Tim
Life is good Joined: Nov 2007
Location: Kalamazoo

A blogger in a recent article on ZDNet raised a point about computer literacy in children and needing to start working on it early. In the post he describes his 6 year old son lacking very basic computer skills, like typing and navigational skills. Also he comments that his son did not know what a cursor was. Being in IT myself and having a fairly extensive background with computers, typing, and having a 5 year old I can safely say that computers, typing, and knowing what a cursor is are the least of children's worries.

However having first hand experience as a lowly 1^st level Helpdesk person and all the way up to junior level programmer has taught me that people, including adults and those younger than me need to start learning what a cursor is themselves as well as working on there navigation skills. I cannot tell you the number of times I've spoken with some one and they did not know what a cursor was or even how to type in a URL. Not knowing what a URL is out of context I can see, but when your told to 'go to the address bar in your browser and type in the following URL' and all you can hear on the phone is a blank stare is a problem. Much less the inevitable question "What is a browser?" This of course is returned by me with a stunned and dismayed tone of "What do you mean 'what is a browser'?" This is staggering at best with knowing that the people I am helping are educated (some times very well educated) work in medicine and do the majority of there computing in a browser!

In the post he also speaks to the fact that his son has a high aptitude for language acquisition and should know his way around a keyboard and be able to pick out the needed letters and punctuation. Punctuation too is something that nearly everyone (including myself at times) needs to pickup on and start aggressively using. The flagrant usage of ill thought out sentences with no punctuation and complete lack of capitalization is an alarming trend. It's almost as if the *art* of texting is taught in schools and is being used in everyday life. Even when I do send a text, leave a comment on a blog, or write a post of my own, I still use at the very least proper punctuation if not going all out an using correct grammar and sentence structure.

Recently Spencer has started learning to sign at his daycare. So far he's learned around 15 words and learning more every week. Why did I bring this up? Because instead of focusing a child on how to type on a keyboard, use a mouse/touch pad, or how to navigate the internet our educational providers e.g. schools both public and private as well as daycares should be teaching preschoolers, kindergartners, and first graders things that are relevant to them and that will set the foundation for the rest of there lives. Such things as staying in the lines while coloring, writing their letters, sight words and spelling. In addition to elective things such as sign language. Even things like counting, and simple addition and subtraction should be focused on in very early years. Just the other day Spencer pointed out to me that two plus three equals five.

But yes there is a place in a child's life for a computer. After all what kind of a "geeky dad" would I be if I didn't let my son help me build my server, or play on the laptop. Though knowing, he's only 5 and there should be no reason for him to have to search out on the internet to find games, chat rooms and the wonders of online videos including YouTube. He knows his way around a computer, and even knows what a browser is, and he can launch (and close) Firefox like nobody's business , all while telling me that my socks and shoes are dirty in sign language.

Of course far be it for me to tell anyone how to raise a child or what they should teach in schools. It's my feelings that each child is unique as well as each set of parents differ from all others. So what I know works for my son will greatly differ from what his frends parents use on them. But the next time my son wants to play games or surf the web, I'll gladly let him. Though knowing he's only 5 and need not know how to type or surf the web. I'm just happy with knowing he can write his full name without assistance, even if it's not in proper case. As long as Spencer's school keeps teaching him new stuff, I'll trust that they know what there doing. Even if it does not include typeing.