Kids and the Internet

I sent the following out as an e-mail to my staff this morning, thought that some of you out there might find it useful as well.


Last night I watched the Frontline program about kids and the internet, while the program focused on kids using social networking sites (like MySpace and Facebook) it did have a lot of interviews with real kids and their views on social networking sites and the internet. You can watch the whole show on-line here:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/kidsonline/?campaign=pbshomefeatures_1_frontlinebrgrowinguponline_2008-01-23


Also out this week, a British study about Kids and internet researching skills. Basically it found that kids may be internet savvy, BUT they are not skilled when it comes to filtering information or searching smartly for information on the internet. Here is an excerpt from the article:

Just because today’s kids grew up using the Internet doesn’t mean they’re adept at using the Web, says a new British study.
"Information Behaviour of the Researcher of the Future" says that although there’s only patchy knowledge about how children and young adults become competent using the Internet, some clear news has emerged. Most notably, the information literacy of young people hasn’t improved with the growing access to technology.
In fact, "their apparent facility with computers disguises some worrying problems." For instance, the speed with which students search the Web means that "little time is spent in evaluating information, either for relevance, accuracy or authority," says the report, commissioned by the British Library and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) [http://www.jisc.ac.uk]. JISC is an organization that supports education and research by promoting innovative technologies.

To read the whole article go here: http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6524475.html?nid=2413

I think this study reinforces what I am trying to teach in the media center, that you cannot just ask kids to go home and go to Google, they need to be TAUGHT how to access the information that is out there!

I did not put this in the article, but I think that some TEACHERS and PARENTS also need to be taught how to access and evaluate information. Like the old saying goes, knowledge is POWER!