The uplifting experience with the kayak on the pond was in sharp contrast to the virtual kayaking the boys had tried about a week earlier. This time, we were visiting another set of friends. The boys had great time swimming in the backyard pool for hours. After a while, though, one of them asked to play the Wii. It isn’t something my boys get to do very often, so they were excited. One of the games they tried was Wii Kayaking. And my goodness, when I say the mood changed at this happy gathering, the mood CHANGED at this happy gathering. Neither of my sons could get the hang of kayaking with the remote control. When someone tried to show how to do it, my sons wouldn’t be coached. They weren’t open to getting help, they didn’t want to let go of the remote and risk losing their turn. One of my sons actually started crying, stomping has feet and yelling in frustration. It was an unattractive side of him, and I wasn’t happy. For him, the experience left him feeling inadequate, disappointed and extremely frustrated. The stress level in the room was high – much different from the relaxed atmosphere we’d had outside at the pool.

Real versus virtual. It has been a recurring theme this summer.  Back in June, a friend of mine told me a story about a presentation he attended.  The subject was technology in the early childhood classroom.  One of the presenters shared an anecdote to help underscore how fabulous our new handheld, digital technology is.

The story goes something like this: One day, a young toddler was running around the kitchen table holding an iPad. The child was saying, “Mommy: cow!” and his mother was able to quickly search and pull up a picture of a cow- and how wonderful it was that the child was able to see a real cow!

Did you catch that? A real cow.  Actually, no, that wasn’t a real cow. A real cow is a gorgeous and often smelly creature. It has smooth hair, a rough tongue, hard hooves and a tail that swats whatever might be in the way. What is especially distressing about the “real cow” story is that the presentation was given by the folks who are crafting the new National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) position statement on technology and young children. It appears that they are so head-over-heels in love with digital technology, and so immersed in the virtual world, that a digital picture of a cow on a small hand-held device has now become a “real cow”.  The current draft of the position statement includes this statement: Early childhood programs have an obligation to use technology to bridge the digital divide.  As I read that I cringe and can’t help but wonder… As we slide along the slippery slope between what is real and what is virtual, how will this affect our brain development? Our relationships with each other? Our relationship with nature?

How long until kayaking on an actual pond -with breezes blowing and frogs croaking – becomes a thing of the past? And what will we lose along the way?

In the Orion Magazine (September/October 2007) article Unplugged Schools, Lowell Monke wrote:

“The health of our children’s inner lives, their civic engagement, and their relationship with nature all would be improved if schools turned down the thermostat on that technologically overheated aspect of American culture. Schools dedicated to that task—we might call them ‘unplugged schools’—would identify the values associated with technological culture and design curricula and an environment focused on strengthening the human values at the other end of the scale.

“The most obvious thing schools can do in this regard is give children experiences with the real things toward which symbols are only dim pointers. Unless emotionally connected to some direct experience with the world, symbols reach kids as merely arbitrary bits of data. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but to a second grader who has held a squiggly nightcrawler in her hand, even the printed symbol “worm” resonates with far deeper meaning than a thousand pictures or a dozen Discovery Channel videos.”

I love that passage, because he states so beautifully what I often think about.  I feel the visceral connection that second grader has to the printed symbol “worm” and am thankful. I want my children, and my students, to have as many authentic experiences as possible before they are submerged in that virtual world.

(By the way, this is a picture of a real cow. This cow lives at The Farm School, in Athol, Massachusetts, and I took the photo on our annual trip with my students from Mission Hill School. Every student visits the farm every year, and the older students sleep over for a few nights. On the farm, they feed real cows, hold real chickens, cut real fire wood with real saws and experience a multitude of authentic experiences.)

Here are some related blog posts:

Is your baby’s iPad drool-proof?

“Me want daddy iPad!”

