Technology Trouble | Teen Ink

Technology Trouble

February 22, 2010
By RachanaTadakamalla BRONZE, Kansas City, Kansas
RachanaTadakamalla BRONZE, Kansas City, Kansas
1 article 0 photos 0 comments

Favorite Quote:
Nothing succeeds like success.


Did you know the average teen uses about thirty-one hours of technology per week? Technology has improved the world in many good ways, but teens are not using it for good reasons…
Most of it is being done in the classroom, yes the classroom. Teens are manipulating there resources into their own benefit, but not in a good way.
Instead of doing their class work, they chat with friends across the room or playing computer games when teachers are not looking. Cell phones are a big distraction. Teachers have noticed that teens are sneaking their cell phones into the classroom and they start texting. And on top of that them text answers to quizzes and tests! This is getting out of hand!
Teen’s text about break-ups and other stupid topics as a replacement for studies and paying attention in class.
A survey was conducted in Sanford, NC. Sixty-five students at a High School were asked questions about their usage of texting and instant messaging. The surveys were anonymous to unsure an honest answer. The students were asked the following questions:
?
Do you text or instant message or both?
?
How many hours a day do you text?
?
How many text messages do you send each day
?
Do you text during school hours
?
Have you ever used text messaging to cheat on an assignment or test? If so how often?
The survey was interesting and here were the results:
It was settle on that out of the 65 students, two instant messaged and 29 texts messaged. Thirty students said that they both texted and instant messaged. Four students did not have an answer nor did not text message or instant message. It was determined that averages of 323 text messages were sent in a day by these 59 students. Fifty –one of the 59 students, or 86.4 percent, text message in class.
Also, on average, 38 text messages are sent in a 90-minute class period. When asked if they have used texting to cheat on a test or assignment, nine students, or 15.3 percent, responded yes.
Now the first text message was sent from the computer to a cell phone and it said “Merry Christmas” but it changed communication forever. In the U.S. texting has become a money maker for cellular providers.
It all comes back to teenagers, ages 13 to 17 years old, which reportedly send and or receive, on average 1,742 text messages a month. While teens originally made more phone calls a month, their call usage has dropped to an average 231 calls a month!
In the meantime when you think your child is doing their homework upstairs in their room they might be doing anything like watching videos on YouTube™, instant messaging answers to tests and more. One of the software that teens are using these days is Skype ™. During classes, I see a lot of people chatting with their friends across the rooms and they don’t get caught.
Most of the people that chat do not get good grades in school and they don’t understand that they are ruing their lives.
Teens are also getting very lazy and not exercising. While the watch TV the usually eat and drink soda and eat fatty foods. On top of that they do not exercise and start gaining weight, and they get heart problems and blood vessel clots.
As you can see technology can be a bad thing. If teens get wrapped in technology they will ruin their lives. Teen’s grades are going to plummet, or they are going to start getting obese. I hope that teens can put their PS3 controller down or stop watching TV, and read a book, study for a test or play outside! There is a great world outside of PS3’s or TV and teens have to start living their lives.


The author's comments:
This is an article about how teens are getting sucked into technology.

Similar Articles

JOIN THE DISCUSSION

This article has 1 comment.


codymoore said...
on Mar. 9 2010 at 12:44 pm
First of all, thank you for covering this important, 21st century teen topic. These issues are multi-fold today, and our society needs to develop healthy programs to deal with them. We just want to let you know about a nationwide nonprofit program which aims at reducing the impact of such teen texting/e-issues. You may find the program’s website at www.MyTtext .com . It’s a unique program that no other nonprofit in the nation is doing right now (that we can find!).
Our TText program delivers a positive daily text message for teens straight to their cell phones. The daily messages range in content from teen-related humor, to news, to positive-outcome messages designed to inform teens about risky behavioral choices (e.g. drug and alcohol use, safety issues like texting while driving, teen sex , etc.). The point is to build a virtual relationship with the teens through the daily content and then to sprinkle in like salt the healthy messages. We also have the capability to conduct surveys with the teens directly. For instance we can text them on Monday morning and ask them, “How many of your friends took a drink of alcohol this weekend?” and thus receive live behavioral data straight from the teens themselves. Parents can sign their teens up for the program for only $5/month on the website.
Anyway, just trying to get the word out about this! If you have an e-mail list or a website where you can share about this, please let me know. Would love to give you more info. about it, if you are interested.
Thanks for all you do,
Cody Moore
Executive Director
The Tree House Center for Youth, Inc.
1505 Chipeta Ave.
Grand Junction, CO 81501
www.TreeHouseCenter.org
970-241-8001 (o)
970-241-8016 (f)