Just asked daughter number 1 about this. Seems she is very aware of the fingerprinting thing... which of course had my eyes bugging out of my head
as I know
nuffin!!!!... She says other than the mothers day gift she made me in preschool, she has never had her fingerprints taken, and she tells me it was first introduced in the US to counter truants and child abductions and is linked to an automated sms message that is sent to advise parents their child has not arrived at school, and provides principals with an immediate print out after start-time of who is absent...
She went into quite a lot of detail... explaining that the kids have to place their thumb on a blue light and leave it there till it turns green, and then they can go through to school. She says the rich private schools in the US have trialled them, because the equipment costs heaps and it probably wouldn't be affordable for smaller schools and she hasn't heard anything about it coming to Australia.
She says the UK introduced it to save 15 minutes "teaching time" that is wasted calling the roll???????
I have just had quite an education. Am really quite blown away....
I guess I don't object to folks being held responsible, so really am swinging like a pendulum on this one. I don't think they should be taken deviously, but at the same time when you know you can be held accountable, I think you tend to be a tad more careful about where you put your hands and how you interact with different environments. A lot of teens learn that the hard way, but I can't really see how a 3 year old would actually learn that... It is almost like they are being set up to get caught making mistakes.
.... Imagine if they were to suddenly start tracing all the litter left laying about, or recyclable items that are just dumped... or hypodermics not properly disposed of...could possibly short circuit a lot of abuse...
but as with many things, when is it appropriate? Do we wait for kids to do the wrong thing and then caution them, or do we raise them knowing that if they do the wrong thing, they can, and will, be caught?
Dunno - it really is a tough one, I think.
"Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia." - Charles Schultz
I like PurpleDragon's blog.
gosh thanks