Parents don't understand the Internet generation of kids.
The Internet generation of kids don't understand their parents.
There are gasps from both sides whenever anything is discussed.
Frontline, as always, is a great primer for this sort of thing.
This is peripheral, but As a current teenager, I'd like to say for the record that all of my favorite teachers have always done it with nothing but a piece of chalk and an eraser. At least IMHO, the medium doesn't matter one tenth as much as the teacher him/herself does."We can't possibly expect the learner of today to be engrossed by someone who speaks in a monotone voice with a piece of chalk in their hand," one school principal says.
Something I think about a lot, slightly related, which I'd like your opinion on: Do you think we -- the internet generation -- will understand our children, and break the mold? Has the internet exacerbated generational gaps, which to some extent have always existed, and split us with our parents in a way that's worse than it has ever been or will be? Has it, in turn, caused us to have the tech savviness to stay "in touch"? My thinking is that we will understand our children better than we were understood by our parents. I think the difference lies in understanding new technologies, and understanding how to understand new technologies. We who use the internet do the latter almost weekly -- but our parents, grandparents, and so on dealt with new technologies much more rarely by comparison. The training that the "internet generation" has in picking up technological ideas will mean that we never get outstripped by our children to the extent that we have outstripped our parents. What do you think?
I doubt it. The technology is trivial in this story. If its not technology, then its music or clothing, or some other confounding factor. There are stories from the Middle Ages about young people wanting to marry for love, but their love is forbidden by parents for political or social reasons. Children never think their parents understand them, and parents always forget what its like to be a child. My parents had no idea what I did as an adolescent. The internet wasn't a part of my life, but it didn't change the fundamental dynamic of young-against-old. That is a story as old a fiction itself, and your kids will not want you to intrude on their social life, whether it be in physical or metaphysical space. Kids need space. Currently, they have found a new way to communicate that gives them privacy in an age where your parents will be thrown in jail for letting you go to the park by yourself. The how is trivial. The story is timeless.
Hmm. In the Middle Ages, when you were born, you knew what you were going to spend the rest of your life doing, because it's what your dad/mom did. Lives were a lot less complicated then, so I somewhat reject that comparison as valid. About half of the people I mention this to align with your viewpoint, by the way. But in my opinion the internet has changed things to an extent that no technology before ever has. Think about it -- what technology has ever existed that was more or less the exclusive domain of the children? Cars? No. Radio? No. TV? No. Just something to consider.
That's a thought-provoking question and one I hadn't considered before. My impulse is to say something about how you might be right based on the fact that the Internet has done a marvelous job of erasing age barriers; I certainly feel that I have a better handle on my younger counterparts than my less-Internet-infused friends. I'm gonna think about that as I drive clear to Morro Bay and back this morning for a brunch date.
I use the Internet for chatting with programmers via irc, learning (on youtube, blogposts, stackoverflow, coursera, academicearth, stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, wikipedia, c2 wiki, etc.), writing todo lists, writing documents, read the news, and have discussions. I use social networks to ask about homework, but that's it. That video was displaying the worst possible, most extreme scenario of how kids might use the Web/Internet, it's not an accurate portrayal of what most teenagers actually use the Internet for. Sure, these things happen, but it isn't as prevalent as Frontline portrays. P.S. In case you might not know, I'm a teenager.