Kidlink: Bridging the Child Divide

Bridging the Child Divide

By Odd de Presno

Presentation held at NECC 2001 in Chicago, USA, and in Fortaleza Brazil the same year.
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Abstract. There are many things that separate children. The Internet has introduced a new element: the quality of their inter-personal knowledge networks. What is an inter-personal knowledge network? How is it different from face-to-face networks? Linking networks to educational contents, and to motivate kids to read and write, and use numbers. Building networked knowledge. How do we connect children to these knowledge networks? How do we guide them into using them proficiently? Does the over-protected child stand a chance?
What divides kids, really?

Age? Geography? Gender? Financial means? Attitudes? Resources? Community classifications? Intelligence? Knowledge? Social intelligence? Interests? Religion? War? Yes to all of these.
In these days of a more open world, add the quality of their personal knowledge networks to the list of what divides them.
What is an inter-personal knowledge network? Groups of friends that the kid can call on when she has a problem or a concern, needs advice, insights, information or facts, to have fun with, share jokes. To lean on when the goings get rough. Friends with the same hobbies and interests, who have interesting things to say and share. Friends who are sincere, true, who know when your kid is not well, and how to make it happy. Who demonstrate understanding, acceptance, tolerance.
So, networking includes friendship. However, the quality of the groups' readily available common knowledgebase is what sets networks apart.
The power of inter-personal networks.

What may be the basic differences between two kid's inter-personal networks? First, the quality of advice and information provided. The speed with which a kid is being helped, given priority. Presence.
Also, the value of a network depends on each individual member's other networks, and in particular if these networks may be shared. So that if someone in a network does not know the answer to a question, she might know a person elsewhere to ask.
The Internet lets kids build networks with peers around the world, efficiently, and at an extremely low cost. They can potentially build and maintain larger and more powerful networks than in their face-to-face environments. Using computers, they can also utilize common knowledge resources better and more precisely. This is particularly so when a network's dialog is being recorded, and the record is searchable.
Face-to-face, we usually know each individual member of our inter-personal network. Often, they are tied to a geographical area, a family, a school.
Not so on the net. In online communities, like Kidlink's KIDCAFE, you may even be networking with people you don't know are there. They may suddenly surface when you ask a question, present an opinion, request second views. As out of a black box.
In online communities there are often more peers available for meaningful exchanges. This may give a higher level of presence than face-to-face communities. More continuity and "action." Common challenges like absence because of holidays, sickness, exams, or other priorities are less likely to delay exchanges.
Online communities speed up inter-personal networking. Some online communities, like those at Kidlink, also link to educational contents, teachers, other adult coaches, or "tour guides." Tutors and mentors guide individual kids and complete online communities to educational contents that support networking processes. Often, they act as "personalized encyclopedias" or "human knowledge portals." When José wants some fact for a note to his network, he may ask a teacher or a parent. - Clever teachers draw on educational material when assisting, thus realizing curricular objectives in the process.
At the outset, these online communities look "stationary." However, they grow like biological organisms, and have the ability to learn. Their common knowledge base, often documented, summarized, and documented in discussion archives or web pages, is often referred to as the community's networked knowledge.
Kidlink is very alert about this. Whenever someone asks publicly for advice, replies are added to the community's knowledge base. Whenever someone extracts tales of best practices, exemplary suggestions, or makes abstracts based on the common knowledge base, then the value of the inter-personal network increases.
Our Who-am-I? educational program "Student contributions" pages (http://www.kidlink.org/kie/waila/students.html) is a good example. This resource grows daily, and adds value to the program, and its various user communities.
In the middle - as integrated in a web - an individual kid, tied into a number of inter-personal, virtual networks. The networked child is "surrounded" by known - as well as unknown - friends, contacts, mentors, and tutors, such as parents, teachers, youth leaders, library and museum staffs, etc. When all channels are open, this gives the kid tremendous opportunities: to acquire knowledge about the art of living, of growing up, doing well at school, getting jobs, and personal benefits.
The kid will be member of some networks for the long term, and others - like the Who-am-I? program - for a limited period of time. Tomorrow, the child will exchange some networks for others. However, this does not mean that the value of the old network is lost. There are contacts in the old networks who may be revitalized whenever needed. The kid may return to the old networks knowledge bases later to recover a bit of wisdom or information.
The Child Divide

