Media and Attention, Cognition, and School Achievement.

I found that a lot of the information presented in this article was “common” knowledge. I think most people assume that watching TV could be beneficial for students learning languages. I also think people know that if you students watch too much TV it could have a negative effect on their school work. Do I really need to be told that some students learn better from watching a demonstration instead of reading? Now the article did provide some numbers to back up these obvious statements, but for the most part I was not overly impressed with most of this article. I also thought it was interesting that the paper used Atari research, ATARI?!? Atari is from the 80’s and I know all data is data but really can we get some more current data since a lot has changed since Atari was popular.
I agree with the authors when they say there are some benefits to video games. I think the problem solving aspects of video games are often overlooked.
I don’t know how I really feel about the section talking about television watching and ADHD. My first thought is how can you test if ADHD is caused by more television watching? I then read the section and realized they just wanted to compare media watching with kids who have been diagnosed with ADHD. It makes complete sense to me that ADHD students will watch more TV because it can capture their attention.
I really enjoyed the number about the internet at school and home. How in 9 years schools with internet access went from 35% to 100%. I found the stat about parents using internet filtering surprising. The article said that 50% of parents use some type of internet filter, I thought the number would be lower.