A special summit held at the Consumer Electronics Show regarding the development of children has one physiologist suggesting that kids under the age of seven should be prevented from playing video games because the technology is "rewriting their brains" and is causing attention span problems and learning disabilities.
Psychologist Jane Healy said, "If you watch kids on a computer, most of them are just hitting keys or moving the mouse as fast as they can. It reminds me of rats running in a maze.”
Her opinions were based upon observations done at the Joan Ganz Cooney Center–an institution dedicated to the investigation on how media and technology influence and affect children.
The researchers said that of the 300 products that claimed to be educational in nature, which included video games and toys, only two were beneficial in helping the children learn skills.
In direct contrast, Alice Cahn of the Cartoon Network said that technology was helping kids instead of Healy’s point of view that it hinders their learning process. "We should not be worried about technology changing the face of play, but rather that all kids have access to the best kinds of technology."
Psychologist Healy maybe barking up the wrong tree. Some would say the school system, as it stands today, is probably the culprit for the masses of kids that sit bored to death in classrooms. If anything, it is technology that will spark their interest in learning again…not antiquated techniques in forcing memorization of facts and doing busy work.
[via news.com.au]
