Technology Misuse Leads to Increased Harassment

Two issues to talk about...

First, schools are restricting kids from being able to send email or instant messages from school computers because they are increasing being used to harrass other students, and consume a lot of time as kids pass gossip, insults, and hurtful messages to each other.

"Instant messages and e-mail are being employed as primary tools for bullying and harassment, said Bill Preble, a New England College professor and national consultant on the topic. They're particularly powerful tools for doing hurtful things."

...and of course, people are a lot bolder about saying things in an email or instant message that they would not say if they were communicating face-to-face. They don't have to consider that they are dealing with a live, feeling, fellow human being, so it's a lot easier to be cruel. They also don't have to deal with a punch to their face when they email something particularly nasty.

Schools need to deal with this, but that isn't going to stop it from happening from your home computers. Most kids spend more time on the computers at home than they do on the school computers. Parents need to keep a careful watch at home and talk to their kids about how to deal with online harrassment.

Secondly, with so many kids using cell phones, text messaging is also a problem. Here is a quote from the article:

As with many schools, Merrimack School District policy forbids students from using cell phones at school, according to Chiafery. However, the policy permits students to carry cell phones. That's because students often need to talk with parents about when and where to pick them up or to coordinate schedules, Chiafery said. [Emphasis is mine].

Why have a policy that allows the carrying of something that you can't use at the school? Because parents WANT their kids to have them so they can talk to them to coordinate schedules or arrange pickups. So the parents would scream as loud as the kids if they were banned outright.

Back when these parents were in school themselves, how did they manage to get through their school days, coordinate schedules and arrange pickups with their parents when they DIDN'T have cell phones? Right. They managed just fine by planning ahead, paying attention, and being responsible to be at the right place at the right time.

Somehow we've become dependent on cell phones, for no apparent good reason, and these technologies have become a major distraction and source of problems.

You might think that they are a convenience, but experts believe that by giving kids cell phones, it removes the need for them to learn valuable planning skills and to teach them how to responsibly be where they are supposed to be for a pickup. Kids today pay a lot less attention to what their parents are saying as they walk out the door, because they figure they can just call later and make arrangements.

Giving kids cell phones also interferes with kids learning how to be independent and problem solve on their own, when Mom and Dad are always a phone call away.

Most parents I know will tell me that they give their kids cell phones for "emergencies" and for "a little more security". Look... you're not doing your kids any favors. You're giving your kids an easy way out of any problems they have by giving them a hotline-to-home to get problems solved vs learning how to solve their own problems on the fly. You're giving them a mechanism for being distracted at school with text messaging and friends calling. You're making the job of the educators that much more difficult since they have to deal with these problems instead of focusing on teaching your kids.

Remember: You got through school without a cell phone and without instant messaging. So your kids should do fine without them as well.

Chances are you're going to give in to your kids requests and give them phones and computers anyways. In that case, be sure you're got some way to limit them so they don't get out of hand. Set clear rules and pay attention to their usage.

Source: The Telegraph Online (Nashua, NH)