This was a good presentation.
galloway is excellent
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That was solid. Thanks.
I’m glad he mentioned Haidt.
I’d strongly recommend his latest book about what and how social media is doing to the latest generation. I’ve posted about my 16 year old daughter elsewhere, and this book is on point about a lot of what she is going through and what we as parents missed.
galloway is excellent
This.
my kids are young; 8 and 10. the eldest has class mates that have zero limits. they have phones, watches, unsupervised access to as far as I can tell anything.
whilst it is going to become increasingly difficult, they do not at present have access to those things and i’ve kicked the phone issue down the road by providing an xplora watch so they can call / text parents but have no access to the net.
i do not see anything that is going to change my current view that access to insta, tiktok, youtube etc will cause my harm than good unsupervised - they watch craft stuff on youtube
Haidt makes a number of what I consider to be reasonable and doable recommendations:
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On the parental level, a commitment to not allow smart phones until a certain age. He recognizes the role peer pressure places here, where if every other kid in school has one, the pressure is on your kid to get one or to be the odd one out. But if parents can agree among themselves, then it could be different. This is something a PTA could organize, where parents sign pledges and that the commitment only comes about once a certain threshold is met. Flip phones are still an option.
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On the school level – no phones, period. Phones are locked up at the beginning of the school day, in a locked pouch or otherwise, and not made available until the end of the day. No phones during class or during breaks, recess, or lunch. He also recommends more recess and free play time through the end of high school, without smart phones. At least during school hours, there would not only be no accessing social media, but little thinking or obsessing about social media. Sure, kids will try to sneak in phones, but that can be dealt with through reasonable but appropriate consequences.
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On a governmental level – Requiring true age verification – and he points out how this can be done in an efficient manner through third party services or internal controls on devices that don’t jeopardize privacy. Also, raise the legal age for social media from 13 to 16.
The problem with the video platforms is the next suggested video algorithms. You go from Minecraft videos to internet celebrities like Mr. Beast. Then it can quickly diverge into any number of paths.
My kids are older and have smart phones. We do put limits on them for most apps but allow unlimited calls and texts. Try to promote being social while curtailing social media. My oldest’s friend has parents who put no limits on her on anything. She is often up well past midnight one some sort of device. Her parents are strange in all sorts of ways.
Our schools have a strict zero phone policy. They go in lockers in the morning and can’t come out again until the end of the day.
Age restrictions on social media sounds like a good idea, but how do you define social media? Is Youtube social media? Texting? Roblox?
I don’t like most TED talks, and I much, much prefer to read over watching a video…but I will make time to listen to this one…maybe during a run.
The problem with the video platforms is the next suggested video algorithms. You go from Minecraft videos to internet celebrities like Mr. Beast. Then it can quickly diverge into any number of paths.
My kids are older and have smart phones. We do put limits on them for most apps but allow unlimited calls and texts. Try to promote being social while curtailing social media. My oldest’s friend has parents who put no limits on her on anything. She is often up well past midnight one some sort of device. Her parents are strange in all sorts of ways.
Our schools have a strict zero phone policy. They go in lockers in the morning and can’t come out again until the end of the day.
Age restrictions on social media sounds like a good idea, but how do you define social media? Is Youtube social media? Texting? Roblox?
My kids seem to have somehow navigated basically unlimited access to social media without at least any obvious issues.
If only they would condense TED talks to a one-page, bullet point summary. There’s a certain style that is off putting.
I prefer the Onion’s knock off version of inspirational talks, on topics that truly matter, such on whether it’s moral to have sex with a robot dog, even though the robot dog was so well constructed that you couldn’t tell the difference between it in a real dog. (Of course, it’s moral. It’s not a real dog. That you can’t tell the difference isn’t relevant.)
That was solid. Thanks.
I’m glad he mentioned Haidt.
I’d strongly recommend his latest book about what and how social media is doing to the latest generation. I’ve posted about my 16 year old daughter elsewhere, and this book is on point about a lot of what she is going through and what we as parents missed.
https://www.amazon.com/...idemic/dp/0593655036
I loved his original “The Coddling of the American Mind”. I just recently ordered his new “The Anxious Generation” and his prior coauthor’s new book “The Canceling of the American Mind”.
That was solid. Thanks.
I’m glad he mentioned Haidt.
I’d strongly recommend his latest book about what and how social media is doing to the latest generation. I’ve posted about my 16 year old daughter elsewhere, and this book is on point about a lot of what she is going through and what we as parents missed.
https://www.amazon.com/...idemic/dp/0593655036
I loved his original “The Coddling of the American Mind”. I just recently ordered his new “The Anxious Generation” and his prior coauthor’s new book “The Canceling of the American Mind”.
I’ve read “The Coddling of the American Mind,” and while I enjoyed it, I thought it may have been over alarming in parts. I do think he’s on solid ground advocating for a play based childhood, where children are given the freedom to play with other kids without parental supervision, make mistakes, incur reasonable risks, including getting hurt, and work things out on their own. He talks a lot about that in his most recent book.
