Teens’ Top 5 Technology Mistakes

From Scholastic News

1. Forgetting to Log Out
Daunisha Cost, 18, was using a computer at school and took a break from work to check her Facebook page. “Then I closed the page and left,” she says. The next day, a friend told her she needed to take a look at her Facebook page.

It turned out that someone had accessed Daunisha’s Facebook page on the school computer and messed around with it. What Daunisha forgot is that when you close a window on a computer, you aren’t necessarily logging out of the application you’re using. Someone went to the computer where she’d been working, typed in “facebook.com,” and Daunisha’s profile popped up.

“They pretended they were me and posted insulting stuff on other people’s pages, and on my status they wrote things that I can’t repeat. Let’s just say they were inappropriate comments,” says Daunisha, a high school senior from Grand Forks, North Dakota. “Luckily, my friends were understanding, but now I make sure I log out every time!” So whether you’re using Facebook or e-mail or checking your bank balance, sign out when you’re finished.


2. Right Message— Wrong Person
Julia Torgerson’s friend was talking about her behind her back. Julia, 16, was upset, so she wrote a text about it to another friend. “But by mistake, I sent it to the person I was talking about,” says Julia, a high school sophomore from Seattle, Washington.


This kind of mess-up is surprisingly common. Three years ago, AOL conducted a survey and found that 32 percent of people had accidentally e-mailed or forwarded an e-mail message to the wrong person. Nobody has done any research, but it’s probably just as common with texting. There’s an “unsend” function in Gmail, but you have to set it up before you make the mistake. There is no way to retrieve a text.

One way to avoid sending a text or e-mail to the wrong person is to type your message first and then select the recipient. That way you’ll be more conscious of the name you choose. What can you do if you make the kind of mistake Julia did? She simply apologized—and it worked. “My friend didn’t talk to me for about a week, but she got over it,” Julia says.

3. Oversharing
“Social media sites are all about getting you to share as much information with your friends as possible so you’ll come back to the site, and they’ll come back to the site, and all of you will look at the ads,” says Amanda Lenhart, who studies youth and technology at the Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project. Often, kids will realize too late that they’ve shared too much. Sometimes, it’s photos and videos: They post or e-mail images of themselves doing things that they shouldn’t. Other times, it’s opinions. Recently, a 24-year-old man whose job was to dress up as a mascot for the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team was fired after he criticized the team on his Facebook page.

Lenhart advises thinking critically before sharing anything digitally, and remembering that once something is online, it’s going to be there for a long time. “Be very certain that what you’re sharing is information that you want to share 10 years from now,” she says.

4. Losing Track of Your Phone
Ben Farrell didn’t use his phone much. So when he didn’t see it for a week, he didn’t think much about it. Then the bill came. “My mom asked me if I knew why our bill was $225 higher than usual,” says Ben, a seventh-grader from Brooklyn, New York. “It turned out my phone had been stolen, and I had never realized it.” The thief used the phone to download games and make calls to foreign countries.

If notified promptly when a phone is lost or stolen, most cell phone providers won’t charge you for unauthorized use. So if you don’t know where your phone is, call your cell phone company immediately and put the account on hold. If you find the phone at the bottom of your backpack, you can always reactivate the service.

The possibility of theft isn’t the only reason to keep tabs on your phone. Brianne Thompson, 16, of Seattle, Washington, left her phone at a friend’s house. The friend read Brianne’s texts and found some critical ones about herself. “I should have had a lock code on my phone,” Brianne says. Smart idea! Even smarter: “I shouldn’t have been sending texts about one friend to another friend,” Brianne says. “I should have just talked to her about what was bothering me.”

5. Making Friends With Strangers
When Dominique Weeks gave her cell phone number to a friend of a friend, it seemed like no big deal. “But right away, he started texting me 20 times a day, asking me really weird, inappropriate questions,” says Dominique, 16, of Seattle.

Dominique’s mom helped her solve the problem. Together, they called their cell phone provider to get instructions on how to block texts from the boy’s phone. “Now I’m careful and make sure I really know someone before I give them my number or accept them as a friend on Facebook,” Dominique says.

No More Cases Of Polio In India

From Teaching Kids the News:

India made history this month when it announced that there were no more cases of polio in the country. The victory came after years of work by India’s public-health workers. They travelled to the most remote places and the poorest areas in the country. They gave vaccines—medicine that prevents diseases—to 172 million children.

Polio is a viral infection that can paralyze (stop movement in) the body, especially in people’s arms and legs. It can also make people’s breathing difficult as if they have very bad asthma. It can even be fatal.

