"Do You Feel Lucky?" "Go Ahead, Make My Day" Adolescent Facebook user meets Dirty Harry-Dad
I, as a parent of a recently-out-of-teens celloson, just had to post this. At the end of this article however, I want to make a point about "Tech Savvy" kids...
Of course, nobody is advocating violence against defenseless computers. (even if they are Winboxes) but it does bring up a valid point that everyone, not just teenagers, needs to be aware of audience when venturing into the tangled thicket of social media. It's not just your immediate audience but the potential audience. It's not just adolescents who don't stop to consider the potential audience for remarks made online. A couple of years ago, several of us counseled an Administrator-in-training who was trash-talking on Facebook, the school at which he was cross-training. Just recently, I read remarks made by a teacher about the school at which he currently works and saying that he will take any job to get away from there.
This is a message that has been made before but it probably bears repeating. I tell staff members not to use the organizational email to write anything that you wouldn't want read by your Administrator, a Police Officer, an Attorney, or your Mother. When we put words out on the internet, it's just impossible to predict where they will end up.
Teens can be precocious, difficult, and presumptuous. Oh, and whiny. So given how tech-savvy they've all become, one idea to offer them perspective might be to take their laptop and blast it with a gun.
No, no, this is not my advice. This is the advice of Tommy Jordan, a man who appears to run an IT company in North Carolina called Twisted Networks.
Jordan, you see, became frustrated when he discovered his daughter Hannah (we're guessing at the spelling of her name) had posted a rather whiny message about her parents and her domestic responsibilities on her Facebook wall. She thought, Jordan said, that mom and he were blocked from seeing it.
Psst, Hannah. Dad works in IT. He seems to be able to circumvent those little privacy settings on Facebook with a mere flick of his gun-toting wrist.
Follow up (13 Feb 12):
[It seems that, once the first million people enjoyed his laptop-blasting exploits, the police and child-protective services operatives paid him a visit. They may have wondered whether his 15-year-old daughter, Hannah-- she who believes she is a "slave" and ought to be paid for doing household chores-- is safe and happy. The Daily offered, from a perusal of Jordan's Facebook page, that all now seemed calm at Casa Jordan.]
The Myth of Tech-Savvy kids:
There are several terms that drive me nuts when I hear them used in schools. Preëminent among these is the term "Tech-Savvy" when used to describe millennial children. Our kids, for the most part, are very adept Consumers of digital technologies. They skillfully consume Smartphones, social media, and streaming audio and video content. The problem is that in the 21st century, society is increasingly looking for people who are equally adept digital Producers of knowledge and content and who are comfortable with digitalCollaboration and Communication.
Where are our young people supposed to acquire these skills? In the schools, of course. Who is supposed to teach them? Teachers, of course. Who is supposed to encourage, insist and empower teachers to learn to teach millennial kids the skills, aptitudes, and habits of mind necessary for success in the world in which they will live and work? School, District, and State-level Administrators, of course. When Administration doesn't get "it", teachers won't get it. When teachers don't get "it", children won't get it.
What's the other term that sends me up the wall? I would like to see the word Technology banned from the shared vocabulary of people who work in schools. (Wait, isn't Technology a good thing?) I don't have a problem with digital technology in schools; obviously. What bothers me is that every time an educator in the school uses the word "Technology", people immediately get mental images of pads and tablets, laptops and iMacs, interactive whiteboards, and the whole panoply of goods that are purchased for schools and apportioned to deserving or lucky teachers. What they aren't thinking about are processes, outcomes, collaboration, communication, knowledge production. Educators, when they hear someone say "Technology", think about things rather than content, strategy, and learning outcomes. Until the word "Technology" elicits the same visceral and cognitive response as words like "Office Supplies, Paper, Textbooks, Markers, and Classrooms," I'll have a problem with it.
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