Overview

Secret Lives of Children in the Digital Age: Disruptive Devices and Resourceful Learners offers an examination of the impact on children, their families and their teachers, as digital technologies and new literacy practices have rapidly transformed how children learn, play and communicate. While ease of access to enormous knowledge bases presents many benefits and advantages, mobile screen technologies are often perceived by parents and teachers as disruptive and worrisome. Developed from a wide range of the authors' research over the past decade to an examination of remote learning during the COVID 19 pandemic, this book posits that while teachers, parents and governments are focused on protecting children, what is often neglected is children's own agency and capacity to engage with mobile technologies in ways that support them in pursuing their own interests, pleasures and learning. This text works to disrupt boundaries in research, policy and practice, between home and school, and across virtual and actual worlds, positioning children as both users of media texts and coproducers of digitally mediated knowledge, with peers, family and teachers. Secret Lives of Children in the Digital Age contributes to research on digital literacies, and offers a pedagogical examination of digital possibilities for bringing playfulness and innovation into learning.

Full Product Details

Author:   Linda Laidlaw ,  Joanne O'Mara ,  Suzanna Wong
Publisher:   Myers Education Press
Imprint:   Myers Education Press
Weight:   0.333kg
ISBN:  

9781975504717

ISBN 10:   1975504712
Pages:   150
Publication Date:   30 December 2021
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In stock  
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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments Dennis Sumara Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: Living in the iWorld: Two Literacy Researchers Reflect on the Changing Texts and Literacy Practices of Childhood Chapter 3: Early Literacy Instruction and Complexity Chapter 4: Rethinking Difference in the iWorld Chapter 5: Parents and Teachers, Disrupted Chapter 6: Locking Up the iPads: Administrative Controls and Resourceful Teachers Chapter 7: Big Brother, Little Sister: Digital Surveillance at Home and at School Chapter 8: Secret Lives, Private Spaces, and Social Media Chapter 9: A Conclusion: Stumbling Toward the Digital Future AfterwordJill Blackmore About the Authors Index

Reviews

"""Teachers and parents frequently express concern about children's use of technology both in schools and at home. They raise questions about the amount of time children should spend in front of screens, what constitutes appropriate use of digital devices, and whether children are safe when they are online. Laidlaw (Univ. of Alberta, Canada), O'Mara (Deaking Univ., Australia), and Wong (Univ. of Alberta, Canada) show readers how digital devices such as iPads have disrupted stale, more traditional forms of teaching, learning, and engagement that take place in schools and homes today. Through myriad research studies, they demonstrate the positive impact that digital devices have on children's critical thinking, learning, and growth, even among children with disabilities. The authors address important questions that educators and parents have in terms of what constitutes appropriate technology use; what it means to be literate in today's digital world; teachers' and parents' roles in this endeavor; and perhaps most importantly, children's agency as producers and users of digitally mediated knowledge. Rich in research and anecdotes from the authors and teachers, this significant book challenges conventional thinking and practice regarding children's technology use. It should be widely read.""--C. B. Freville, Dominican University for CHOICE, May 2023, Vol. 60, No. 9 ""This is a unique book. It makes the personal social and the social personal through reflection on lived digital experience and the findings of more than a decade of research in and about the learning spaces of homes, classrooms, and communities. Rich in data, adventurous in theory, and imaginative in conclusion, this book is a well-selected mix of new and re-printed pieces. It sparks insights about the lives of children born into digital worlds and about parenting and schooling by adults grappling with technological revolution. At once retrospective and prospective, it charts emergent ways of digital being and invites action for fairer futures for all young people. It is a book for re-reading.""--Karen Dooley, Ph.D., Faculty of Creative Industries, Education and Social Justice, Queensland University of Technology ""The Secret Lives of Children in the Digital Age by Linda Laidlaw, Joanne O'Mara, and Suzanna Wong uncovers the lived, felt, and tacit ways that children move through digital spaces without much fuss, rather with energy, enthusiasm, even passion. Focusing in on Lego robotics kits and story play videos, the authors string together a series of small stories that collectively paint a vivid and vibrant picture of children's rich daily digital encounters. It is a book that you can sit with and linger over and it is an absolute pleasure to read.""--Jennifer Rowsell, Professor of Literacies and Social Innovation, Co-Deputy Head of School, School of Education, University of Bristol ""In The Secret Lives of Children in the Digital Age: Disruptive Devices and Resourceful Learners, Laidlaw, O'Mara, and Wong masterfully weave together over a decade of data from four research studies that occurred across two continents. Integrating the voices of youth, teachers, parents, caregivers, researchers, and other educational stakeholders, the authors trace the role of technology in youth meaning-making experiences in and beyond school, providing readers with multiple perspectives of the complex nature and transformative possibilities of youth digital practices.""--Sandra Schamroth Abrams, Ph.D., Professor, St. John's University, USA"

