Final Round! Cyber Travellers

I found this article very interesting regarding the emotional aspect of education among Aboriginal students. Kana‘iaupuni, S., Ledward, B., Jensen, U., (2010) explains “[f]irst, culture-based education (CBE) positively impacts student socio-emotional well-being.” Which is will be part of my research regarding the emotional impact education has among Indigeous people. As well, the study indicated that students using their method “are more likely to have strong community ties as exemplified by working to protect the local environment and attending public meetings about community affairs.” In order for me to attempt to tie together the social aspect (i.e. social media) and the emotional aspect among First Nations, its important to find more studies that are relevant.

It has been difficult for me to try find more recent data since this study was conducted in 2010. The concerns I am having is the rate of evolution for technology. It is a great thing that every 6 months, we are having a new idea or a new piece of technology to assist educators. But at that rate, how can anyone have a full understanding of the effects or defects of that medium.

http://www.ksbe.edu/_assets/spi/pdfs/CBE_relationship_to_student_outcomes.pdf

I found this website helpful for me to attempt to categorize the type of emotions students have. Pekun, R, (2009) noted that there are “[t]wo distinct ways of describing emotions are provided by categorical and dimensional approaches.” His definitions are very similar to that of Dr. Brown from our readings.

Pekun, R. states that “categorical approaches, qualitatively different types of discrete emotions are differentiated, such as enjoyment, anger, anxiety, or boredom.” Where as, “the dimensional approach, a small number of dimensions are held to be sufficient to describe human emotion.” He identifies those dimensional valance and activation. Despite the lack of relationship for Indigenous people, I think that if we understand emotion not only for Aboriginal children, but all children in the educational world. This website explains that emotion, when positive, will provide a positive outcome regarding the educators approach. Considering how generic that ideology is, it would be extremely difficult for any educator to always be positive when the students understanding of positive would differ. For example, as in Dr. Brow explanation, reprimanding aboriginal children for sharing their knowledge during a test would go against the cultural training that it takes a community to answer. However, this article does help supplement that emotion is a big factor for children and students. How would I apply that? How does that affect the socio-emotional being of indigenous children?

http://www.education.com/reference/article/student-emotions/#B

One point that I thought was relevant was the article “The Emotional Toll of Social Media.” This article does take a more negative note of the impact social media has on society. The author (n.d.)  states “[m]any social media users say that they feel a sense of inadequacy because they subconsciously compare themselves to the people that show up in their streams.” What I question with the author is their statement that “most people do not put up the good and bad on their social media outlets. Therefore, these outlets are portraying an idealistic image that doesn’t really exist.” I wanted to address people like the first Native America beauty model. The better aspect of her social media attention is that she is the First native woman to become Mrs. Universe. She can help other young native women aspire to become more in themselves. The negative aspect, (as noted by the article) is that it could create an unrealistic view of what a Native woman should look like. Many of my fellow students understand there are many variations of indigenous people. Some wear beaded garments, others use Deer skin, hair hats, straw-hats, sheep wool, and many other variations. So, would we be forcing a single ideal of a native culture onto the majority indigenous population with the help of social media? More questions, I’m hoping to address.

http://www.beliefnet.com/wellness/articles/the-emotional-toll-of-social-media.aspx

This last article goes into the type of negative and positive impact social media has on users. Schacter, H., (2015) explains “social media use can be particularly maladaptive when it occurs in the form of passive browsing.” Social anxiety is bred on social media because of feeling left out or excluded. I believe that point is important for Indigenous people that are now using social media to announce cultural events. There must be some type of emotional concern when one family member is excluded from an e-vite, or not tagged for the event. This article does replicate a bit of the previous website, but it is a little more technical and giving me more opportunities to dig further since she has references to studies. This is what caught my attention when I read her findings (2015):

“considered the role of technology-based “social comparison and feedback-seeking” (SCFS) in the development of depressive symptoms. They found that adolescents (8th and 9th graders) who reported engaging in more social comparison and feedback-seeking behavior online (e.g., “I use electronic interaction to see what others think about how I look”; “I use electronic interaction to compare my life with other people’s lives”) experienced more depressive symptoms a year later, even when accounting for earlier levels of depression as well as concurrent technology use.”

If I apply that specifically to Indigenous people, I would think this would drastically change (or alter) the view of technology and education that uses technology as a medium.

 

Ultimately, I’m hoping to connect emotional well being being impacted by social media. Which would (or could) affect educators that intend to use technology as a medium.

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