What are you doing to equip your children for life in a tech-driven world? How important do you think it will be for them to have programming skil...
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I have two kids 5 & 9.
I apply three concepts when it comes to tech.
First, I think tech skills will be important in the future. However, they won't be the skills I currently use (or am interested in developing).
So with that in mind:
Curiosity. If my child is interested in something, I enable them to learn more.
Limits. I've learned to manage the amount of tech my children consume. Allowing my children to watch YouTube videos all-day does not help. I also do this by spending time with my kids on non tech activities. Regular Parenting rules apply.
Patience. No one learns when they're over excited about something. Because I work in tech, my kids are already exposed to it. They've gone with me to the office on Saturdays while I upgraded our network switches, etc.. To them my job is boring.
When it comes time to learn about programing, they light up and get excited. So it helps me to remember this.
From my perspective, my kids see tech like a black box that does crazy things.
Enabling them to learn how this black box works is the goal.
There is no doubt that as parents we would have to empower our kids to start learning stuffs about technology. As a programmer myself, i did love my child to start programming at a very young age between 7- 8 yrs. I think first I have to create an enabling environment for them, and what I mean is to equip the house with tech stuffs like the PC , and some books that talks about tech. At age of 5-6 can begin with taking them through scratch programming or some gamy programs about tech.
Kids will need to learn how to use technology to get answers. This is valuable no matter their desired goals.
What is hard is finding ways to make exploring fun.
"It doesn't work."
"what is it doing."
"it didn't do what I asked"
"what was it supposed to do."
"... 😠"
It is something I haven't figured out yet.
You do not start. They start besed on their taste! You regulate them by controlling the kind of apps they use or how long they stay at a device.
I do not encourage my doughter with tech. I simply explain it to her when she asks.
Being skilled in tech is required only if you want to work in the tech sector.
Otherwise average usage understanding is enough.