TV in school

[kattyo]

I've noticed a few posts in which people talk about their kids watching TV/DVDs in school. Is this normal???? I don't remember anyone watching TV when i was a kid - apart from the silver jubilee, when the tv was wheeled in specially (and yes - this dates me). We don't have a tv at home and the kids only watch at most one DVD a week (a disney movie). They are nearly four. What am I to expect when they start primary school? What kind of DVDs are kids watching? And why? Laziness on the part of the teacher, or is it actually meant to be educational? Slightly panicked as it's reinforcing my fear that early years teaaching is just a fancy form of state funded childcare.

And just to say, I didn't feel particularly convinced by Palmer's evidence on that day (although it wasn't the topic of the session) but it certainly gave me something to think over.

I think there is a problem with children being visually over stimulated to the point they don't really listen but I totally disagree that teachers working with young children (primary age) are ignorant of child development or that chalk face professionals don't recognise the value of evidence-based research (not sure the same applies to those making policies though)

I think there needs to be a balance, between use of media and purposeful use of media. One of the main concerns at present is that children lack experiences and in some cases they don't actually go anywhere, from an early age they are placed in front of a television, x-box, playstation etc. for long amounts of time and that is it. It is therefore important that in schools we are much more proactive in giving children real life experiences.

For example, I watched a lesson a few weeks ago with a teacher in Year One. It was a lovely well planned lesson on Telling the time. However, she put a great deal of effort into looking at a clock on the Interactive whiteboard, moving the hands with the pen etc. when really the children would have benefitted much more from having actual clocks to move the hands. I've seen similar things where a teacher was teaching 3D shapes and the only practical examples she gave them were on the Interactive whiteboard where they were completely flat and therefore 2D.

I believe there needs to be a shift back to giving children practical experiences and not showing them how things work on an Interactive whiteboard. Why show them what a forest looks like? Why not actually take them to one or set up a Forest schools area? Yes I know there would be a funding implication, but these things need looking at.

I think there is alot of evidence-based research which is entirely contradictory - you can probably find any number of papers on the effect of TV on development and the data will be interpreted in a positive or negative way.

I'm not poo pooing it but I am interested in the evidence for it affecting childrens development in a negative way. I think it's questionable whether it adds anything to learning because children tend to learn by doing rather than watching but it can also add some interest to a lesson ir another wY of approaching subject matter as some teachers have explained.

Op - you could always ask for your child to be removed if the TV goes on, I suppose.

Single - I absolutely agree with that.

Yay! I'll add 'woefully ignorant' to my list of personal qualities.
Not strictly true though - Primary and Early Years teachers tend to do a lot of child development study during their training, plus a piece of 'action research' to encourage the habit of looking at practice, questioning and changing it. (I agree that learning styles/VAK are a load of bobbins though).
Sue Palmer is hardly full of top-notch epirical research - don't read it uncritically just becuse she's saying what you want to hear.

This week my class watched 'television' (well, 2 2-minute clips on the IWB) showing Chinese New Year. It was used as a stimulus to talk about similarities between our New Year and the Chinese one, and to generate questions for our Hong Kong-born visitor to answer later. We used the dragon dance clips as inspiration for our own dances, made lanterns, cooked noodles...
Could I have done all the activities without the clips? Yes, but I think it enhanced the children's experience and understanding.

To say 'all electronic media in the classroom is a bad thing' is, I think, misguided. Go and have a look, visit classrooms, talk to teachers. And if you still think it's a deal breaker, try Steiner (anyone mentioned the Gnomes yet?) or HE.

empirical

I agree totally. Technology has it's place but isn't a substitute for real life experience.

We definitely had TV in the 60s at primary school - for music programmes, iirc.

dd's school only uses films for very wet or impossible-outdoors type weather lunch breaks - or occasionally (really occasionally) as part of specific learning.

They NEVER use it in the nursery (where dd2 is). Or in Reception, either.

I think like most things the way it is used is probably the determining factor for whether its positive or negative, no?

My DS (5) and I loved watching Bruce Parry/Human Planet in the Arctic and I will show him the rainforest one. We don't watch a whole hour in one go, also we stop to discuss it. Sorry, but I can't give him the real life experience here. Neither can schools, but I am sure a few clocks or 3D shapes (cans/boxes) could be found in addition to the whiteborad.

He doesn't watch much TV otherwise, I would limit it but he doesn't want to watch it much anyway. However, I would not agree to them being put in front of a TV during wet lunch 'for a bit of piece and quiet' - they can do board games, lego, chat, read ... they are also there to learn social skills at that age I thought.

Also, why should it be bad for them to learn how to use the computer? How would they get on later without that skill? Computers are everywhere and are here to stay.

I am surrounded by teachers and heads of education insisting on 'active learning' at all times even though we have been presented with no consistent definition of the term nor any strong evidence-based research (let alone recent compelling pilot studies) that shows that achievement improves when compared to other methods of learning. The questioning of current favourite theories is certainly not encouraged.

Fair point that it was extreme on my part to suggest that teachers don't have an understanding of child development. But people here do say the darndest things in support of their use of screen technology in the classroom.

As I've said here before, it's not that this stuff shouldn't be in schools, it's a matter of when. I don't think you'll find anyone suggesting that screens and such are inappropriate for twelve-year-olds. But there is a debate about the appropriateness for seven-year-olds. So why do schools embrace this technology if there are still questions about it? This seems reckless, most especially because it's not necessary or even preferable to teaching through doing.

for Pekkla, the use of the Chinese clips sounds like it did indeed enhance the lesson, and I would be very comfortable with what you've presented for my dc, even perhaps grateful. But I'm absolutely not happy with TV for wet days or peace, Disney, Pixar and nintendo gaming for maths.

