Squall06's List: 2.4 Misinformation debate

• But now fears of a decline in literacy have become more prominent,
• here is the fear that this ‘new language’ may replace Standard English and young people will become unable to use our language ‘properly
• Woronoff (2007)  thinks so. He describes texting as a “habit forming menace [which] can influence kids to spell incorrectly”.
• It explained that some teens misspelt words and used textisms in their GCSE papers. Despite this, The Daily Telegraph then later published an article in 2011 supporting the opposite point of view. The heading read “text messaging ‘improves children’s spelling skills”. 

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• Children are more prone to commit errors because they have read less, and prefer to play games, or watch TV, etc. Much of their time is influenced by what is going on in their environment. So we have to be watchful that they not look stupid because they cannot spell simple common words. Texting has come along with a flourish, making a big impact among them. This habit forming menace can influence kids to spell incorrectly or get confused about the correct usage.
• they can help good or bad spellers become worse.

• Examiners have given warning that pupils are increasingly using text message language in GCSEs, the first official acknowledgment that mobile phone shorthand is undermining standard English.
• A report published by the Assessment and Qualifications Alliance, the largest exam board in the country, has disclosed that this year's GCSE English scripts were peppered with the abbreviated words which have become second nature to many youngsters.
• Examiners found that the trend was accompanied by an increase in grammatical errors. "The weakest answers were devoid of punctuation, including the full stop, and were difficult to follow as a consequence," the report said. "Sentences were frequently too long (10 lines or more). Apostrophes were often missing and inserted into plural nouns. The usual errors with they're/their; are/our; your/you're were frequent." Examiners also described the misuse of capital letters, a common feature of texting, as "more glaring this year". "Capital letters are also used in the middle of words, the result of poorly formed letters or an apparent ignorance of the difference between upper and lower case," the report added.
• the use of text message abbreviations was a growing problem.
• It is quite appalling that schoolchildren cannot distinguish between ordinary language and text language. It is something that teachers need to tackle urgently if we have reached the stage where students are making such errors in exams."

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• Pupils are to be banned from taking study leave before their GCSEs because ministers fear that they are spending their revision time playing video games.
• "Study leave must not become 'video-game leave'. At this crucial time in a young person's life, it is more important that they achieve the highest GCSE grade they can, not the highest score on a games console."

• negative side effect is beginning to take hold in our classrooms. Cyber slang is suspected of damaging students’ writing acumen.
• I’m a little worried about where we are in America with literacy levels dropping
• The Times Daily newspaper cites a recent report from Pew Internet and American Life Project, "Writing, Technology and Teens," which found that the cell phone text-based abbreviated communications teens use are showing up in more formal writing.

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• Yik Yak, which allows for anonymous messaging, offer online bullies new tools.
• According to EducationNews.org, the app has been blocked at 85 percent of high schools across the country. A
• t a high school in Charlotte, North Carolina, the app was being updated with "derogatory" messages targeting students and teachers alike. 

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• ur skills in critical thinking and analysis have declined
• Reading for pleasure, which has declined among young people in recent decades, enhances thinking and engages the imagination in a way that visual media such as video games and television do not,
• "By using more visual media, students will process information better," she said. "However, most visual media are real-time media that do not allow time for reflection, analysis or imagination — those do not get developed by real-time media such as television or video games. Technology is not a panacea in education, because of the skills that are being lost.
• Studies show that reading develops imagination, induction, reflection and critical thinking, as well as vocabulary,"
• Reading for pleasure is the key to developing these skills. Students today have more visual literacy and less print literacy. Many students do not read for pleasure and have not for decades."
• mong the studies Greenfield analyzed was a classroom study showing that students who were given access to the Internet during class and were encouraged to use it during lectures did not process what the speaker said as well as students who did not have Internet access. When students were tested after class lectures, those who did not have Internet access performed better than those who did.
• These and other studies show that multi-tasking "prevents people from getting a deeper understanding of information

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• watching TV can lead to less interaction between parents and children, with a detrimental impact on literacy and language skills.
• he results demonstrated that who mothers co-read books communicated significantly more with their children than mothers watching TV. The amount of communication involved in reading was not significantly higher than playing with toys. However, the quality of maternal responsiveness was higher in books than toys.
• The team found that when reading a book with their children parents used a more active communication style, bringing the child into contact with words they may not hear in every day speech, thereby improving their vocabulary and grammatical knowledge. In contrast watching TV resulted in significantly fewer descriptions and positive responses than mothers playing with toys.
• “Reading books together increased the maternal communication beyond a level required for reading, while watching TV decreased maternal communication.

