Written by I was curious to see how saturated with technology my second grade students are and started going through an informal survey with them. Being that they are in second grade this kind of a procedure takes some patience and needs to be conducted very methodically.
As we sat in our ‘meeting circle’ I started asking them about technonlogy and what they personally owned. Of course by ownership I understand that it belongs to their mom and dad. I clarified and asked what is theirs, and is not shared with mom and dad. For exammple if they said they had an iPad I told them if they borrowed the iPad from mom and dad that didn’t count. I wanted to know what was dedicated for their sole use. The results from the 18 students in attendance were as follows.
How many of you have your own:
- Phone – 7 (surprisingly, only one student had their phone at school today)
- Nintendo Wii – 11 (not surprising as is seem Nintendo has the corner on children’s video games)
- XBOX360 – 1 (also not surprising as many of these game are geared toward older audiences)
- Playstation 3 – 0 (They are missing out on the best gaming console out there…joking)
- Nintendo DS – 9 (most-likely the same kids that have the Wii)
- iPad – 3 (this percentage is sure to grow)
- Laptop – 3
- Desktop – 9
- Camera – 8 (I did not clarify if they are considering the camera their phone as a ‘camera’ for this category)
- iPod – 4 (surely these will start being replaced by the iPad)
Being the ipad fan that I am, all of the results were tabulated on the iPad. What other classroom tool is there that’s more versatile?
My favorite part of this whole exercise was when I was talking about cameras. I asked them how many had ‘digital cameras‘ and a student next to me scrunched up her nose, wrinkled her brow and asked, “What’s a digital camera?!” I could only smile as I realized that I was an old man that had watched the transition from film to digital in the last 15 years.
What was I thinking? There are no other types of camera out there, by default they are all digital.
Funny one, Steve. Digital is as unnecessary as album, record, and now even disc. They are the slide-rules of our generation. I am curious to run this little check with my seniors. It’s interesting because they are the first year I’ve had students with laptops as the wave the began three years ago finally crested into senior year. I did ask them if they’d rather lose their laptop or their phone and almost unanimously, they said laptop. When I asked why, they said, “I can do everything on my iphone…plus I don’t have to worry about WiFi.”
I get the strange feeling that I have reached the point where I am falling a step behind every year and will never see the front of the pack again.
Interesting question you asked your class of second graders!
I’m wondering why you specifically asked for technology they “owned”, rather than technology they have access to. Would your results be drastically different?
I teach a Kindergarten class and I don’t know how many of them “own” a piece of technology. I’m pretty sure none of them own a cell phone or a personal laptop dedicated purely to their use; or maybe they do. Do PSPs and DSs count?
At what age would you feel comfortable handing an iPad to a child and tell them that it’s theirs?