Magical nonthinking--technology--part III

Magical and amazing is the world wide web, and no doubt, it is so helpful in so many ways that I can't even begin to count or to know about. But I do know that it can also be dangerous, damaging, and a time- or life-suck. Some of the things that I mention in these next few posts could/should be incorporated into school curriculums.

But first a humorous story. Now remember that I am in my 60s, and I taught high school English for nearly 40 years. As you can imagine, I have seen a lot of things come and go in our society and in education in the last six decades. When the internet first came out so-to-speak, my initial contact with it was in school.  I remember thinking, "Well, this is too complicated to figure out (Remember we were writing out own programs back then!) so I'll just wait until it goes away!" Instead of it being a culture-changer, I thought that the internet was just another passing phase in our culture and in our education system!

But who could have seen its impact on our culture and who now can see the problems that it creates? Here's the overall problem: the internet came in so fast and got amazing so fast that we as a society have not had time to deal with its negative aspects. We intuit that there are things about it that disturb us, but the ride is going so fast that we hardly have time to think about it, much less to do something about it. We don't have the time, nor do we quite know how to get a handle on it.

  
As usual, my answer to the problems is education. We need to teach ourselves and our youth how to use technology wisely. Wouldn't it be great if Cheatham County would be one of the pioneers in this movement: to teach wisdom, proper safety and manners in the use of technology? My guess is that the more innovative school systems are already doing so.

First, allow me cover the dangerous part of technology: it is simply not safe to check, to talk, to answer, or to text on our phones while we are driving. (I don't even think that the blue tooth is safe if we are focusing on whom we are talking to and on what we are saying.) I am not perfect and have been guilty of doing these things myself. But now what I try to do is literally to throw my phone in the back seat when I get in the car. To emphasize to myself that I'm not even going to answer my phone while I drive. I am only going to focus on driving. And only use my phone when my car is stopped.

Last year, I blogged for some lawyers, and when doing research, I kept coming across news article after news article about distracted driving. Almost all of them had to do with using phones while driving, and most were really tragic stories. Lots of deaths and maiming of drivers, passengers, and other people on the road. Time and again, the authorities could tell that the driver was on the phone, had made a call or texted just seconds before the tragic wreck.

For our teenagers in middle and high school, showing them videos of these tragic accidents caused by using our phones while driving would be effective.  Pictures are powerful and impactful, staying with us much longer than words. But most of all, we parents, we adults, need to model for our young people our decision not to use our phones while we drive. And talk to them about why we are not using them.

One more note: our roads and interstates have gotten more crowded and more challenging to drive on. Most everyone seems to be in such a hurry and particularly irritable. Lots of people are communicating with their phones when driving; they are distracted. So it's even more important that we be driving defensively with hands free and minds focused. 

Ultimately, we parents are our children's and grandchildren's best teachers.  And children are learning really early about technology, so let's start them out on the right road to the safe use of smartphones.  Our children are watching us.

To be continued . . .