After a semester of observing families play computer games, and interviewing mothers about their children's media habits (from a grounded theory approach), I found what I'd call positive results (I am viewing all of this mainly from a learning/education perspective). The two families played Disney's Toontown Online, and both parents felt their kids were learning positive things (like community building and literacy skills, such as reading and computer). The four mothers (3 from U.S. and 1 from India) all generally felt t.v. and video/computer games were culturally and instructionally useful, but also consistently reflected that after 1-2 hours of media a day, kids behavior would get negative, selfish, and defiant (these were 2-5 year olds). There's more to all this to report, but that's the summary.
The interesting thing, though, was what I found in my literature review. Maybe I shouldn't be suprised, but I'd say 90% of what I found was paranoid advice. With all the positive family-media experiences I witnessed, it's logical to me that parents should be informed on educational/cultural strengths of media so they can take advantage of them for their children's benefit (as well as the whole family). I saw parents helping siblings to teach each other gaming strategies - and the sharing working - and I saw children excitedly taking direction from their parents. Positive interactions any family would want.
So I was suprised when I found groups like
The National Institute on Media and the Family who bleakly give the impression that no media is the best media. They give parents strategies on how to police their children's media habits and limit consumption. This is important, as media is dangerous and parents are wise to limit and be aware of what their children are seeing. But where is the pro-active approach? What about examining what good things happen when families spend time together with media? And then creating ways to share and teach best practices? In any case, the academic approach to family media habits seems pretty lopsided right now.
Comments? I'd be interested to hear what others think (especially disagreements) about media in the family setting.
4 comments:
Cblakes-
I am in your corner on this one. The world is constintly progressing and it seems to me that using new media and technilogical breakthroughs to teach children makes sense. Why would I not want to do something that will teach my child something that I can't? I think that it is important to be well rounded and try many approaches to learning.
Where does the National Institute on Media and the Family draw their line on what is media and what isn't? What about a book that has buttons that make noises, sounds, and say words? What about a short movie or show that teaches sign language. We have both a book and a movie that teaches sign to children. The book is cute and fun, but its very unclear how the signs and motions work. The movies are fun and clearly show how the signs are and what they mean. I would never say that one type of media is better than the other in all situations, but its clear that TV wins in this case.
One problem with media/games for teaching falls strictly on the parent. It is used as a babysitter. They dump their children in front of the tv and let the tv do the teaching. I see the huge positives in this kind of education (I seem to favor it myself for my personal education) but their is still a level of responsibility on the parent/educator involved.
Chris, you and I had talked about multi-player role playing games building people skills and team work skills. I feel that that only works if it is moderated and if there is human contact to back it up. There needs to be a human interface not just a computer screen.
I work on a computer all day. And on some jobs it has been virtually solitary work for long periods of time (days/weeks). It definitely alters how I interact with others. It tends to be negative in it's impact. I find myself not expressing myself as well as I would like and finding it frustrating when others aren't reacting/doing/performing what I want them to. I find myself wanting them to be a computer almost.
I have seen the same in my four year old son. While these games do help him learn at what seems to be an accelerated rate, it has its costs. He does become very self-centered and disobedient if we let him play to long. The only way to avoid that in my experience is for someone else, a parent, to sit down and play, encourage, and coach the child. There needs to be a balancing human interaction.
I definitely think there is a whole new world opening up with technology and education. But I fear that people often remove the human interaction that is so critical to human development. I fear we will become like people I know who can only relate to others through the computer via chat, email, websites. However in person they feel outside their element not having that buffer of a computer between them.
Just to clarify. I see your post you are advocating family involvement, not the babysitting method. I think what you had to say was great. Involving the whole family around a game is an excellent concept.
I think those that oppose media (I think they define anything video related as bad media) for education study what happens when a child is left alone to interact with a game/computer. That is just speculation but that is I imagine is their focus.
awesome. I responded on the next post. Thanks!
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