Customer Reviews

Internet Safety Kids' Guide

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The book is an easy read. Though in the suggested age range of the audience, 9-12, I wonder how many will actually bother to do so. Having observed kids of that age fluidly use the computer for browsing, email and Instant Messaging, I have the nagging feeling that this book is largely irrelevant to most of them.

In some ways, and perhaps inadvertantly, the book reflects a generation gap. Many children in the US have never known a world without computers and the Web. Also, children are tending to go on the Internet at earlier than 9. And not just at home, where parents can try to restrict their activities. But also at school and public libraries. The book tends to underestimate their experience levels.

Frankly, by the time a child is 9, which is the earliest recommended age for the book, much of its advice is tedious or redundant. Take for example usernames and passwords. The book devotes several pages to explaining what these are. Too late. Many 9 year olds already have usernames and passwords, and have had these for several years. I can readily envisage eye-rolling if a teacher passes this book around class, and starts reading these passages.

Granted, there will indeed be students who lack much or any computer experience. So perhaps for them, the book has merit. But there is another problem. To the extent that this lack of experience reflects a lower IQ or attention span, the book is unlikely to garner their attention. The book is 100% text. Strictly black and white. Not a single illustration. Those students will not tend to be grabbed by the book. It is not a coincidence that when you go to a bookstore and look at kids books, that so many are lavishly illustrated. All the more so with textbooks, because those face a harder problem than fiction, in holding the reader's attention.

The large publishers of kids books know this, and go to considerable expense to gin up their books with lots of colour figures. Because they have found, for competitive reasons, that they must do so. The publisher of this particular book, Lulu Press, perhaps lacks those resources.