spent outdoors with friends or reading the classics? “I think anything done to excess is excessive,” says Hupert. She goes on to say that this thinking applies to any task i.e. a child who spends all his time doing math homework, playing basketball, reading magazines or playing video games.
If a child is spending an inordinate amount of time online or playing video games, you may want to enforce a time limit and/or get the whole family involved. Many of today’s gaming systems have two, three or four player options – families can sing popular songs, try out new dances or compete in tennis together. This alleviates some of the concerns around isolation and inactivity.
Overall, though, there’s no need to worry, says Don Tapscott in Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing Your World. He argues that from ages 8-18, the brain is still being built and that kids’ brains are becoming hard-wired to live in a digital culture. In other words, technology is literally rewriting their brains. In addition, he asserts that, “the challenges of the Internet could actually provoke the Net Gener (11 to 30-year-old person) to do the hard thinking to make sense of a broader scope of information than the one that would have been available to the Boomer.”
Ironically, technology may have a hugely positive impact on those children diagnosed with attention issues. Hupert talks about informal studies done in classrooms where those with ADD-like symptoms (inability to focus, hyperactivity) “shined when they had to do a PowerPoint presentation.” While Hupert and other educators aren’t sure what it is about technology that made the difference (more creativity? more freedom?), these exercises show that technology can be valuable when it comes to learning.
Down the Road
As parents and children are increasingly more reliant on technology to work, play and learn, we can breathe a little easier knowing that it can be a partner in the learning process. Taking part in educational online activities like those on TVOKids.com, playing games as a family on the Wii or reading slang-filled text messages may actually offer learning opportunities never before available.
Stay tuned for an upcoming Your Voice show on the same topic.
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