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Reporting from Generation Next's Mental Health and Wellbeing of Young People seminar 2019, EducationHQ's Sarah Duggan wrote an article to relate the key messages from Kristy Goodwin's presentation, 'Managing Attention Span in the Age of Digital Distraction'. Kristy's main takeaway is that the ability to focus is a skill in its own right, and in [...]
When it comes to excessive device use, there’s nothing wrong with young people – they’re just the first generation ever to grow up with unprecedented access to technology that's been specifically designed to exploit weaknesses in human psychology, says digital wellbeing and learning researcher and educator Dr Kristy Goodwin. According to Dr Goodwin, who spoke [...]
It's never been easier to seek out instant gratification and to stave off boredom almost indefinitely. So it's not surprising that many young people are struggling with the repetitive, often boring practice and study required to master skills and cement new knowledge. Anyone can be taught the value and the how-to of deliberate practice, however. [...]
It was the big tech equivalent of “drink responsibly” or the gambling industry’s “safer play”; the latest milestone in Silicon Valley’s year of apology. Earlier this month, Facebook and Instagram announced new tools for users to set time limits on their platforms, and a dashboard to monitor one’s daily use, following Google’s introduction of Digital [...]
Last year, I took twenty Year 11 students on a mountain biking camp. We rode through the Stromlo Forest in Canberra by day, and camped in sub zero temperatures by night. It’s only in the last couple of months that I’ve really appreciated some of the analogies I could draw between by experiences mountain biking [...]
The emerging youth mental health crisis makes it clear to mental health professionals, educators and researchers that for some reason our young people are having ever-greater difficulty controlling their mental and emotional content, their inner world. The situation reminds me of the iconic book by Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are.4 This book was published in 1963 and [...]
New research shows looking at cute images of baby animals may actually improve your work performance, inspiring more fine-tuned attention and careful behavior. Perhaps unsurprisingly this new study comes from researchers in Japan, where kawaii (Japanese for "cute") reigns. From the characters of "Hello Kitty" and "Pokémon's" Pikachu, cute creatures stir positive feelings, researchers say, [...]