We want our kids to grow up to a life of happiness, safety, harmony, balance. We want them to get meaningful jobs that offer them the joy of using their knowledge and abilities extensively. That motivates them to stretch, and continue to grow.
Our world is moving and shaking. New professions are born, while old professions disappear. We face more division of labor and specialization. Local community attitudes are changing. Changes. Changes everywhere. The ability to cooperate across language and cultural barriers is rapidly becoming a determining factor in people's lives.
Never before has it been so important for each individual to have their antennas up for navigating impulses. Never before has it been so important to be supported by friends, by strong inter-personal networks.
What is the Child Divide, then? It is about access to the new networking medium, the Internet. It is about our child's application of the networking resource.
Some use it as an encyclopedia, an entertainment central, or for fun chats. We are not advocating that these applications should be discontinued. We suggest that a child should also be introduced to inter-personal networking through the net. The child should learn how to cooperate with others in meaningful ways. To build friendships across cultural and language borders. To consult their knowledge networks on anything from schoolwork to personal problems.
How do we help them join?

Our first challenge is to give children access to the Internet, in a world where a large majority do not even have a telephone.
On a small scale, Kidlink is trying to make a contribution, for example in Brazil, Mexico, Angola. However, the task is bigger than any individual organization on earth, so we eagerly cooperate with anyone sharing our views. We publish experiences and methods freely through the Web, so that others can read, learn, and use. Schools are our most important arena. Therefore, Kidlink cooperates with teachers around the world - by showing them how to enhance their local curriculums by using our educational programs.
For example, our Who-Am-I? is designed as a means to classroom instruction within writing, research, social studies, history, geography, foreign languages, economics, mathematics, science, the arts, current awareness, as well as personal development, Internet networking skills, information and communications technology skills.
Our next challenge is to guide the kid to meaningful knowledge networks, and to guide them to the art of getting friends, and setting up their social antennas.
Our primary contribution here is the 8-month "Who-Am-I?" program. It helps kids and youth prepare for meetings with new friends, and gives them a chance to "test run" relationships. It provides experiences about rejection, and acceptance - without giving the individual reasons for bad feelings.
Meeting new people is difficult, be it face-to-face in a schoolyard, or online. Regardless of age. The kids stand a better chance if doing some research and preparation first.
Key to the program is 389 optional questions and 244 activities - so that the kids' coaches might make a selection that fits their kids best. Key questions include: Who am I? Where do I live? What are my rights? Who are my friends and family? What are my roots? What do I want to be when I grow up? How do I want the world to be better when I grow up? What can I do now to realize this dream?
The program closes with a virtual vacation, in which your group invites kids from other parts to visit your place for a three day virtual vacation, and then travels to your place through the Internet. Afterwards, the group travels to a place of their choice.
Participating kids perceives the Who-am-I? process as important to their lives. Their coaches report about excitement and interest. When students have a purpose (to get friends) and an audience, they want to read and write, and use numbers. They demand knowledge to realize their purpose. Thus, the program gives otherwise "boring" classroom tasks meaning for students.
From join to make use of

It is not enough to be a passive participant. The invisible kid gets little in return from interpersonal networks. While it is acceptable to listen without speaking up, sharing experiences and views publicly is what makes the kid an identifiable person; gives feedback; invitations; friends.
Coaches should guide kids to some understanding of group dynamics. They should explain the power of asking questions that leads to answers that benefit the whole group, and challenge kids to make submissions that contribute to the network's common knowledgebase.
Does the over-protected kid stand a chance?

In the background looms parents and communities' fear of child abuse, and loss of privacy, of sex, violence, drug abuse, and undesirable cultural influences. "Never tell others who you are!" "Do not tell others about your inner feelings, problems, or anything that might identify you later."
At the extreme, some require children to use false identities on the Internet. This is a signal saying that lying is best. Requirements that kids never are to disclose their second name is in essence the same thing. It makes a person unaccountable for what he or she says or does.
Yes, we do want that our children to be safe. However, we also want them to get friends with the same hobbies and interests, who have interesting things to say and share. Friends who are sincere, true, who know when your kid is not well, and know how to make it happy. Who demonstrate understanding, acceptance, tolerance. We want our kids to handle their friends in the same way. To be sincere and true.
Also, we have noted that many children refuse to learn from parents and adult coaches. How they insist on learning from own experiences. We have also seen how kids who were strongly protected when growing up did not always end up so very happy as adults...
So, we believe in finding a middle ground. We must foster environments where kids may be reasonably safe, while at the same time permitting them to learn from own experiences.
Preventing a child from joining inter-personal knowledge networks with peers through the Internet is at best a very risky act.

Contact: Odd de Presno