The World of Technology
In this week’s lecture we talked a lot about internet identity and viewed an interesting video by Michael Wesch. The video talked about how we as humans have a huge power right at our fingertips, we can become famous or set trends or been seen by the whole world in literally the click of a button. Kinda creepy right? From my perspective if used correctly, the internet can be an extremely useful tool. Key words, USED CORRECTLY. That’s the issue, lots of the time the internet is used for the wrong reasons and can easily get people into trouble.
How laptops have recently evolved!!
Click here to read an article all about how technology has changed in education!
With that being said, the internet will be used for a very very long time and has evolved drastically. It will be used for all purposes, one example being teaching. Since all students know about the technology world, what better way to keep students engaged than to use what they are most familiar with? The internet can be used for lesson planning, teaching different topics, videos, it increases student engagement and the list can go on. Not only will technology and social media be useful for in school hours, but as well as staying connected outside of school hours, on weekends, posting assignments for those who maybe missed a class, a place that students can ask questions, or simply be a safe place to chat if needed. An amazing example of this is throughout Covid-19. How would schools work and students learn if we didn’t have technology? As technology is becoming more and more common, we as teachers need to be educating our students how to use the interest correctly and the hazards that come with misusing this tool. We need to educate them on the harm they can do to themselves as well as other people and that what goes on the internet is there for an extremely long time. Katia mentioned an example in lecture about not telling children to not sext because they won’t listen to an adult constantly bickering at them, but to teach them how to sext in a way that it less likely to get them into trouble. Here’s the link to the super cool slideshow that Katia presented in lecture.
Another thing that I believe needs to be talked about more often is cyberbullying! I think that there are common myths and misconceptions about cyberbullying and it is our job to educate our students to protect them and others. Cyberbullying has made bullying so much easier because you can be mean to random people across the world or even make it so people don’t know its you. More often than not, children think it’s okay to bully someone they don’t know but it’s important to teach them that just because they’re “random people” doesn’t mean that it hurts them any less.
Over all, I think that the internet and social media can be used in great ways and can be very useful, but it is also extremely dangerous if people are uneducated on the dangers associated with it. It is important as teachers to not only teach students the appropriate way to use technology but for us to also abide by our lessons. Thanks for tuning in this week!