A teacher's view on attention span
In today’s classrooms it has become quite a task to teach young students. There are lots of factors that come into play such as family ties, the internet and technology. Mixing all this with a fast paced society makes for a cocktail for short attention madness. But I can’t put all the blame on the kids and families or society. There are also teachers who are untrained or just uninspired. This part of the equation is not often discussed or even mentioned.
F Is For Family
This may be the most important factor when it comes to child education. Nowadays, teachers are expected to be more than just a teacher. They are expected to be a teacher, a psychologist, and a parent in some ways. Although teachers are an extension of the family in, you can’t expect a teacher to raise your kids. It’s such a difficult job to raise one kid, so imagine having to raise 13 kids or 20 kids or even 100 kids.
Parents need to step up and go back to the traditional ways of raising their kids. This includes actually installing moral values in kids, paying attention to them when they are at home and most of all teaching them that if they do something wrong, there will be consequences. Of course there are also great parents out there, but maybe others should follow suit.
In my personal experience of teaching kids, I have come to the conclusion that nine times out of ten, children who have low attention spans, which leads to misbehaviour, often don’t have any type of family support. The parent’s of these kids are sometimes just as bad or even worse than their kids. I have learned that a lot of parents are very sensitive about observations made about their kids, when maybe they should be more sensible.
The IT Crowd
Nowadays, the internet plays such an important role in kids’ lives. They use it for entertainment and studying, which is basically 60% of their free time. More and more kids are becoming hibernators and, add to this the fact that both parents are at work and rather have their kids on a tablet or a video game, and you begin to understand the short attention span phenomena.
You, yourself, might be at home right now, online reading this post and maybe watching Netflix and listening to music at the same time. Perhaps you could understand the difficulties a teacher has in a classroom. Kids are bombarded with options: YouTube, Netflix, Instagram, Tik Tok, Snapchat, and the list goes on and on. This makes it very difficult for a teacher to try to capture their attention. At home they have so many options, while in their classroom their choices are very limited and the tools teachers have are their disposal are also very limited. Add to this lack of discipline at home and it’s game over.
iTeacher
In 2020, technology has become so advanced and has enabled us to do anything in a matter of minutes. We no longer have to look up information in an encyclopaedia, cut out newspaper articles, or even go to a library. All the information we need is right at our fingertips. Kids today don’t want to wait for the answers, they don’t want to research by looking through books or go to a library to take out a book.
There needs to be more incorporation of technology in the classroom in order to give teachers a fighting chance. This would make it an even playing field. A teacher can’t compete with an online dictionary, our hard drives have limited storage. Kids love to ask many questions and are now accustomed to typing a question into a search bar and getting an immediate answer, whether it is right or not.
Vocation Vs Vacation
There is a big difference between a teacher that wants to be a teacher and a teacher who wants long summer vacations. I mean no teacher is perfect, after all we are only human. But during my teaching experience, I have come across many teachers and all can be placed into the prior two categories. Finding a teacher who likes to teach and who is good at teaching is not always easy. It’s like dancing I guess, some people are naturals on the dance floor and others want to be good but struggle to dominate their skill.
Some teachers are just not meant to be teachers. Teaching is not their calling in life, and they should not be in charge of educating kids. That being said, there are plenty of teachers who are good at what they do. Teaching kids is not the same as teaching adults. Kids need to be studied before you can teach them. They are all different and express themselves in different ways. Being able to break through that wall is what makes the difference in your success with them.
I, myself, have been handed off kids and told, ”This kid is impossible to teach. He is so rude” and so on. I see this as a challenge, not as a problem. It’s fun to be that person who was able to get through to that kid. Nevertheless, I don’t consider myself a teaching guru and there are many teachers with my abilities. What ‘m saying is that this part of the equation is just as important as the three previous three.
