My perspective on the world, as many of my other colleagues would say as well, is mainly formulated by social media or the news. I fought to keep YouTube TV, so I could still have access to new stations for important events. Unfortunately, I am finding that so much of the news is one-sided, depending on what you are watching. This means that my perspective on different situations are not always correct. What I find interesting is, the idea of someone who says they are “cultured”. What exactly does that mean? If you ask five different people, you’re going to get five different responses. Unfortunately, one of those responses could be information they get online and feel that they know everything about a culture or an event. It is very easy to get sucked into an app like Tik Tok or Facebook and feel like you are getting accurate information. I do it all the time. I cannot tell you the amount of times I see news about Disney World and come to find out that most of the news is false. Information can be so easily manipulated and falsified nowadays that people will believe anything. If information about Disney World can be falsified, who's to say that there is not more false information about other cultures that we don’t quite realize.
Even though social media has an age limit, we know, especially on an app like TikTok, many of the users are kids. Kids will believe anything that is put out there to be fact. If kids are only seeing negative information about different cultures or cultural events, then that is the only information they are going to go off of. As a fourth grade teacher, many of my students have a TikTok account. It is very interesting to hear them talk about what appears on their “for you page” and what type of information they receive. I appreciate that some of my kids are trying to learn about different cultures, but a lot of the time they come in with false information that I attempt to correct. I think this idea of social media and kids ties directly back to Tunde Szecsi et al article Transforming Teacher Cultural Landscapes by Reflecting on Multicultural Literature. We need to integrate more types of multicultural, literature, and curriculum to provide students with opportunities to be exposed to a variety of cultural narratives and help foster empathy and understanding (Szecsi et al., 2010). If students are getting differing news from school and TikTok, then it could make the students step back and think about what is actually being presented to them.
Even though it may not seem like it, I do not believe that social media is not all bad. There are plenty of benefits that come from it. The fact that we are able to learn about the world with the touch of a button is something we should not take for granted. I think the important thing to take away is, the importance of not only teaching children how to navigate it correctly, but making sure everyone is diligent and aware. My question to everyone would be what makes somebody “ cultured?” Can you be cultured just by looking on the Internet?
Even though social media has an age limit, we know, especially on an app like TikTok, many of the users are kids. Kids will believe anything that is put out there to be fact. If kids are only seeing negative information about different cultures or cultural events, then that is the only information they are going to go off of. As a fourth grade teacher, many of my students have a TikTok account. It is very interesting to hear them talk about what appears on their “for you page” and what type of information they receive. I appreciate that some of my kids are trying to learn about different cultures, but a lot of the time they come in with false information that I attempt to correct. I think this idea of social media and kids ties directly back to Tunde Szecsi et al article Transforming Teacher Cultural Landscapes by Reflecting on Multicultural Literature. We need to integrate more types of multicultural, literature, and curriculum to provide students with opportunities to be exposed to a variety of cultural narratives and help foster empathy and understanding (Szecsi et al., 2010). If students are getting differing news from school and TikTok, then it could make the students step back and think about what is actually being presented to them.
Even though it may not seem like it, I do not believe that social media is not all bad. There are plenty of benefits that come from it. The fact that we are able to learn about the world with the touch of a button is something we should not take for granted. I think the important thing to take away is, the importance of not only teaching children how to navigate it correctly, but making sure everyone is diligent and aware. My question to everyone would be what makes somebody “ cultured?” Can you be cultured just by looking on the Internet?
Szecsi, T., Spillman, C., Vazquez-Montilla, E., & Mayberry, S. (2010). Transforming teacher cultural landscapes by reflecting on multicultural literature. Multicultural Education, (Summer), 44-48.
I had not even thought of the fact that a lot of kids have some kind of social media and all the negative impact it can have. I agree with you that teachers need to seize opportunities to integrate more multicultral literature. I know it's changed my perspective.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that you can only look at the internet to be cultured. The thing about the internet is that you have to be so careful of whether or not the information is true. You can learn some things but I don't think it should be the only source. Now the same could be said of literature but writing pieces go through a big process to make sure facts and information are accurate. Being cultured is not just reading literature or the internet. It's also experiencing it. So I think being cultured is at the very least reading and experience.