Kids Can't Use Computers

[CrossCuT]

My only question is, whats wrong with kitten videos!?

 

I love them  :unsure:

[morostheos]

I'm proud to be in the group of people in their 30s-50s that are relatively computer literate. :P

 

That said, I think it's a great article. It raises a lot of points about learning to take care of things yourself when you can. I think this is something that can be applied to almost any aspect of life: computers, cars, food, home maintenance, etc. The important thing is while kids are still young to encourage the attitude that if you don't know how to do something, see if you can learn it somehow instead of getting someone else to do it for you. With that attitude, learning follows. Sure, you can have computer science classes in school if you want to make sure everyone knows some basics, but then those kids may only know the exact things they were taught in class, which will probably be out of date in just a few years. 

[arfink]

I'm proud to be in the group of people in their 30s-50s that are relatively computer literate. :P

 

That said, I think it's a great article. It raises a lot of points about learning to take care of things yourself when you can. I think this is something that can be applied to almost any aspect of life: computers, cars, food, home maintenance, etc. The important thing is while kids are still young to encourage the attitude that if you don't know how to do something, see if you can learn it somehow instead of getting someone else to do it for you. With that attitude, learning follows. Sure, you can have computer science classes in school if you want to make sure everyone knows some basics, but then those kids may only know the exact things they were taught in class, which will probably be out of date in just a few years. 

 

Right, but I think he actually does discuss that a little bit. If they are taught how to do things themselves, even if those skills "expire" they will still have learned the more valuable skill of knowing that they can learn this stuff, and how to go about learning it. He also only very briefly addresses the problem of filtering censoring the Internet in schools, because the kids don't learn how to take care of themselves online, and he doesn't mention it in this article but addresses it elsewhere that many times the filtering makes learning certain technical skills impossible. For example, if you wanted to look up anything about proxies or iptables or anything like that you'd be immediately blocked because that knowledge could be used to circumvent the filtering.

[CrossCuT]

Right, but I think he actually does discuss that a little bit. If they are taught how to do things themselves, even if those skills "expire" they will still have learned the more valuable skill of knowing that they can learn this stuff, and how to go about learning it. He also only very briefly addresses the problem of filtering censoring the Internet in schools, because the kids don't learn how to take care of themselves online, and he doesn't mention it in this article but addresses it elsewhere that many times the fiddlering makes learning certain technical skills impossible. For example, if you wanted to look up anything about proxies or iptables or anything like that you'd be immediately blocked because that knowledge could be used to circumvent the filtering.

 

But wouldnt removing these internet blocks be the same thing as removing movie ratings so that any kid can watch a porno? Or a violent movie?

What about allll the other types of censorship that aim to protect children? Should we do away with all those so that the kids can "take care of themselves"?

How far does this apply?