Building Digital Wellness in the Age of Distraction
Help me give my students and their families the tools they need to recalibrate their relationship to the alienation machines, aka the devices of devious distraction, aka smartphones.
This project is a part of the Hispanic & Latinx Heritage Month celebration because
it supports a Latino teacher or a school where the majority of students are Latino.
My Project
My students are digital natives: they have grown up in the age of constant connectivity, where our screens bombard us with a flood of high-dopamine distraction, making it hard to stay present, go deep, and be truly connected to fellow humans in real life. This has resulted in a devastating rise in anxiety, depression, and mental health issues for Gen Z, one that no previous generation has encountered.
"How to Break Up With Your Phone" by health and science journalist Catherine Price offers us a "Wake-Up" to all the ways our WMDS (wireless mobile devices) impact our sleep, social connection, motivation and mental health, followed by an accessible, research-backed "Break Up" plan to establish digital balance.
"The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness" by social psychologist Jonathan Haidt dives deeper into the impact of social media and constant connectivity that has robbed young ones of what they most need in childhood: free play, authentic human interaction, and robust protection against the Wild West that is the world-wide web.
These two books will help students understand the impact of screens, and give our school the opportunity to host parent workshops on how to understand what our young digital natives need in the age of machines.
More than three‑quarters of students from low‑income households
Data about students' economic need comes from the National Center for Education Statistics, via our partners at MDR Education. Learn more
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Kight Witham and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
