My nine-year-old daughter is now enthusiastically networking on MSN Messenger sites, splitting her after-school time between telly, homework and now social media. (She does get out the house, too).
We now have three school age children for whom a large chunk of their home life is taken up by online networking. And now all the MSN Messenger, Facebook, MySpace and Twitter activity in our house has just been brought into a sharp national educational focus.
Leaked plans show government proposals to include social media skills on the primary school curriculum. ‘Twitter in the classroom’ has been the headline, but it hasn’t as yet produced the kind of kneejerk outrage it may have done in the past.
There’s been some mildly exaggerated ‘traditional subjects to lose out’ stories but there seems to be an acknowledgement that the social media teaching is needed - because kids are already doing it.
So far I’ve not seen much linkage between this and the recent furore over Baroness Susan Greenfield’s speech in the House of Lords that social media usage could be altering youngsters’ minds - destroying the ability to concentrate, leading to a new hyperactive human brain.
Check out the speech, the lady certainly has a turn of phrase perfect for a mid-market tabloid. It led to a recent BBC 2 Newsnight confrontation between a scientist supporter of hers and Ben Goldacre, the energetic doctor-writer behind the Bad Science website and Guardian column, which is worth looking at.
Goldacre loses his cool in a way which does no service to his claim to his debunking stye - a rational, ‘let’s focus on the peer-reviewed science” position.
On the Bad Science site, it’s disappointing to see the ‘Ben’s mates’ comments, all slagging off Greenfield’s case because the science on this is in its infancy.
In between the two over-heated standpoints are yer average parents and their children, who don’t need to be experts to know that the Internet is changing our world irrevocably - and in ways which would cause any rational person to ask whether it is affecting us in a neurological as well as social sense.
I hope the schools don’t just teach ‘how to’ lessons but also help guide kids through the emotional landmines of putting yourself ‘out there.’ When Personal Brand Building starts at 9, receptive and naive young minds are going to need help if they are to do their growing up online.
PS Parents spend a lot of time intrigued and often anxious about what their kids are up to online. We sneak a look at the screen, the kids click off in a ‘don’t invade my privacy’ style . So in taking our eldest two to the stunning production of Macbeth at Manchester’s Royal Exchange, what did we get? Child rape, child murder and full frontal male nudity. The cocaine-sniffing scene was almost light relief. It’s not got a ‘15′ reccommendation for nothing. Thank goodness it was Cultural.
Tags: Bad Science, education, Royal Exchange, social media
