to want DS1 to use an encyclopedia. DH thinks so.

[5inthebed]

Bit of a non problem, but just wanting to know, am I being old fashioned?

DS1 (Y4) came home with a school project today, first one he's done, all about celebrations and festivals. He has chosen to do it on Halloween.

I suggested he uses one of the encyclopedias we have to look for some of the answers, DH said he can use the internet and that I'm being old fashioned (I'm only 30 FFS)

Now, I think the internet, as handy as it is, will just give him the answers to his questions and no work to be done other than copying. Encyclopedias have to be indexed, looked through and a bit of thought put in it.

Happy to be told IABU and an old fud.

Wall to wall books in this house.

Look it up - then verify it on the the PC

I teach year 4. I would be really pleased if a child produced work researched from an encyclopedia written in his own words.

YABU. Internet research (including identifying which online information sources are reliable and which aren't) is far more useful skill than looking things up in a dusty old book. You are disadvantaging your son and holding him back if you don't recognise this, as surely as if you denied him medicine or friends.

The world has changed. Watch , then sit with your son, show him how to use Simple Wikipedia for his homework project, and teach him the Word of the Day on dictionary.com.

Have fun :)

I agree learning to sift out the crap websites from the reliable ones is an important skill - just think if you go straight to online study, it'll be harder to get DCs off the computer and onto books because they will be used to doing it the instant, technological, shiny way. They might not want to then use books at all, IME. Which would be a shame.

I should think that any teacher would be pleased to have a DC use books and write it out in their own words rather than do the usual-just printing something straight off the internet.

Surely you can't expect that they have access to books either, euphemia? More people have the internet in their homes than have an encyclopaedia - and libraries have free internet now!

Pancakeflipper

You are right. that's how we used to learn things - by noticing other topics while looking for what we wanted to research.

That's where general knowledge comes from - noticing things.

Internet first, then I always say let's have a look in the encyclopaedia too and see if there is anything interesting in there? Also all words looked up in an actual dictionary, not on line.

I am going to sound nuts now but i do feel quite concerned sometimes about our utter reliance on technology that can only function with electricity. It's quite scary really.