There’s a lot of talk about how to infuse technology into the classroom. Teachers are constantly looking at new ways to incorporate technology in their daily classroom framework. I know that technology has definitely influenced the way I teach. Technology makes my job easier. My lesson plans are simpler, and I have to worry about less materials in the classroom because every student has a device. However, is this influence of technology as good as it seems? Are we allowing our students to participate in something that is destructive to not only them but society as a whole? One of the major questions we should ask is are our students or even ourselves given an opportunity to reach our full potential, or are we destined to whatever an algorithm chooses for us?
Technology has many benefits, but its over consumption can be detrimental to our health. Studies have shown that blue light keeps the body from releasing melatonin. This gives rise to sleeplessness in students. In a study done at Harvard University, it was observed that exposure to blue light suppresses melatonin twice as much as the same length of exposure to green light (Storm, 2021). The lack of sleep in a students life, has a negative impact on their physical well being. Sleepiness is just one issue to a student's health. As students spend more of their time in the digital world, their physical social interactions go down. A lack of sleeplessness, lack of social interaction, and other factors contribute significantly to a decline in students' mental health. The switch to digital learning proved to bring a rise in temper tantrums and poor emotional regulation in the life of Elementary students.(Nichols, 2024) This is not even considering the effect of negative online interactions such as cyberbullying.
Then another issue isn’t just a child’s mental health but what a child is becoming under the influence of technology. Technology is designed to be hyper addictive and quick rewarding. This lowers the ability of our students to pay attention in class. This also prevents them from being able to pay attention as they get older. I remember when I was in the children and youth ministry, I would have to rotate the lesson every 5 minutes when teaching children but not when teaching youth. Now as a teacher I noticed that even 12 th graders have the attention span of 1st graders 20 years ago. Technology has also taught our students that to interact in the civil world they have to sacrifice their privacy. They have become used to all their data being collected and stored. They have to log in and be monitored increasingly as technology becomes more prevalent. This constant monitoring creates a world where students do not understand the concept of what's private. Also digital environments tend to narrow a students exposure down to only what is being recommended to them by algorithms. Think of the implication there, no longer will our students reach their full potential but now they are at the mercy of an algorithm. In these algorithms our students are told what to think and how to think.
If our students are increasingly using technology in their everyday lives, what does that mean for society? One doesn’t have to think too hard to realize the negative implications that the previously mentioned dangers could have on society, but what about other societal harms. The use of algorithms in technology increasingly isolates us from differing views and ideas. As businesses and organizations buy the attention of users to promote their products and beliefs. When we think about the infusion of technology in a classroom we don’t consider this as a part of it. However, promoting technology is in fact promoting the ideas that come with the infusion of technology into society. In essence we are influencing our students to be a part of this type of society.
It sounds all doom and gloom quite honestly. I am not trying to promote a classroom without technology. In fact, I don’t think that world is a possibility anymore, it would be nearly impossible to go back to a world that was not influenced by technology. If given the option I would not want to return that world either. After all there are so many positives that technology brings to the classroom and to society. However, the negatives are there, and it should have each one of us questioning how we use technology, and how we educate our students about technology. Technology is used best when it’s used as a tool to improve the lives of those using it. As a teacher, I need to really think about when and where I am going to use technology, and not just use technology because it’s the easiest or the coolest thing to do. Just as I go through my curriculum constantly deciding what is useful for my class and what isn’t, I need to pay close attention to what technology is beneficial and what isn’t. I think it would also be beneficial to promote physical social interactions in the classroom to counteract the absence of them in my student’s lives. Scott Widman makes a good point in the video above. We can prevent our students from using technology, so as teachers we have to teach and guide them in best practices when dealing with technology. Regardless of our feeling about technology it's not going away, and our students are already consumed with it.
Antero, G (April 2023) Technology might be making education worse. Stanford Report. https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2023/04/technology-might-be-making-education-worse
Frazier, M. & Hearrington, D. (2024) The Technology Coordinator’s Handbook (Fourth Edition) Portland, Oregon: Internation Society for Technology in Education.
Nichol, M. (January 2024) Is Technology Ruining Schools? The Impact of Technology in Elementary School Classrooms. Arthur. https://www.trentarthur.ca/news/is-technology-ruining-schools
Strom, A. (2021). The Negative Effects of Technology for Students and Technology for Students and Educators. NW Commons: Masters’ Thesis and Capstone Projects. Northwestern College, IA. https://nwcommons.nwciowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1322&context=education_masters
UKEssays. (September 2021). Discussing the Negative Effects of Technology on Society. Retrieved from https://www.ukessays.com/essays/technology/negative-effects-of-technology-on-society.php?vref=1
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