Is Computer
Technology Harming
Our Children's Social Skills? By
Jan Gamm
Recent studies highlight our
children are becoming super skilled when it comes to finding
their way around a computer, but less proficient at social
skills such as making new friends, knowing what to say in
certain social situations, and so on.
Hardly surprising, considering that from as early as the
late seventies we have all been obsessed with teaching our
kids how to use their computers efficiently and how to
navigate the web, so they would not be left behind in the
techno race for supremacy, as it were. By the nineties we
all accepted that, if our children were to make any real
progress in life, they must be at ease with a computer mouse
and keyboard.
To some extent, this it true. Nowadays it is unacceptable
for any school leaver to be unskilled in computer
technology. Some have only basic knowledge but enough to get
by in a world run by computers. It does seem a pity,
however, that we have neglected our childrenīs other social
skills so woefully.
Many young adults have very little confidence in their own
abilities to enter into social situations. So many spend
their social time glued to a computer screen in their
leisure time, they have been rendered socially inept in just
about every other respect. A surprising number of teenagers
are unable to comprehend a section of society that are
unskilled in computer technology and would be unable to
interact with such people.
It is important that responsible parents and teachers
promote social skills in your people, to prepare them for
adult sociability. Parents have as great a role to play as
teachers. Teach your child to answer a telephone politely
and correctly. Give your child some basic information to
ease their journey into maturity; tell them how to address
someone formally as well as informally, it cannot harm them
to know these things and one day they might value their own
ability to be comfortable at any social level.
By all means, encourage your child to be a whiz on a
keyboard, but donīt allow them to neglect other areas of
social behaviour.
Jan Gamm writes reflections on life with an
emphasis on world travel. She has lived in many countries
and traveled extensively in the Far East, the Middle East,
America, South America and throughout the South Pacific. She
writes for fun and for money whenever she can manage it.
A Healthy Breakfast
For Your Child
By
Carolyn Joana
Breakfast is usually the time
when you're busiest - what with packing your kids off to
school, looking after the house and rushing to work too.
Often moms give a ready-to-serve breakfast with sweet
cereals and cereal bars which do not have much of a
nutrition profile to boast of.
Read more...
Everything
Mom needs to know...