Polio is very contagious, so when people with polio are living close together, like they do in India, it spreads easily from one person to another.

 In the 1950s thousands of Canadians and Americans got polio. Parents panicked, worried their children would catch the disease. In 1955, an American, Dr. Jonas Salk, created a vaccine to prevent polio. It has now been wiped out in the U.S. and Canada.

African boy with legs withered and crippled by polio

But polio went untreated in many poorer countries that could not afford to vaccinate people.

African boy with leg braces and crutches donated by a charity

Many companies have contributed money and resources to vaccinate children around the world. WHO (the World Health Organization), UNICEF, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and International Rotary (a business club) helped pay for the vaccines and the people to give them out. It cost millions of dollars, but for countries like India it has paid off.

Physical Activity Can Boost Kids’ Brains

From Teaching Kids the News:

Most people agree that doing schoolwork, puzzles, math and reading help kids get smarter. But did you know that a good workout can also help you learn more easily?

Scientists say that physical exercise gets more blood flowing through a person’s brain, and helps them think better. It also causes the brain to release a protein (called brain-derived neurotrophic factor) which makes new brain cells grow.

Researchers say kids who are active and fit perform better on memory tests. It affects certain areas of the brain, like the hippocampus and the basal ganglia. Children who aren’t as active are more likely to become easily distracted.

Studies have shown that, with as little as 90 minutes more exercise a day, kids do better in math, reading and spelling.

As well, exercise can help lessen depression. Depression is a feeling of sadness and hopelessness that can last for days, weeks or months.

Eating the right foods also helps the brain work better. Foods that have Omega-3 fatty acids, such as fish, eggs, seeds and nuts, are “brain foods.” Foods with antioxidants, like blueberries, are also very good for the brain. Fruits and vegetables also help the brain to work at its best.

Getting a good night’s sleep is also important because it helps to strengthen the brain, especially in children. Studies have shown that not getting enough sleep can cause some children to have problems at school.

This article was taken from an article in the Globe and Mail by Mark Fenske. He is a neuroscientist and an associate professor at the University of Guelph in Canada.

Police get tough on school violence

From the Korea Herald:

Police will mobilize some 12,000 detectives to combat school violence, a measure that comes after a suicide note left by a Daegu 14-year-old increased media attention toward bullying.

The National Police Agency warned it would detain young suspects in serious criminal cases, signaling a change from its customary restraint in doing so.

Such moves come as recent student suicides have prompted public calls for tougher measures to deal with school bullying.

The NPA delivered these and other directives on Saturday to 16 regional police investigation units to strengthen its crackdown on school violence, officials said.

The 12,000 officers will be dispatched mainly to high-risk areas including private educational institutes, parks, school zones, internet cafes and other popular hangouts for teens.

To more effectively carry out the directives, the police decided to transfer the responsibility for school violence to investigative divisions that deal with serious crimes. It has so far been handled by public safety divisions in charge of minor crimes involving women and juveniles.

In cooperation with schools, the police will also make efforts to disband school gangs and sternly punish those who coerce their peers into joining such gangs, officials said.

The police will intensify measures to help victims, their families and friends to come forward and report their cases to the police. If students are repeatedly caught assaulting their peers, police will request that the school in charge transfer them.

“In cooperation with education offices and expert groups, we will strengthen preventive measures, offer counseling support and help victims after the incidents,” said a senior NPA official, declining to be named.

Meanwhile, the National Assembly passed a revision bill last month which blocks students who are forced to transfer after assaulting another student from attending the same school as the victim.

The suicide of a 14-year-old boy who leapt to his death in Daegu last month after being bullied caused a stir within the country, with parents and schools accused of negligence.

The boy, surnamed Kim, listed in his suicide note things that two classmates forced him to do, including playing an online game using their IDs and punishing him when he failed to meet their expectations in the game by wrapping a radio cord around his neck and dragging him, forcing him to eat crumbs off the floor as well as beating him numerous times.

Two of the teens involved in the case were arrested Saturday on charges of repeated assault and blackmail.

Kim’s mother also plans to file a lawsuit against both the school and the families of the perpetrators, according to news reports.

Separately, last month the Supreme Court ruled that the perpetrators of school violence, their guardians and the school were all liable in a high school bullying case.

One in 10 teenagers aged 15-19 thought about committing suicide at least once in the past year, according to 2011 government statistics. Other government data shows that 735 students in primary and secondary schools committed suicide between 2006 and 2010.