Radical Preschool

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Dr. Katz is an international leader in early childhood education who, for decades, has lectured and taught all over the world.  She shared her ideas through an inspiring keynote address to hundreds of early childhood professionals gathered in Providence, RI last Sunday for NAEYC’s Professional Development Institute. Her words of wisdom, delivered with honesty, humility and humor, help preserve what is good for young children – in the face of all that is now working against young children. I can’t hope to capture all her pearls of wisdom from that morning, but I hope to paint a picture of some of the themes.

“Curriculum,” Dr. Katz explained, “should help children make deeper and fuller understanding of their own experience.” Going outside the classroom – and observing what is right there – that is where meaningful learning happens.  From maple leaves to industrial parks, Dr. Katz gave examples of early childhood experiences that tapped into children’s natural capacity for interest, and provided opportunities for children to draw from observation – to look closely and represent on paper what is really there – as in the Reggio Emilia approach.

She cautioned, “please do not confuse excitement with learning,” adding, “You can be addicted to excitement and that is a dangerous thing.” These words rang true, and conjured up for me images of children excited by electronic gadgets that promise to teach. There is often excitement about the latest gadget/website/app, but the excitement quickly wanes and the child is left looking for the next exciting gadget…looking for something outside himself to stimulate something inside – rather than pondering his own questions, and investigating the real world around him.

Dr. Katz also shared her concerns about television, and worries about its impact on young children.  She cited the practice of other countries’ aim to protect children from developmentally inappropriate images and news stories, by saving adult content until after 10:00 p.m. She wonders why haven’t we taken similar steps in the United States.

She urged teachers of young children to have “continuous contingent interactions” with young children, explaining that recent brain research has shown how neurological connections happen when children engage in extended, meaningful conversations – back and forth exchanges where one person’s response is contingent on what the other has to say.

She also offered some of her ideas about experiences that children should often have – and encouraged those of us in the audience to go back and talk with colleagues to make our own list. Some (but not all) of her experiences for children included:

• being intellectually engaged and challenged
• applying developing skills in meaningful ways
• confidence in their own intellectual powers and questions
• extended conversations and interactions with adults and peers
• asking questions, making predictions and hypotheses
• sustained involvement with worthwhile topics (projects children come back to for days and weeks)
• feeling of belonging to community and school

I loved her list and could feel that others in the room agreed with her. My hope is that all of us in that room find ways to share her wisdom and keep her ideas alive for current and future generations of children and teachers, who are being told over and over again, that a Race to the Top is what is best for children. These experiences that Dr. Katz is talking about can not be found in scripted curricula that rushes from one disconnected topic to the next. They can be found in authentic experiences, emergent curriculum. These experiences take time and allow for investigations and conversations.

I end with one more of her wonderful nuggets: “Curriculum is not delivered. Milk is delivered.” Nice! Thanks to NAEYC for the opportunity to hear Dr. Katz’s words of wisdom.

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As a young child I visited Disneyland and watched the Mickey Mouse Club on TV. These were fun times, no doubt. However, Disney has taken advantage of the trust that parents have in the Disney name. As an adult, I now worry about the vast influence that Disney has on our children and on us. Disney encourages young children to play online with websites such as Club Penguin and World of Cars. Disney confuses parents about how babies learn by selling Baby Einstein videos. Check out this list of companies owned by Disney, complied by Lisa Ray. (Her family is documenting their Year Without Disney!) Disney controls so much information – that just cannot be good. They also market heavily and directly to children – including the brilliant move to market all the Disney Princesses together in a way that has appealed to girls the world over. But what messages do the Disney Princesses send our girls? Check out this short video about the Princess Effect from the Empowering Girls to Fly High.

And check out what the updated TRUCE Action Guide says:

If you are one of the tens of thousands who will be attending the conference, please stop by and visit us in the exhibit hall. We will have copies of our free guides on hand and we’d love to talk to you. We’ll be sharing booth 1044 with TRUCE steering committee member Hugh Hanley and his Circle of Song!

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