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• As teenagers’ scores on standardized reading tests have declined or stagnated, some argue that the hours spent prowling the Internet are the enemy of reading — diminishing literacy, wrecking attention spans and destroying a precious common culture that exists only through the reading of books.
• At least since the invention of television, critics have warned that electronic media would destroy reading
• ast fall the National Endowment for the Arts issued a sobering report linking flat or declining national reading test scores among teenagers with the slump in the proportion of adolescents who said they read for fun.
• According to Department of Education data cited in the report, just over a fifth of 17-year-olds said they read almost every day for fun in 2004, down from nearly a third in 1984. Nineteen percent of 17-year-olds said they never or hardly ever read for fun in 2004, up from 9 percent in 1984.

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• Does   playing video games affect the literacy levels of young people?  The   answer is yes; however, some feel that video games have a negative impact on   literacy
• TV and   video games offer instant rewards” while “reading … offers delayed   gratification because it takes four to five years to master the skills”,   therefore the more young people “turn to TV and video games, the dimmer   their prospects of reading improvement”
• Knowledge is learned through reading   alone, therefore, “work that does not involve such learning is   ‘meaningless’” and “activities that are entertaining but that themselves do   not involve such learning are just ‘meaningless play’”
• Being able   to read words on a page and answer general, factual questions about the   texts only provides a literal understanding of the text, but fails to show   any contextual or social meaning

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• Baroness Susan Greenfield, former Director of the Royal Institution, claim that video games negatively “rewire” our brains, infantilising us, depriving us of our very identities and even instigating the financial crisis.
• They found that after 4 months, boys who had received the games had lower reading and writing scores than expected, failing to improve to the same degree as their console-less peers. They also faced more academic problems at school.
• They found that the budding gamers had significantly lower reading and writing scores than those who never received the PS2. In the intervening months, the control group became better at reading and writing, while the gamers stagnated or, if anything, became slightly worse. This didn’t escape the notice of their teachers, who said that they were showing more problems at school in reading, writing and spelling.

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• However, numerous studies show that video games, especially ones with violent content, adversely affect a teen's aggressive behavior.
• Part of the increase in aggressive behavior is linked to the amount of time children are allowed to play video games. In one study by Walsh (2000), a majority of teens admitted that their parents do not impose a time limit on the number of hours they are allowed to play video games. The study also showed that most parents are unaware of the content or the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) rating (see below) of the video games their children play.

• In another study conducted by Gentile, Lynch, Linder & Walsh (2004, p.6) "adolescent girls played video games for an average of 5 hours a week whereas boys averaged 13 hours a week". The authors also stated that teens who play violent video games for extended periods of time show the following behaviors:

   
  1. Tend to be more aggressive
   
  2. Are more prone to confrontation with their teachers
   
  3. May engage in fights with their peers
   
  4. See a decline in school achievements. (Gentile et al, 2004).
• Another negative impact is that players are rewarded for their violent acts.
• Gentile & Anderson (2003) state that playing video games may increase aggressive behavior because violent acts are continually repeated throughout the video game. This method of repetition has long been considered an effective teaching method in reinforcing learning patterns.
• Their report states that exposure to violent media can elevate aggressive feelings and thoughts, especially in children. These effects on aggressive behavior can be long-term.

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• A False Sense of Connection
• social media sites can make it more difficult for us to distinguish between the meaningful relationships we foster in the real world, and the numerous casual relationships formed through social media.
• Cyber-bullying
• social media is available to predators as well as friends. Kids especially are vulnerable to the practice of cyber-bullying in which the perpetrators, anonymously or even posing as people their victims trust, terrorize individuals in front of their peers.
• The anonymity afforded online can bring out dark impulses that might otherwise be suppressed. Cyber-bullying has spread widely among youth, with 42% reporting that they have been victims,
• Decreased Productivity
• the sites can also prove a great distraction to employees who may show more interest in what their friends are posting than in their work tasks
• Privacy

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