After having seen the interview with Mark Bauerlein, I started to think about what had been said and quite quickly I came to the conclusion that the expert had some positive and some negative arguments.
To my mind, it is not appropriate to generalize on teenagers and their usage of the internet and networks like “facebook” and others. It might be true that there are teenagers who spend most of their spare time surfing on the internet and forgetting the outside world. Nonetheless, there are also others who only try to use the internet as a research source and some networks as communication platform. Furthermore it could be argued that other cultural aspects such as literature, films etc do not receive the attention they should get, but on the other hand internet and networks can help teenagers/students in order to find their role and position in the society they live in.
So I would come to the conclusion that internet is getting more and more attention nowadays, but that we should not only consider the negative aspects of it. It depends on every single person (student) in what way and in what quantity he or she wants to use the internet. Nevertheless, other areas of culture (books, films etc.) should also be integrated in life. In order to achieve this, students, teachers, family and the society should work together. I would disagree with the expert who argues that the teacher has the whole responsibility in helping teenagers to “access to the adult world”.
Dear Sarah,
I am not sure about the statement, whether the teachers have the whole responsibility on helping teenagers to access to the adult’s world. It is obvious that teachers somehow guide and support their students in becoming adults. However they are not solely responsible for that. What about the pupils’ parents and friends? In my opinion there are so many influences on students’ lives which all can be found in their direct environment.
What I absolutely agree with is the separation you make between those who are interested in research and those who just use the internet for chatting.
hey sarah,
you are certainly right to say that we can not treat all teenagers the same. We definitely have to differ between the ones surfing all day in the internet and not going outside anymore and the ones who really want to use it as a source of information and less for unlimited chatting.
I agree completely with you saying to support the positive aspects of the internet, not only the negative ones. Besides, the pupils or students can really decide on their own how and when to use the internet. But sometimes the teachers have to help the students to also appreciate books, films, etc as you correctly said.