This is a unique book. It makes the personal social and the social personal through reflection on lived digital experience and the findings of more than a decade of research in and about the learning spaces of homes, classrooms, and communities. Rich in data, adventurous in theory, and imaginative in conclusion, this book is a well-selected mix of new and re-printed pieces. It sparks insights about the lives of children born into digital worlds and about parenting and schooling by adults grappling with technological revolution. At once retrospective and prospective, it charts emergent ways of digital being and invites action for fairer futures for all young people. It is a book for re-reading. --Karen Dooley, Ph.D., Faculty of Creative Industries, Education and Social Justice, Queensland University of Technology The Secret Lives of Children in the Digital Age by Linda Laidlaw, Joanne O'Mara, and Suzanna Wong uncovers the lived, felt, and tacit ways that children move through digital spaces without much fuss, rather with energy, enthusiasm, even passion. Focusing in on Lego robotics kits and story play videos, the authors string together a series of small stories that collectively paint a vivid and vibrant picture of children's rich daily digital encounters. It is a book that you can sit with and linger over and it is an absolute pleasure to read. --Jennifer Rowsell, Professor of Literacies and Social Innovation, Co-Deputy Head of School, School of Education, University of Bristol In The Secret Lives of Children in the Digital Age: Disruptive Devices and Resourceful Learners, Laidlaw, O'Mara, and Wong masterfully weave together over a decade of data from four research studies that occurred across two continents. Integrating the voices of youth, teachers, parents, caregivers, researchers, and other educational stakeholders, the authors trace the role of technology in youth meaning-making experiences in and beyond school, providing readers with multiple perspectives of the complex nature and transformative possibilities of youth digital practices. --Sandra Schamroth Abrams, Ph.D., Professor, St. John's University, USA

Author Information

Linda Laidlaw is a Professor working in the area of early literacy in Language and Literacy Education at the University of Alberta, in Edmonton, Alberta. She teaches courses at the graduate and undergraduate level in early literacy, drama education, writing, literacy for the elementary years, and research methods. Formerly a classroom teacher, her research focuses on digital and mobile technologies in primary education, diversity, and the relationships between children's digital practices at home and their experiences at school. Her research takes up case study, auto-ethnographic and microethnographic methods and is informed by complexity thinking and frames from literacy theory. Her latest projects are two international collaborative studies: Reimagining Literacy Education: Being Literate in the Twenty First Century, which aims to develop new frames and strategies for literacy education in a changing world; and Making Literacy Through Maker Literacies: Building Learning Opportunities in Early Childhood, which investigates 'making' strategies and pedagogical frames through working with teachers, parents and children. Joanne O'Mara is an Associate Professor of Language and Literature Education and Chair of English teaching method at Deakin University. An experienced secondary English and Drama teacher, she has continued to work with young people and schools through her university research. She particularly values the opportunity to work with students to develop their confidence and self-belief. She considers herself extremely lucky to have the opportunity to work with wonderful colleagues on a series of projects that are valuable. This research includes reading for pleasure, literacies and new textual practices; digital play and games; literacy pedagogies and gratitude and secondary English and drama pedagogy. Suzanna So Har Wong has two primary research areas. One is understanding young children's home digital literacy practices. The other is the connections between literacy learning and makerspaces in elementary classrooms. In addition, she is interested in studying children's engagement with critical literacy, equity, and social justice in- and out-of-school settings. She has worked with researchers in Canada, Australia and United Kingdom during her Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Alberta from 2017 to 2019.Currently, she is an adjunct professor and assistant lecturer in Elementary Education,Language and Literacy, at the University of Alberta.

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