Back in the 1990’s, I commented to my colleagues that I felt the need to place a cardboard box around my head when teaching so that my students would relate to me as a screen and so bring the same level of focus and attention to my lesson that they were bringing to the emerging medium of computer screens.
The demands of students, coupled with society’s focus on the future of education, gave rise to the Digital Education Revolution referred to first in 2007 (1) and then implemented by the successive Labour Government with the aim being to:
Contribute sustainable and meaningful change to teaching and learning in Australian schools that will prepare students for further education, training, jobs of the future and to live and work in a digital world (Australian Government DEEWR 2008: 1).
Several orbits more around the sun to the present day and both my personal observation and the Rudd / Gillard election promise have both been fulfilled. The authority and the source knowledge in classrooms are now shared between the teacher and a screen. Each classroom has an interactive whiteboard, a row of desktops and access to iPads, as well as specialist lessons every week in Digital Technology and Robotics. Teachers are exhorted at every turn to update their digital pedagogy and to present lessons that appeal to the (ostensibly) preferred learning style of digital natives. If a student has difficulty with an academic topic a likely solution will be found by pairing them with an animated and colourful online platform that they can engage with over and over at any time of the day until the concept is grasped.
Now I am no technological Luddite – I love the way my lessons connect globally through this interface, as well as the almost unlimited access to information I have at my fingertips and the ability to connect and share resources remotely with colleagues and students.
I do however, question if we are collectively using screen technology in a balanced and judicious way or have we been oversold on screens as a go to, quick fix solution for all and any issues, which arise in the educating of our children? Is it possible we have jumped a little too enthusiastically onto an evangelical techno bandwagon without first discerning the far ranging, long term effects – adopting the approach of shoot, or view, first; ask questions later? Have we discerned what we might be avoiding looking at by consistently applying it as the ‘one size fits all’ solution for what is ailing and failing in our education system?
There are currently emerging some sobering statistics on the negative effects of digitalisation and screens on children’s physical health: 70% of teenagers now suffer from screen related sleep disorders - a figure which has doubled in the last 15 years (2); behavioural optometrists report a marked increase in eye trouble in children, including a loss in peripheral vision and early onset screen distance related deterioration in the eyes. Such data alone offer a point of consideration for us to stop and take a moment to evaluate the underlying costs associated with our societal attachment to screens.
Perhaps even more so do we need to evaluate the mental and emotional effects of this new normal and the way in which it is / has reconstructed how we relate to each other and to our children in schools.
Personal observation shows how for many children gaining access to a device takes on the status of a coveted reward, a reward that is tenaciously fought for in precisely the same way that any addictive substance is sought across a wide range of addictions and eliciting the same intense levels of reactivity in its absence, or when threatened with its potential loss or removal. It would be very rare to find an adult who would intentionally place a known drug in a child’s hands. Why then are we allowing this more common screen addiction to occur and increase, unchecked by adults?
Moreover, once the coveted prize, the screen device, is ‘won,’ it is common to observe how some children go into what some call ‘the zone.’ In ‘the zone,’ children’s eyes glaze over; they become unaware of their physical surroundings and of the people, large or small, in their immediate environment. When in this ‘fantasy land’ of their own creation, their expression and demeanour often bear a remarkable similarity to that of older folk in care facilities who have been diagnosed with the onset of dementia.
Confronted by this screen associated phenomenon daily, it is difficult not to conclude that we are indeed creating and allowing a form of juvenile dementia to unfold moment by moment, before our eyes.
And yet we continue to accept this as normal. What are we normalising and what is our relationship with our students when we allow these behaviours to continue without comment or responsive intervention on our part?
Observation, common sense and personal anecdotal evidence all indicate that many disaffected young people seek and respect connection and responsible role modelling and parenting from the adults in their lives.
Online connectivity is a very poor substitute for this type of true connection.
Connection and connectivity are clearly not the same thing at all. Why then are we allowing confusion between the two to dominate our relationships, in effect substituting online connectivity for true connection?
We teachers can certainly share source knowledge with an electronic white board because it is our humanity that our students seek above and beyond the curriculum we teach. It is also our humanity that will ultimately ensure that we have children utilising screens in a manner that enhances their academic learning, rather than using them as a means of escape from life or from true relationships.
It would be care-less and unwise to allow any third party to stymy the relationship between the teacher and student – including the third-party screen. Holding clearly this uncompromising foundation will sensibly bring about the much-needed conversation about the truly judicious use of screens in schools.
(1) Australian Government, Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR) (2008). Digital Education Revolution, Commonwealth of Australia http://www.digitaleducationrevolution.gov.au/ [Accessed 11 February 2009]
(2) Teen Sleep Problems and Solutions. Presented by Dr Chris Seton at Generation Next – The Mental Health and Well Being of Young People, Brisbane, May 25, 2018
(3) Apple acknowledges the iKid generation at its developer conference with new parental controls-https://theconversation.com/apple-acknowledges-the-ikid-generation-at-its-developer-conference-with-new-parental-controls-97853?utm_medium=email&utm