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Paper “Eight-to eighteen-year-olds spend more time with media than in any other activity besides (maybe) sleeping- an average of more than 7 h hours a day, seven days a week,” according to the Kaiser Family Foundation Study. This statistic shows how much of an Importance the media has on children these days. They spend most of their time in front of some sort of screen: whether it’s a television, phone. Pad, or computer screen, as if it were an unpaid Job, absorbing what they see and/or hear. The media today Is a great part of children’s lives especially with this generation now as Generation MM, All of the variety of interactions they make with certain types of media, such as watching TV, playing video games, listening to music, tweeting, chatting on AOL and more are the Interactions children take part In everyday that offer opportunities to absorb different types of topics. For instance.
Black Ops, a video game that revolves around shooting the so called ‘enemies’ refers to the topic to violence, or another example would be Keeping up With The Sardinian which is a reality television show reflecting not only on the topic of family relationships but also sex. With the understanding of the concept that kids these days are becoming greatly attached to the media it comes to the thought to questioning the affects it has on a child and their education. Is there some sort of relationship between kids’ media use and poor school performance?
Personally I believe the media use has become too available in the sense that children have access to it at any time of the day even throughout school hours. Although, some teachers may Inflict certain regulations such as the use of cell phones during class does not necessarily keep students from using them during school hours. Students could easily sneak off to the restroom with their phone in their pocket or discretely use the phone under their desk or during lunch hours.
Teachers are focused on the material they are presenting to the students and they usually have a class of about 25 students, so ideally phone usage is not one of their mall concerns unless of course a student gets caught using their phone during class time. Not only do students have access to media usage through their phones, in middle school and high school there are some classes that require the usage of amputees. I remember took a course In high school that required the use of computers during the entire period, although the school had blocked websites like Faceable, Pinsetters, Twitter, etc. There was still a loop hole that was found by students, which was through some sort to website that had a third party you could go through in order to access these sites that were prohibited. Today children have a greater access to the media at home and even during school hours. With this excessive access to the media children have during any hours to the day it can be assumed that the media use is affecting the way children perform academically. I believe there Is a relationship between kids’ media use and poor school performance. N ten contrary, toners may argue Tanat ten meal use NAS no relation to how kids do academically; that or, in fact the media may be the reason as to why some students do so well in school. A few counterclaims that can be made are the fact that the great amounts of media provided today help kids receive a variety of information from different sources. Another counter argument that can be made is the way children use the media today to their advantage.
For instance, although it is not ideal to see a kid reading a newspaper, some schools may assign students to research current events which can be found in newspapers, or with the advanced technology we have today newspaper articles can easily be found on the web. A field study project was designed by Hometown in 2000 in order to examine the antecedents and consequences of home Internet use. For this project they recruited 90 families to participate in an 18-month study.
During this 18-month span the children’s grade point averages (Gaps) and scores on standardized tests for reading ND math were recorded. The Hometown results wound up in favor of the children who used the Internet. The conclusion was that the kids who used the Internet more showed greater gains in GAP and reading test scores, but not math test scores. This argument showed that Internet use leads to improvements in academic performance. With the Hometown study there were a few problems in the beginning that reflected on the results in the end.
For instance the study was done on low-income families. This could greatly affect the results because low-income families don’t habitually own nice phones that have Internet access or several televisions around the house or computers. Another conflict with this study was the fact that the children were performing below average at the beginning of the project. “The mean GAP was about 2. 0, and mean percentile ranks on standardized tests of reading and math were about 30%. The mean Gaps and standardized test scores that the children obtained after the 18-month period were still below average at the end of the project meaning it didn’t make much of a difference. The study also forgets to mention how he children used the media whether it was for educational purposes or Just for their personal entertainment. I found there to be to many flaws with this project and also it was done in the year 2000, our society has definitely grown with technology since then.
Although it can’t be completely proven through studies that there is some sort of relationship between kids media use and the poor school performance, it can be noted as one of the factors that may cause a distraction for kids. Kids are becoming overly dependent on the advanced media we have been blessed with over the years. They seemed to have taken advantage of the availability of the media and are using it for all the wrong reasons. The other day I found my little brother on Google searching his homework, which he wound up finding along with answers.
Of course he copied them down without even giving them a second look or absorbing the information. This is exactly what I’m talking about kids Just don’t seem to notice how lucky they are and how much they have available to them instead they continue to use the media for simple entertainment. This concept can be reflected in the media yester dependency theory which is basically an idea that the more a person depends on having needs gratified by media use, the more important the media’s role well De In ten person’s Tie and, odometer, ten more Incidence tense meal will have.
Melvin Defiler and Sandra Ball-Reach, theorists that provided a fuller explanation stated that, “in our industrial society, we are becoming increasingly dependent on the media (a) to understand the social world, (b) to act meaningfully and effectively in society, and (c) for fantasy and escape. ” I completely agree, it’s coming difficult for people especially children to think for them selves, especially when they can simply type in a question on Google and get the answer in seconds.
This of course will eventually reflect on kids work at school, they will lack a way of critically thinking on their own. I also find the media use for kids to be very distracting. Kids are constantly found using a variety of media during school hours, checking their passbooks, testing, reading magazines online, checking e-mails, shopping online, playing games, all of this can be found on a simple device, a cellophane. Students are constantly multi- asking in school and fail to pay attention to the material a teacher is presenting.
This may be done during school hours, what about when kids’ get home from school. Parents are usually still at work so the kids’ have more time to use all these types of different medias. The amounts of portals of media open to children today are distracting from actually learning. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation Study they found that, “nearly half (47%) of all heavy media users say they usually get fair or poor grades (mostly Co’s or lower), compared to 23% of light media users,” again this how’s how the media can effect kids academics.
Although I believe there is some sort of relationship between kids’ media use and poor school performance, I don’t necessarily believe that the amounts of media open to everyone is a negative thing. Kids today take advantage of what is available to them instead of embracing the opportunities that the variety of media today brings forth. I believe kids need to be not necessarily limited to the media but taught how to use it appropriately. References Pew Internet and American Life Project (2002). The digital disconnect: The widening gap between Internet sax. N. Students and their schools.