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Introduction
Technology has transformed the world significantly, affecting almost every aspect of people. One area that has been majorly impacted by technology is early childhood development. Before technology, most parents spent time with their children interacting with them actively. Such children grew up being socially active and with the ability to easily imitate moves and learn new words at a tender age. However, technology has limited the time most parents interact with their children. Increased digital devices in most homes have seen children getting early exposure to screens. Most researchers argue that television exposure to children below 18 months should be highly regulated (Barr, 2019). Most parents tend to defy these recommendations and expose their children to intentionally or unintentionally screen time. Therefore, the family media ecology plays a significant role in shaping the early development stage of the children.
Media and Childrens Development
One of the significant ways that technology affects the ability of children to be socially active during their early developmental stages is through technoference. Technoference is the ability of technology to interrupt interpersonal interactions, including a childs ability to pay attention or control their emotions (Barr, 2019). For instance, children tend to be distracted by the background television when they are playing. While they may not understand the television content, the frequent interruption reduces their playing time and their concertation on their activities.
Plying time is essential for children because it does not only determine their ability to interact with other people but also enables them to have a better memory and easily learn new words. For the play to be effective, children require concentration and an active playing partner. Parents are the ideal playing partners for children during their early childhood stage. However, most parents are not playing their roles effectively. Their time to interact with their children and foster their relationship with the children has significantly been interrupted by digital devices, including phones and televisions. Parents have substituted the time for interacting with their kids with social media and television content. In most cases, engaged parents respond passively or fail to respond at all to their childrens signals. As a result, these children tend to experience slower cognitive and language skills development.
Contrary to the adverse effects of early technology exposure on children, there are various benefits that children may enjoy by using education media as a form of cognitive development. Through the proper channels, technology can be very educative to children. Televisions, social media, mobile apps, and e-books can effectively expose children to the various practical interactions necessary for their cognitive and language development. This mechanism can only be effective if there is close supervision of the interaction process. Additionally, the kind of device used as a means of learning plays a significant role in determining how effective the media is in developing the childs cognitive abilities.
The educational media is often effective if it is interactive and allows the child to be responsive most of the time. For instance, the use of a touch screen tablet is considered more effective in making the interaction between the child and the media lively than using a non-interactive screen. The use of video chat is another essential media that makes the interaction with the child livelier and hence more effective. Video chats are more related to a face-to-face conversation than a prerecorded video. A video chat enables the child to respond to instructions and gives the tutor the chance to correct the child (Barr, 2019). There is limited interaction between the media and the child in a prerecorded video. The child only responds to instructions, and there is no chance of correcting them. There is a need for the parents to be directly involved in the childs learning process when they are learning through the media. The active participation of parents makes the process more interactive, thus enabling the children to be more responsive to the instructions in the media. Parents can participate in the interaction by helping their children with the correct pronunciations and encouragement.
The media is a vital element for childrens cognitive development during their early childhood. Therefore, there is a need for extensive research to understand the effects of the media on early exposure to children and how it can be positively used for the development of children. There are various ways to generate a comprehensive understanding of the media. There is a need to research how the brain processes visual or audio stimulations from different Media (Barr, 2019). This will be essential in developing the correct devices that can produce stimulations that a childs brain can accurately interpret. Furthermore, there is a need to understand the amount of media exposure that adversely affects the childs development. Lastly, it is necessary to understand how children from different cultures are affected by early media exposure. This will be essential in developing a culturally inclusive approach toward making the media more beneficial to children.
Conclusion
In conclusion, media exposure has negative and positive effects on a childs development. Media exposure affects children negatively by interrupting their playing time and the quality of their concentration. This form of disruption makes children slower in developing cognitive and language skills. On the other hand, using the media as an educational tool can effectively affect the childs cognitive development by facilitating various interactions. However, the media should be interactive, and the parent must participate actively in the interactions for the media to have a positive impact on the children.
Reference
Barr, R. (2019). Growing up in the digital age: Early learning and family media ecology. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 28(4), 341-346.
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