My good friends at
edSocialMedia--an extraordinary website dedicated to the role of social media in education--share behind-the-scene email communication that usually dwells on the site's great success. But this week, our esteemed leader, Bill Stites wrote, "I'm curious as to how distraction is effecting you personally and/or in your institutions" with specific focus on Facebook. Are our kids over-connected, to the point of distraction?
I once heard a child psychologist offer the opinion that kids who rapidly jiggle a knee up and down do so because they need to. It's helping them. They're not nervous; they're coping. It's a compensatory behavior.
I am an iconoclast...motivated to attack stuff that is generally worshipped, so I respectfully offer a counter to those who lament our students' distraction. I want to suggest that it is what they
need to do to compensate for all the focus we demand of them. We demand a lot of focus.
How many of you noticed the crayon under Sam's nose? Hmmmm. Pay closer attention.
What follows are some images from the past few hours. Consider attention versus distraction.
You can't play spoons while distracted....
No shortage of focus here.
