How do we understand and raise digital natives? • CHILD Magazines

20 Mar How do we understand and raise digital natives?

Posted at 06:30h in Validate by Editor

The launch of the iPad in 2010 coincided with the beginning of our current generation of children, writes Mark McCrindle.

Generation Alpha – and there are now 2.5 million Gen Alphas being born around the globe each week.

While Australian teenagers currently consume more than 10 hours of screen time per day in about eight hours – such is their multi-screening behaviour – this is expected to increase for the new generation born into a world of iPhones, YouTube and Instagram.

Children born in the past 10 years are moving through their formative years in a unique era. Also called the i-Gen, the click-n-go kids and the digital integrators, technology is key to their lives and futures. In less than a decade, screens have become integral in their schooling, key to their social interactions and the primary channel for shopping and entertainment.

Not only do they multi-screen and multi-task, but glass has become the new medium for content dissemination in a visual, interactive, connective and portable format.

A key role of parents has always been to create a safe and supportive environment, and with children dedicating 27 per cent of their waking hours to screen time, parents now endure the added challenge of making their home not just physically secure, but cybersafe as well.

While there are added challenges for parents in watching out for screen addiction, cyberbullying and the management of child-friendly content, parents of Gen Alpha are familiar with the online world and are better equipped to manage these complexities.

Generation Alpha, coined by social researcher Mark McCrindle, refers to the demographic cohort born between 2010 and 2024, the first generation to be entirely born in the 21st century and who are the children of Millennials and the younger siblings of Gen Z.