For some years now, there has been an issue picking in many people´s heads -especially in those who have children- regarding the way in which young people behave, and the level, quality and methods by which they receive education. The thing is that times have changed and some habits have been lost or replaced. For example, people do not read as much as they used to read some years ago. Today´s kids have grown surrounded by electronic devices –which they, at the age of 5, understand better than we do- and have developed other kind of habits than those we did. When we came home from school all we wanted to do is run in the park, climb trees, play in the swings. But today, all kids want to do when they come from school is watch TV, play in the computer, Ipad, tablet, cell phone, play station, etc. Of course, there are still some feelings that we (when we were kids and kids today) all shared: wanting to go home from school and wanting holidays to arrive, for example.
But, going back to habits, we were more used to reading than they are; and even though times and many traditions and practices have changed, school teaching methods haven´t changed much. We were used to reading many pages with a lot of content and remembering what we just read, but kids today have trouble doing that, as they are used to watch things, interacting with them, and that way retaining the information.
In this article, my aim is to present you with some ways in which the use of QR codes can help improve educational level.
The use of QR codes in education would allow more interaction between students and the content, easier communication between schools, parents and students, and more interest in school for the kids.
- QR codes could be placed among the texts, including videos and pictures which would help students to understand, and perhaps with further information or interesting data.
- QR codes could be included with games or quizzes to measure the level of understanding they reached in a way in which kids won´t get bored.
- QR codes linked to the assignments they due to do for that week, or remind them of tests coming up, so that then they wouldn´t have the “I forgot!” or “I didn´t know” excuse.
- QR codes could be linked to extra work for those students who want extra credits and who could send that work privately to the teacher, avoiding bullying for “being a nerd” and that kind of unpleasant stuff that makes school harder for many kids.
- QR codes could be placed in billboards directing to changes of classrooms, timetables, maps of the school, and some important messages that the school would like to transmit to students.
- QR codes with tasks could be included at different stages of texts to see if they are reading or they are falling behind.
- QR codes with extra information, materials, and different tasks could be very helpful for those students who have learning disabilities, allowing a better tracking of their studies.
These are just some of the ideas of ways in which QR codes can help improve the educational system, but there are so many more! For further information, ideas, and questions contact me! The education of our children is a matter that concerns us all, take action! Kids are the future.