When I was in grade 4, I was one of a few students selected from a few thousand in my elementary school in China to take the first ever elementary school computer class offered in the city. The computer lab housed about ten Apple computers, only one with color monitor. Before each class, we donned white lab coats and gloves, then proceeded to learn programming in Basic. I still remember reciting P-R-I-N-T, D-O…
Image: Wikipedia
Fast forward a few decades. I am still using Apple gear, only now they look more like pieces of art, yet I no longer don white coat and gloves to use them.
Image: Wikipedia
When CC was about one and half, she discovered my iPhone. I found a Chinese kids song on YouTube for her and off she went happily listening to the song. A few minutes later, a different song started playing. From that moment of discovery onward, CC had been addicted to YouTube on iPhone, and later iPad.
At a little over two now, she’s already a pro. She learned numbers 0 – 9 and my password to log into the iPad, navigates with ease to YouTube, finds new songs, saves her favorite songs, controls the volume, swipe, rotate, shake, snap pictures, view pictures, expand, contract… Lately she’s being inverting the display color (a trick my sister’s fiancee taught her, much to my chagrin). Good thing there’s a password to the App Store…
We tried to hide the gadgets for obvious reasons (too much time in front of screen, radiation concerns, real potential to damage my prized iPad – she already destroyed a cellphone and a camera, etc.). We didn’t give into the whining, kicking, crying, but after she learned the word “please”, she’s been using that sweet word with a sweeter face. What do you say to “iphoot peese” or “ipat peese”, with the cutest expression on her face?
Last night, she was singing and dancing to the YouTube Snuffle Shuffle song from Sesame Street, a song she found on her own. We started thinking maybe it’s not a terrible thing that she likes iPad so much. After all, she did learn numbers 0 – 9 very quickly with iPad as the incentive. I wonder if it can be an effective tool to teach other skills to toddlers. A quick search in the App Store with the keyword “kids” returned over 2000 free iPad apps and over 6000 free iPhone apps!! There were plenty of apps for language, math, pattern, music, drawing, etc. I downloaded a whole bunch for her. Can’t wait to show them to her when she comes home from daycare!
PhD Parent 