"The Touch-Screen Generation" by Hanna Rosin asks whether or not young children should be spending so much time with iPads in their laps and the television remote in their hand. Rosin, upon relaying her experience at a conference for kids' app creators, comes to the conclusion that apps and television don't substitute for person-to-person interaction, but they aren't as harmful to children as some parents believe. Rosin, at this conference, discovers that many parents limit their kids' time with the family iPad everyday because they don't believe it's best for their child to be completely absorbed into a screen. Rosin does not disagree with the notion that a child who becomes too attached to a screen do suffer in the long run, but for a child who uses an iPad every so often and doesn't watch TV constantly, there isn't a big issue with a kid using technology. Television shows that "interact" with the children watching them such as Blue's Clues actually help children improve their problem solving skills. Some iPad apps, when used in moderation of course, can help a child become more familiar with the alphabet and writing letters. In her conclusion, Rosin notes that when she gave her own child open access to an iPad, after a few days, the child forgot about it as he would any other toy, but picked it back up again a few weeks later, less often, to play a game to help him with his letters. This shows that technology can be helpful to kids, but that they aren't dependent upon it like some parents believe and giving children access to technology won't rot their brains either.
"By their pinched reactions, these parents illuminated for me the neurosis of our age: as technology becomes ubiquitous in our lives, American parents are becoming more, not less, wary of what it might be doing to their children" (Rosin).
Often times nowadays people commonly think that parents just hand their kids technology to make them rest or be quiet and don't really think much about it. This shows that parents don't really hand their kids iPads mindlessly, in fact, they do it reluctantly.
"Norman Rockwell never painted Boy Swiping Finger on Screen, and our own vision of a perfect childhood has never adjusted to accommodate that now-common tableau" (Rosin).
This idea that the image of childhood is still a kid playing with other kids, or playing outside on the water slide, or splashing in puddles hasn't gone away. In fact, people are constantly trying to protect it because it's tradition and people cling to tradition. They don't like to alter their long-standing vision of something.
"A more accurate point of comparison for a TV viewer's physiological state would be that of someone deep in a book, says Kirkorian, because during both activities we are still, undistracted, and mentally active" (Rosin).
Most commonly, people say that TV will rot your brain, when, in fact, while certain programs like say, Jersey Shore, might rot your brain because of content, the brain is still active while watching TV. It isn't a completely passive activity like people claim it to be.
"Parents end up treating tablets like precision surgical instruments, gadgets that might perform miracles for their child's IQ and help him win some nifty robotics competition-but only if they are used just so" (Rosin).
This quote seems to be in contradiction with the previous one that parents are very worried about the possible positive effects iPads can have on their children. If they're so worried about them doing harm to their children why, why not simply cut them out all together in favor of more traditional teaching methods? Why acknowledge that there could even possibly be a positive to tablets in toddlers' hands?
"To us (his parents I mean), American childhood has undergone a somewhat alarming transformation in a very short time. But to him, it has always been possible to do so many things with the swipe of a finger, to have hundreds of games packed into a gadget the same size as Goodnight Moon" (Rosin).
Why not propose teaching the children from other sources as well, such as books? Why not teach kids from the beginning to play with both their puzzle color shape blocks and their iPad.
Rosin, Hanna. "The Touch-Screen Generation." The Atlantic. The Atlantic, 20 March 2013. Web. 3 April 2013.
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