I find it interesting that a lot of his criticism comes from some libertarians who don’t like any proposed solution that involves government regulation as well as some on the left who think his recommendations are too conservative or not sufficiently correct politically, especially since he’s pretty much a traditional liberal who probably agrees more on political issues with those on the left.
That was solid. Thanks.
I’m glad he mentioned Haidt.
I’d strongly recommend his latest book about what and how social media is doing to the latest generation. I’ve posted about my 16 year old daughter elsewhere, and this book is on point about a lot of what she is going through and what we as parents missed.
https://www.amazon.com/...idemic/dp/0593655036
I loved his original “The Coddling of the American Mind”. I just recently ordered his new “The Anxious Generation” and his prior coauthor’s new book “The Canceling of the American Mind”.
I’ve read “The Coddling of the American Mind,” and while I enjoyed it, I thought it may have been over alarming in parts. I do think he’s on solid ground advocating for a play based childhood, where children are given the freedom to play with other kids without parental supervision, make mistakes, incur reasonable risks, including getting hurt, and work things out on their own. He talks a lot about that in his most recent book.
I find it interesting that a lot of his criticism comes from some libertarians who don’t like any proposed solution that involves government regulation as well as some on the left who think his recommendations are too conservative or not sufficiently correct politically, especially since he’s pretty much a traditional liberal who probably agrees more on political issues with those on the left.
Yes, many pushed back at first. Though both Haidt and Lukianoff are liberals. I held that aspect back when convincing a right leaning family member to read the book. They oppose right and left ideology if it is against psychology or law.
if there’s room for some hope, then I think that additiona, reasonable restrictions on adolescents access to smart phones/social media may be one are where most people can agree regardless of party lines.
if there’s room for some hope, then I think that additiona, reasonable restrictions on adolescents access to smart phones/social media may be one are where most people can agree regardless of party lines.
Agreed.
My kids seem to have somehow navigated basically unlimited access to social media without at least any obvious issues.
The kids I know in my area use their phones in healthier ways than many adults I know. Granted most of the kids I know are high-performing.
That’s my worry about blunt force restrictions.
Effective use of smartphones is pretty much necessary skill to succeed in modern life at this point. The phones aren’t going away. I’ll defer to actual research, but I’d sure want to see that explicitly promoting the teaching and practice of healthy phone habits might be a better approach. Or at least an approach to use in combination with “banning” their use in certain situations.
You can ban the sale of Twinkies at school. It’s a lot harder to get kids to eat healthy outside of school. Telling kids what they “can’t do” often doesn’t work well vs. promoting what they can.
Plus there’s a certain adult hypocrisy involved when the adults all have their heads buried in their phones, including the teachers between classes.
My kids seem to have somehow navigated basically unlimited access to social media without at least any obvious issues.
The kids I know in my area use their phones in healthier ways than many adults I know. Granted most of the kids I know are high-performing.
That’s my worry about blunt force restrictions.
Effective use of smartphones is pretty much necessary skill to succeed in modern life at this point. The phones aren’t going away. I’ll defer to actual research, but I’d sure want to see that explicitly promoting the teaching and practice of healthy phone habits might be a better approach. Or at least an approach to use in combination with “banning” their use in certain situations.
You can ban the sale of Twinkies at school. It’s a lot harder to get kids to eat healthy outside of school. Telling kids what they “can’t do” often doesn’t work well vs. promoting what they can.
Plus there’s a certain adult hypocrisy involved when the adults all have their heads buried in their phones, including the teachers between classes.
Do you have kids?
Do you have kids?
I do not. Though I have a long history of interaction with kids, over a decade as a youth coach, guest lecturer at high schools.
Edit:
But if I had kids, I think I’d take the approach my dad took with me when introduced to the Atari and gaming. He got me a Sinclair and said I had to program a game for every Atari game I had. I make well into the six figures as a programmer 4 decades later…
Vs. just “banning gaming.”
So I think I’d try some approaching teaching how to use phones as a productive, creative instrument vs. just a passive consumer of mindless clickbait or low-grade social media nonsense.
Of course the irony is not lost on you that you used a YouTube link to promote a thoughtful idea…this is modern life. Phones won’t go away. Nor will the valuable uses they have.
I didn’t really fully understand the level of concern until I had my own. Maybe something will be figured out when he gets a little older.
Effective use of smartphones is pretty much necessary skill to succeed in modern life at this point.
Meh. There are plenty of adult skills required to succeed that you don’t need to learn or use when you’re in grade school. I do think there’s value in teaching computer science, accompanied by things like smart use of social media platforms, but I don’t know that having a phone when you’re 10 is somehow critical to success as an adult.
My nephews were kept off of cell phones when they were young. Then given dead phones (i.e. only offline games, no cell signal), then graduated to phones that could only connect to the family wifi. Eventually they got access to the outside world with parental controls, and the oldest still rapidly got himself on platforms where questionable people could jump into their conversations, text groups, etc. And that’s on top of the just regular inappropriate stuff kids his own age were doing. This is on top of having discussions about appropriate content on Youtube and other platforms through the TV, and other stuff like that, so it’s not like their parents were lax about having those discussions. There’s just a lot of temptation for kids that age, little impulse control, and a lot of people trying to take advantage.