"While there is no questioning the scale of young people's engagement with the internet, evidence suggests that engagement is biased towards consumption rather than production."
I find similar results with my 5th grade Florida students. For the last four years, my seven 5th grade classes participate in a survey about their social media use. The tide seems to be shifting for some students from simple consumption toward greater communication and production. Web 2.0 use with my 5th graders, ages 10-12, seems to favor gaming and mobile device situations.
Here are the survey responses from three classes, March 2015, answering the question, "How do you communicate online?" One class is labeled "gifted," another "ESE inclusion," and the last "Dual Language Spanish Immersion." To check an item on the survey, students must have published or activity engaged in the medium, not simply having consumed another's publications or experiences.
Media with 50% or greater respondents are marked with a red check. The surveys are not identical because each class drafts their own surveys, providing personal examples.
Crook, C. (2012). The digital native in context: Tensions associated with importing Web 2.0 practices into the school setting. Oxford Review of Education, 38 (1). 63-80.
Ok, I will use the excuse that I have a 9 year old daughter for doing this but I was googling videos on Nerf guns the other day to look at reviews of the different types they have. I found countless review You Tube sites and I would say half of them were from kids (elementary to middle school). My daughter and I sat and watched a few of these for her to decide what Nerf gun she wanted to buy. I know maybe to much research for a toy but we wanted to see what worked before we went and spent money on one, those things are not cheap. I was amazed on the level of detail and knowledge that these kids share. I looked at a few other sites and I did see a lot dealing with games and toys. As I was looking I found out that my little nephew has a site that he also reviews and discusses his games that he plays. Who new and now he has another follower.
ReplyDeleteHow very cool! Good for your nephew. My son enjoys looking at kids' YouTube videos with toys, namely Legos. He's posted a few videos as well. My informal observation is that there is a huge jump in publishing in Middle School.
ReplyDeleteBTW - The kids in our neighborhood prefer the disk Nerf guns to the darts or any other form. They shoot farther and straighter. And they have cool reloading attachments.