Effects of Technology on Elementary School Students
The world today harbors swift technological development that touches all circles of life. The technological development that affects education comes in different ways, including cellphone, internet, and general technological development. In the pursuit to smoothen operations, sectors, including the education sector, integrates technology into their use. Also, learners independently engage the use of technology in their life. Any approach to using technology generates a stream of effects, both positive and negative. This paper explores how cellphones, internet, and the broad technologies impact the learning process of elementary school students. Don't use plagiarised sources.Get your custom essay just from $11/page
Impacts of Cellphones
Negative Effects of Cellphones
The invention of cellphone takes a significant share of the effects on expertise on elementary students. Analysis of the impact indicates more disadvantages than benefits. Firstly, during class sessions, Cellphones interfere with the process both on the side of the teacher and the students. In Jessica (2018) work, a study on the effects of the phones on human behavior reveals that despite the phones reduce the overall attention of learners, in the long-term, they also lower the memory of students.
Learners in the elementary stage require the right environment that would facilitate their brain development. Interfering with the scene leads to adverse effects on mental growth. Li et al. (2014) add that the connection between cognitive psychology, attentiveness, and good memory of what the brains captured earlier is essential in the development process of young learners. The scholar recommends the process not to get interference at any cost. Therefore, loss of attention at the learners’ early-stage retards their brain development (Jessica, 2018, Li et al., 2014)
Jessica (2018) also indicates that elementary school learners fancy playing cellphone sounds like ringtones and videos. The sounds lead to disruption during class sessions, leading to distractions from their teachers. The effects also spread to their neighbors, affecting the whole class. The results of cellphones extend beyond a classroom setting. While in their homes, the learners still interact with the gadgets.
Consequently, the devices take much of their attention, which they would put on homework. Focusing on the phones also confines them indoors, denying them time for physical exercise, and interaction with their peers (Zhang & Duke, 2011). The kids focus on phones, always browsing the internet, watching videos, and playing games. This physical inactiveness pauses significant challenges to physical fitness and can cause physical abnormalities and lifestyle diseases like obesity in the children (Leung & Lee, 2012).
Positive Effects of Cellphones
Despite the vast adverse effects, cellphones also have some positives to the learners. The phones have applications that are educative to them. Using these applications, children enhance their learning process. They watch educative videos using the programs. Also, since cellphones offer the fastest way of communication, they are useful in case of emergencies in schools. The phones facilitate communication between the schools’ management with guardians, increasing the effectiveness of the necessary assistance. The phone can aid in the location of stray students using geographical positioning system (Goolsbee & Guryan, 2006). Students who possess cellphones that access the internet can continue with their learning process even when they are out of class.
Influence of the Internet
An evaluation of the internet depicts more benefits than demerits. Since the usefulness of the internet accrue from communication and learner takes place through dissemination, appropriate use of resources leads to the following benefits.
Positive Effects of Internet
The internet connects people, shares information, and acts as a source of knowledge for the students. It serves as a virtual teacher to students and tutors by offering a platform for information dissemination and research. Its users get relevant study material from multiple sites, which enhances their understanding of specific topics (Zhang, & Duke, 2011). This benefit is not only reflected in the classroom setting, but also social interactions. Peers can study different researches that strengthen their knowledge, understanding, and exposure to various study areas.
Leung and Lee (2012) say that through platforms like WhatsApp and Telegrams, learner adopts internet as a mode of communication between their tutors and between themselves. The platforms enhance sharing information regarding classwork, and other activities like co-curriculum activities and helps them air their concerns, worries, or needs to the respective respondents (Goolsbee & Guryan, 2006). The platforms, therefore, enhances the learning environment.
Access to the Internet using tablets enhances students’ access to platforms through which they share information and views. When each child is at liberty to express their views, emotions, or disappointment to their classmates, they relieve themselves (Goolsbee & Guryan, 2006; Zhang & Duke, 2011). Their teachers and counselors identify the possible problems and act swiftly. Zang and Duke (2011) report that the appropriate use of such information dramatically reduces the depression in learners, leading to low cases of suicides.
