Technology is not to blame, you are
Recently, PCF introduced technology into our sign-in system. Instead of the manual signature by the parents, parents use the iPad to take picture to sign in. Seems like a no-brainer as this digital storage of information will be better for the administrative duties too.
The best thing is that they can take picture of the person fetched the kids from school. In case of any dispute, they are able to track it and prevent any incidents where our children can be fetched by any random stranger.
Technology can really help us a lot.
So I was surprised to overheard a parent complaining to the teacher that they should not have used technology. Now his daughter is able to use the iPad effortlessly and he thinks it's not a good exposure. In his words, the school should not be exposing them to gadgets at such a young age. Mind you, his daughter is around 4 years old and not as young as my daughter at 2 years old.
Of course, the teacher explained that they are unable to play games with the iPad. Moreover, use of technology should always be supervised and the children should not be left alone with these devices. At a tender age before 2 years old, my daughter is able to press the correct applications that leads to her favourite children's songs and games. Of course, those apps are approved and downloaded by me. She also likes watching YouTube due to the music and dances.
I try to give her around 30 minutes of screen time every day, I supervised her and accompany her to play with the games or sing along with the music. For me, I think technology is not a bad idea.
It's how you use it that is the issue.
As our government keeps advocating about smart nation, children will grow up with technology as a double-edged sword and take it as part and parcel of their lives. We use our mobile phones every day and they will want to use them too. They behave just like us and frankly, at this young age, all they know how to do is to imitate us. We cannot keep them out from technology but we can educate them.
That's where the role of the parent comes in.
Instead of stopping the school or the nation from using technology, it is best the parents do their part in supervising and controlling how they use the gadgets.
As to the issue on privacy, that's a hotly debated topic for another day.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Follow me to be updated on more family issues.
The best thing is that they can take picture of the person fetched the kids from school. In case of any dispute, they are able to track it and prevent any incidents where our children can be fetched by any random stranger.
Technology can really help us a lot.
So I was surprised to overheard a parent complaining to the teacher that they should not have used technology. Now his daughter is able to use the iPad effortlessly and he thinks it's not a good exposure. In his words, the school should not be exposing them to gadgets at such a young age. Mind you, his daughter is around 4 years old and not as young as my daughter at 2 years old.
Of course, the teacher explained that they are unable to play games with the iPad. Moreover, use of technology should always be supervised and the children should not be left alone with these devices. At a tender age before 2 years old, my daughter is able to press the correct applications that leads to her favourite children's songs and games. Of course, those apps are approved and downloaded by me. She also likes watching YouTube due to the music and dances.
I try to give her around 30 minutes of screen time every day, I supervised her and accompany her to play with the games or sing along with the music. For me, I think technology is not a bad idea.
It's how you use it that is the issue.
As our government keeps advocating about smart nation, children will grow up with technology as a double-edged sword and take it as part and parcel of their lives. We use our mobile phones every day and they will want to use them too. They behave just like us and frankly, at this young age, all they know how to do is to imitate us. We cannot keep them out from technology but we can educate them.
That's where the role of the parent comes in.
Instead of stopping the school or the nation from using technology, it is best the parents do their part in supervising and controlling how they use the gadgets.
As to the issue on privacy, that's a hotly debated topic for another day.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Follow me to be updated on more family issues.
Jes
If you have benefited from this post, support our first business venture at snackfirst.com or like us on Facebook!
%2B(6).JPG)
Hi Jes,
ReplyDeleteI can understand why the parent don't want the kid to be exposed to tech so early. In my line, I've seen a lot of kids, esp boys, who are addicted to mobile phone games. To them, a phone is a device to play games, and with the mobile phone, it's really hard to control.
It's still work in progress for me on how to decide how much tech is suitable for my kid. It helps that both me and my wife don't really use the phone to watch videos or even play games, so hopefully my kid will learn that from me too. It's only hard when the parents present one kid of pattern but the kid is forced to follow another - this inconsistency will create a lot of conflicts.
I guess if I want my kid to do this and that, as role models for them, we also have to suck it up too.
Hi LP,
DeleteI think the addiction to tech will come from the time spent outside of school instead of during school, since they don't get to play with any gadgets during lessons.
Yeah, definitely if the parents are not overly glued to the mobile, then the children will likely follow suit. That's true, children know about double standards and that will not work. If you and your wife use the computer or laptop, then your kid will want to join you too!
As parents we can control the amount of tech exposed to the kids. However, we can't really stop the school and society from going high tech anyway. Then the family has to stop going PCF, and cannot even go to those restaurants that use iPad, haha!