Speaking specifically, I think there should be a general no-video policy for primary with the option to ask for a dispensation for something like Pekkla's lesson. I also trust the mrz would come up with meaningful uses based on her thinking on previous threads. But unless there is some clarification, someone is always going to come up with a justification for Toy Story being educational.

we used to watch 'schools television' in primary school in the 1970s - there was one called 'How we used to live' which was the high spot of my week for a while; brought history very much to life; loved it.

Don't like it in nursery, my dc's old nursery used to watch especially at the end of the day, current one doesn't and I do prefer that. And I wouldn't be thrilled about disney videos....

We used to watch TV in the 70's. This was limited as there was no means of recording or playing back the programme. We had to file into the hall and watch the one school telly live. 'Watch' and 'look and listen'.

The difference is now, we can record and edit, which allows clips to enhance what is being taught.
I have found that this helps visual leaners in the class take on baoard what it is I am trying to teach

Even watching a bit of Toy Story could be educational if used as inspiration to start/continue a story, discuss whatever ...

But I do not agree with young children just sitting there and staring at a screen. I don't know about other DCs, but mine (5) still doesn't concentrate for the duration of a whole film, does not understand it all and ends up just staring at the pretty pictures or goes off to do something else. We still watch films in junks of about 1/2 hour.

I am middle school so not EYFS but I use media in the same way as Pekkla. I teach RE and short of packing my class off to India sometimes the best way to show faith in action is through video clips.

Yes I have used video for the majority of a lesson before, mostly notably with Year 8 when we looked at key scenes from The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas.

I do agree about the showing of Disney though.

DD's school use DVDs for v. wet playtimes (we have a lot of them here). I don't really object to it, although DD is scared of Finding Nemo, but had to watch it at school :(

I do however object to bloody Nintendo DSs in the classroom - I've told DD she is too young for one and her argument is that she gets to use them at school

Oh, meant to say - we watched school TV in the 70s, I loved "How we Used to Live"

Yesterday I did a lesson about identifying trees before taking year 4 out for a visit to a local farm. I used the iwb to show images of different tree silhouettes, bark and leaf buds. We could, of course, have used a book and passed it round the 37 children in the class ....
I also frequently use the board to show images of things that crop up in lessons; I can't quite remember why last week I used google to quickly find a photo of an aardvark ... but it was lucky because my spontaneous aardvark drawing isn't brilliant.
My dd is 4 and is not at school at the moment. She loves watching dvds, including Disney films. Then she goes off and spends hours in role as one of the Aristocats, or makes fairy houses in the garden, or does 'cooking' in her tree house, or draws ... I don't see that it is adversely affecting her development.

Our Year 3 / 4 watched BBC weather forecasts the other day, and were then supposed to comment on it, and write about it too. If it is, to some extent, 'educational' it is surely valid?

On the last day of term children can bring in games or toys, and there is often a DVD showing; but plenty of kids choose not to watch it,

Our Year 1 / 2 have made PowerPoint presentations, and also a frame-by-frame movie of visits they have been on.

One of our Governors a few weeks ago, having a big clear-out in the basement, came across school equipment from the Victorian era: rusty pen nibs, and tiny slates, some lined for text, some squared for numeracy, and a 'scriber' for writing on the surface!! [Honest !] Our kids were fascinated by it, and that really was HISTORY!

Great name, Ferguson!

My Y1 class watched "Magic Grandad - toys from 1950s" the other week. We're looking at toys as part of our topic, The children have looked at old toys, read books about them and talked to grandparents etc about toys and this gave them a clear idea of what things were the same/different - perfect for 5 year olds. The 15 minute programme took half an hour because we kept stopping it to talk.

When I've taught year 3/4 I've watched "Look and read" every week. It's the same 10 part series some of you watched at school - Through the dragon's eye; badgergirl; boy from space; dark towers etc. It has a big literacy input and for a 20 minute program (some of which are over 40 years old), the children sit fascinated and spend quality discussion time talking through it afterwards.

I can also confirm that technology is used in the independent sector. I find that there are many good video starters for lessons. There are also many good documentaries that you can use for note-taking practice. Children also use laptops to word-process written work and to create power-point presentations. Children enjoy and pay attention to video.

I think the jury is still out on video texts.

Video games are, it would seem, clearly damaging at primary school (something to do with speeding up the brain so the children cannot put down memory traces as easily). I find many parents have not taken this on board (see Toxic Childhood by Sue Palmer for the study links). Video texts are clearly not as damaging and shouldn't be lumped in with gaming, in any case they are never used as a substitute for reading and writing, just as a support.

I was wondering less about interactive white boards and video clips used as illustration than I was about watching TV or disney films, or any other programme or films, as a sit down activity - whether it's rainy day or (occasionally at the nursery my children attend) end of day activity. I've heard of this not just here on mumsnet but from parent's with kids in the schools around where I live.

I'm not sure why the children can't just read or draw on rainy days. Isn't that activity also good down time activity? That's what mine do. It involves a bit more effort on my part, for sure, but now they are used to it - so they just go and look at books by themselves if we are indoors. Isn't it a good habit to get kids into - pick up a book/do a drawing - rather than switch on the tv to divert boredome?

My kids also do ten minutes of computer time when they are at nursery. I have no desire for them to learn a computer yet - they are still three - but I don't mind - although I wish the teachers wouldn't just put the kids on the cbeebies page so that the children start recognising all the little characters on the screen, and then when we go out, want to buy tie-in merchandise....