Technology & Learning without Labels

In any school classroom, you are likely to find kids with labels--"gifted", "learning-disabled", "ADHD"... A great benefit to using technology is that children are able to learn free of these very common labels. Today's educational applications can be designed to continually assess and adapt to a child's abilities. We took this into consideration when our company developed the Imagine Tomorrow program. I wanted to ensure that each child who used our software would be able to comfortably explore and learn at his or her own pace, and achieve success. The adaptive measures the software takes is transparent to the children. As they sit side by side, they only see that they all complete the same mission and reach the same goal. They all share in the same successes.

Set Rules at a Younger Age

Many technology related rules and guidelines are being handed down to school age children much after the fact--after they've already been chatting online, or texting each other, whether innocently or not. Setting rules and expectations for technology-use should be a proactive measure, and those rules should be communicated to children at a MUCH YOUNGER age.

Walk past an elementary school and you might be surprised by how many kids are texting and calling from their own cell phones as soon as school is out. Computer and cell phone use has been migrating to a younger and younger age bracket. And technology should be in the hands of young children as a tool for communicating and learning. However, adults need to teach children to respect the technology before they start using it. That isn't limited to respect for the device they are handling (to try not to break it) but also respect for basic rules for how they should communicate (tone) and what they should communicate or view (content).

Children are used to rules. Their world is full of them! Rules start very early at home and those rules not only keep the peace, but also keep young children safe (don't touch-it's hot, sharp, dangerous...). School age children learn an entirely new set of rules--quiet in the halls, raising hands to speak, and so on. So when introducing young children to computers or other technology, respect must be taught. The rules for technology-use must be clearly explained in an age-appropriate manner.

Let's encourage use of technology by young children, but not forget to first lay out the rules and continually adjust those rules as technology--and the child--grows.

Immersed in Learning

When parents leave the hospital with their newborn, they are given a lengthy list of instructions on how to care for their baby. But parents aren't given any instruction on how to help their baby achieve major learning milestones, such as talking. There is no list of words handed out to every set of parents--to be taught to children in a specific order. Nor are parents told to teach their child certain grammar rules before their child begins putting words together to form sentences. Why not? Because that is NOT how children learn. Children learn by being immersed in the learning process, and then positive interactions lead them to successfully learn new concepts. There are three levels to this learning process: introduce the concept, reinforce the concept, and master the concept.

For example, a very young child babbles and happens to say, "da da". Everyone around gets really excited and points to Dad and says, "Yes, this is da da!" Then the child continues to babble, and eventually the child realizes when he/she says "da da", that Dad turns or answers back. "So that guy is da da!"--The connection has been made and the concept is just one of the thousands more the child will soon learn. The people around the child have an important role in reacting to what the child says and does, and facilitating the learning process.

Knowing that young children learn in a non-linear, immersing way, it is easy to see that technology can be a wonderful medium for teaching new concepts. To provide the best learning environment, technology needs to be coupled with software that truly engages the child and provides positive feedback. The teacher or parent still has an important role--to guide the child to success.