A Mighty Girl Web Site

The web is just one more place that bombards young girls with images of what women “should” look like. But one antidote is a new Web site called "A Mighty Girl" and its repository of books and movies with girl empowerment themes. It is refreshing help for parents trying to counteract the “helpless princess” theme that is so prevalent on sites for young girls.

Kids & Technologies: How Student Learn

A fourth grade teacher, knowing of my interest in kids and technologies, advised, “You’ve got to read Rewired by Larry D. Rosen. It explains so much about what those of us in education and parents need to know.” She was right. This book and other resources by Rosen give us a glimpse into the “psychology of technology” so that we will be better able to understand how our kids learn. According to Rosen, the iGeneration, those students born in the 90s, expect “instant access” to information and people.  These are kids who are constantly connected through digital devices and believe that anything is possible. Additional information about Rosen’s books is available on his site and at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Women in Technology

As we work toward encouraging our daughters to take the highest levels of science, technology, and mathematics courses available in middle and high school, we need to be aware of the obstacles women continue to face in the workplace. When it comes to heading tech companies and leading technology initiatives, women often find themselves not competing on a level field with their male counterparts. Claire Cain Miller’s NY Times piece, “Out of the Loop in Silicon Valley” gives examples of difficulties women often experience when breaking into management, getting start-ups going, becoming entrepreneurs, etc. In addition to the problem women have with juggling careers with family, they have to learn how to operate in a field dominated by men. Times are gradually changing as organizations such as Girls in Tech, Forum of Women Entrepreneurs and Executives, and Women 2.0 lead the way. What we need is a new model to break the stereotype. What is the image you see, when you think of a computer scientist, a tech start-up leader, a computer or engineering company executive?  Maybe that’s part of the problem?

Fashion - Cellphones and Young Japanese Girls Lead the Way

Holy Cellphone, Mom and Dad! Forget texting and taking pictures, young girls in Japan are leading the world in a revolution where clothes can be ordered off a cell phone as well. In a country where almost everything Americans do on a computer - read e-mail and news, search for restaurants, blog and shop  - is done on a cellphone, it seems almost inevitable that clothes would be next.  BTW - enough new mobile phones were sold in Japan last year - a total of 52.3 million - for nearly half the population. Now Xavel, a Tokyo startup company is taking advantage that by staging fashion shows where you can order the clothes that have just gone by on the model on the runway using your cell phone. Twenty-two thousand girls showed up at the last show and talks are underway to bring the concept to the US as well as elsewhere. To stay in the loop, check out the girlswalker.com site designed to be accessed from mobile phones as well as personal computers.

Toy Fair Focuses on Wired Kids

Every year toy manufacturers converge on NYC in February to show off their latest and greatest. This year that fair seems to be driven by one very startling fact: Kids create more than 100,000 avatars each day in virtual communities such as Habbo and Club Penguin. What that means is that when kids say they are going out to play, more and more often they are going online to do it. Now toy manufacturers are scrambling even faster to be part of that action. Of course with all of this there are pros and cons. For example, online there is no lead paint to worry about. But how about getting kids away from the screen? Using a pedometer, IToy's ME2 keeps track of a kid's daily steps and transfers points to an avatar's power levels. This pushes kids to ride a bike, run or walk to earn points to buy a virtual vehicle. Or how about this? Tired of yelling at the kids to get them off the computer? Try Meet Bob, an $80 device that controls the electrical power for a TV or computer monitor. By requiring users to punch in a code number, Bob silently enforces parents' viewing rules, counting down the amount of viewing time available and turning off the screen during designated homework hours and at bedtime. Fisher Price even has the Smart Bounce Spin Pony based on the classic springy playground ride. But this one, for ages 12 to 36 months, is connected to the TV via a wireless device. The more baby bounces, the better the onscreen educational play. At age 3, the child can continue the move-and-play process on the Smart Cycle, celebrated last weekend as the Toy Industry of America's innovative toy of the year. All that makes me wonder. Will kids expect teachers to move faster the more they bounce when they go off to school? Maybe the old adage "they don't have to be sitting quietly in their seats to be learning" will finally get some playing time. (Sorry for the pun.) (The link from this article is to the Washington Post that you can read for free, but you'll have to register.)

Girls Playing Online

A new study by market research firm NPD Group indicates that young girls spend an estimated seven hours a week playing on computers, twice as much as they spent four years ago. They also found that most children begin playing on the computer around age 5 ½. All this has had consequences for Mattel's Barbie, which saw a market share loss of 15% in 2007. While Barbie also has her own web site, she has stiff competition from the sites of Webkinz and Bratz. All this indicates that social networking and online games are having a bigger and bigger influence on girls at an even earlier age. Definitely something to watch, as is the idea that all this online activity is just early training for online shopping. Whatever happened to creating things on the computer? Games are good, but let's stop letting our kids be spoon-fed by these kinds of sites.  BTW - the number one activity for kids, according to the surveys, remains watching television. (The link from this article is to the Washington Post that you can read for free, but you'll have to register.)

Hanging Out Safely on the Web

Safe Card tech and a Web site are combining to test a new idea for student digital safety.  When students go online, they insert a card with their fingerprint into the computer and are directed to a safe site where they can enjoy monitored chatting and traveling to sites that are screened for violence, nudity, solicitation, etc. The program is targeted to students 17 and under and can be put to use in homes as well as school. In schools, the card can be used for keeping track of attendance, lunch purchases, library records and more. Check out information about how Safe Card is currently being used to provide online security for purchases.

What Parents Think & Do When It Comes to Their Children & the Net

Parenting Moves Online: Parents' Internet Actions and Attitudes 2007 features the results of a poll taken by Cable in the Classroom and Common Sense Media. It features information about what parents are doing at home to keep their children safe online in addition to parent attitudes about how the Internet can help their children. Find out if parents are facing the same problems with their children's Internet use as you are with your students' Internet use. You might also be interested in the 2006 poll, Parenting the MySpace Generation.

Girls Gotta Have IT

The K-12 NCWIT (National Center for Women & Information Technology) Alliance (College Board, ISTE, American School Counselor Association, Girl Scouts, and other organizations) offers a free kit packed with materials for encouraging girls to consider careers in information technology (IT). The kit includes the following publications: Totally Amazing Careers in Engineering, Science Can Take Her Places!, Girls and Information Technology, Computing Degrees and Careers, IT is all about Me, and more. You can download the materials in pdf format from the site.

How to Be Safety Savvy

If you are looking for materials that teens will appreciate GirlsHealth is a site you might want to investigate. In it you'll find the section, "Safety: How to Be Safe Savvy", which includes topics related to relationships, fun, and safety at home, school, on the road, and on the Internet. The Internet section features articles on safe surfing, chatting, bullying, blogging, and cybercrime. You'll want to have your students take the "Are You Safe in CyberSpace Quiz."