Editor
Kicking back in the lounge area of an airport hotel, I from such an early age and for so many hours a day they have no observed an infant child. He was safely strapped into his time to experiment with language. It’s easy for parents to ignore highchair, his little legs barely visible beneath the tray. His parents them when they are not being disruptive or seeking attention,’ sat nearby in lounge chairs sipping an evening wine and nibbling she said, ‘and the games they are playing draw them in and hold nuts. None of this would be especially remarkable but for the their attention for a very long time.’ device the wee boy had in his hand. ‘Look out!’ I warned my Reception classes may give children the pre-learning skills they travelling companion, ‘you could wear that shortly!’ need to begin formal learning but by intermediate age a whole new The device was an iPhone which in the tiny fingers of this not- network of issues emerges. A Hawke’s Bay principal recently told yet-two-year-old was XOS size. My friend and I took bets on how me ‘It’s the social media which cannot be controlled, and it can be long it would take before the phone smashed its way to the floor. so destructive,’ he said. He showed me some Instagram messages We watched and watched and waited some more. The posted by year 7 and 8 students – an echo of the ‘chain letters’ that phone continued to capture the attention of our infant subject, circulated 50 years ago, only more sinister in tone: ‘Repost this as he worked his tiny fingers about message or you will die at 4am.’ He said it the blue-light screen, immersed in the Our digital personas was not unusual to read hurtful or nasty mysteries of his digital world. Yes, his messages and these could be sent 24/7. digital world, because not a single human are becoming as far There is no doubt in the minds of being conversed or interacted with him many principals that social media is removed from reality having a detrimental effect on the mental for the next 35 minutes. We’ve witnessed similar examples as processed bacon bits health of young people. The frequency before. We’ve seen Mum, Dad and the kids of engaging with social media can lead out for dinner – each with their iPhone, are from pork chops. to isolation and unhappiness. And the iPad or chrome book. We’ve watched as compulsive way in which young people they hook into their respective social media or game console, feel they must respond to messages means they are disrupting failing from then on to share a single word with each other. their natural sleep patterns. Couple this with teenagers We’ve also seen the images of the twenty-somethings on their comparing themselves to the photoshopped, airbrushed perfect big OE, backs to the Grand Canyon, Taj Mahal and Egyptian Instagram shots of peers and it’s not long before their self-esteem Pyramids facebooking their friends pictures of the burger they is scuttling off to wallow in the detritus on the forest floor of ate for breakfast. self-doubt. Anxiety is now presenting in greater numbers of Digital technology is inescapable. The question is does it add young people than any world war produced. to the quality of our lives? Does it make us more curious or more Our digital personas are becoming as far removed from reality interesting? Does it make us more human, more humorous . . . or as processed bacon bits are from pork chops. better conversationalists? Recent research published in ScienceDirect, December 2018, Principals tell us that more and more youngsters are arriving at highlights some of the dangerous effects of digital technology school without the necessary prerequisites to undertake formal on young people. learning. One of these prerequisites is the ability to play. Another 1. More hours of screen time are associated with lower wellis the ability to converse. being in ages 2 to 17 It is now becoming usual to establish ‘reception classes’ for 2. High users show less curiosity, self-control and emotional these ‘humanly underdeveloped’ digital natives, where they stability learn how to interact with each other, share and play together 3. Twice as many high (vs. low) users of screens had an anxiety and where they learn the very basic skills of communication and or depression diagnosis initiating conversation. As one Palmerston North principal said, 4. Non-users and low users did not differ in well-being ‘My school is in the middle of an affluent community and more and more children are starting school ill-equipped for learning 5. These associations with well-being were larger for adolescents than for children to read or write. The children have the best of everything a privileged home can offer but they don’t have the most basic of And we haven’t yet begun to consider the effects of that bright conversation skills.’ She located this problem firmly at the feet of blue-light on the tiny developing brain of the less than two-yeardigital technology. ‘These children are immersed in their iPads old wee boy in his highchair.