Adverse Effects of the Internet
Misuse of the Internet, like the learner accessing the websites with rights out of their age bracket, corrupts their reasoning (Pontes, Szabo & Griffiths, 2015). The sites may contain content not suitable for the children under the elementary school. For instance, access to websites classified as having adult content, pornographic films affects the conduct of the students. The students may share some information that catches the attention of others, disrupting their attention (Goolsbee & Guryan, 2006; Zhang, & Duke, 2011). This move disrupts the link between the learners and their teachers and between the students themselves. Sharing malicious information sends wrong impressions to all the group participants and can even lead to panic. Students under such an environment usually perform both socially and academically.
Contribution of Other Technologies
Negative Effects
Although the technology used has proved to be beneficial to learning, it also has several undesirable effects on the quality of life and development of elementary students. Different techniques affect the performance of elementary students in a unique way. Li et al. (2014) indicate that the overuse of technology reduces the concentration and lowers the thinking capacity of young students. Constant exposure of the students to social sites supports their attempts to make virtual friends through the online platform (Pontes, Szabo & Griffiths, 2015). Such friends usually instill contrary reasoning, making the students’ rogue.
Psychological therapists associate most of the unexplainable characters in elementary school children with the abuse of technology. The emergence of online gaming technologies has led to installations of computer play stations that usually consumes much of the elementary students’ time, and inhibits their mental and cognitive development (Pontes, Szabo & Griffiths, 2015). In some cases, it leads to severe medical or psychological conditions s necessitates health checks. For those students who receive early exposure to technologies like calculators, the tools hamper their creativity. When they encounter numerical challenges, they quickly engage the machines instead of trying themselves out.
Long exposure of the children to technology in their earlier ages makes them fail to separate reality from fiction they see on the internet since anyone can share any information via the internet without reviewing the impact on young minds (Zhang, & Duke, 2011). Pontes et al. (2015) suggest that the security mechanism for major technologies does not have an elementary student’s vulnerability in mind. The kids use the technology excessively in pursuit of happiness (Pontes, Szabo & Griffiths, 2015). While navigating the system and enjoying what it offers the same ease of access, content download, and copying pasting, the learners adopt unethical behaviors like plagiarism, and falsification, whose effects touches their academic life (Li et al., 2014).
Positive Effects
Technology influences the schools’ systems due to their versatility and ease of use. Its resourcefulness in a classroom setting, especially the use of videos in teaching, affects students’ and teachers’ work processes (Pontes, Szabo & Griffiths, 2015). Its application simplifies studies, making the schools embrace it. The wave of technology also improves students’ understanding. It provides a range of information, knowledge, and educational resources, enhancing studying even beyond the classroom. The use of good storage technologies that hard disks not only allow teachers to preserve students’ entertainment materials, but only improves research as they keep research information for long (Zhang, & Duke, 2011). Through the use of online articles, teachers prepare lessons for teaching, including videos and power points. Technology offers interactive support between the teachers and the learners.
Conclusion
Technology, internet, and cellphone have both positive and negative effects on the academic performance, social and physical life of student life. Although the overuse of technology derails learners’ academic, social, and psychological progress, its proper use of supplements, both students and teachers work. Teachers and guardians should design moderations and guide the students on how to use technology to improve their life appropriately. These moderations will prevent much of the negative side of technology to the learners.
References
Goolsbee, A., & Guryan, J. (2006). The impact of Internet subsidies in public schools. The Review of Economics and Statistics, 88(2), 336-347. https://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/rest.88.2.336
Jessica S.Mendoza, B. C. (2018). The effect of cellphones on attention and learning: The influences of time, distraction, and nomophobia. Computers in Human Behavior, 52-60. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563218301912
Leung, L., & Lee, P. S. (2012). Impact of internet literacy, internet addiction symptoms, and internet activities on academic performance. Social Science Computer Review, 30(4), 403-418. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0894439311435217
Li, Y., Zhang, X., Lu, F., Zhang, Q., & Wang, Y. (2014). Internet addiction among elementary and middle school students in China: A nationally representative sample study. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 17(2), 111-116. https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/cyber.2012.0482
Pontes, H. M., Szabo, A., & Griffiths, M. D. (2015). The impact of Internet-based specific activities on the perceptions of Internet addiction, quality of life, and excessive usage: A cross-sectional study. Addictive Behaviors Reports, 1, 19-25. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352853215000061
Zhang, S., & Duke, N. K. (2011). The impact of instruction in the WWWDOT framework on students’ disposition and ability to evaluate web sites as sources of information. The Elementary School Journal, 112(1), 132-154. https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/660687