Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 10
Posts 1 - 10

Liebesgeschichte, Heldenreise, Flachwitze, Kacke

(Love story, a hero's journey, flat jokes, poop)

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Newspaper | Welt
Date | 2.8.2017
Language | German
Country | Germany
Topic Tags | childhood, emojis, marketing, smartphone, texting, threat, youth
Summary | The new emoji movie for children is an animated film starring emojis as its main protagonists. Critics find it quite distasteful because it is full of casual advertising for major tech companies and because it does not address the danger of the internet at all. In Textopolis, the world in which emojis live, alphabetic letters are depicted as elderly with walking canes because the youth does not use letters anymore.
Image Description | Screenshots from the Emoji movie.
Image Tags | emojis, female(s), male(s)

Children are humiliating victims by using memes and chat rooms to 'roast' them in the latest cyberbullying craze

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Newspaper | Mail Online
Date | 25.7.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | childhood, cyberbullying, gender, texting, youth
Summary | Parents and teachers are worried about one type of cyberbullying; children pick on another with offensive abuse until the victim ‘cracks’. Girls seem to be twice as likely as boys to be perpetrators and victims of cyberbullying (boys seem to be more involved in physical bullying). It usually happens in group chats where people know each other. Cyberbullying is a competitive activity; the most offensive thing someone says, the better. One of the downsides of the digital era is cyberbullying and our children's protection.
Image Description | Photograph of a girl in front of her computer screen and photograph of a boy looking at a tablet screen.
Image Tags | computer/laptop, female(s), male(s), tablet

Comment donner le goût de la lecture?

(How to instill the love of reading?)

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Newspaper | Le Figaro
Date | 20.3.2016
Language | French
Country | France
Topic Tags | childhood, school, spelling, texting, threat, word/writing
Summary | Teenagers don't read a lot. This is not new, but nowadays texting and social networks are a priority among young people. They want immediacy, community, and noise, and reading equals silence, long time, and solitude. Young people read differently, which is why Bayard decided to focus on short stories instead of novels. Elementary schools are experimenting something new: the reading machine. Users can alternate on a tablet reading and listening phases.
Image Description | Photograph of an open book

"Ich bin dein Sohn!"

("I am your son!")

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Newspaper | Die Zeit
Date | 6.4.2016
Language | German
Country | Germany
Topic Tags | childhood, emojis, texting, YouTube
Summary | It is interesting to watch children develop a texting personality. As they grow up with new media, they use them quite naturally. They easily incorporate emojis, use audio messages, or share YouTube videos. Texting humor is also learned quite automatically.
Image Description | Image of a boy holding a smartphone.
Image Tags | male(s), smartphone

Logisches Pisa-Ergebnis

(Logical Pisa result)

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Newspaper | Appenzeller Zeitung
Date | 15.12.2016
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | childhood, research/study, school, social media, texting, word/writing, youth
Summary | The Pisa study shows that Swiss students have decreasing writing and reading skills. This is not suprising considering the high percentage of foreign heritage children in Switzerland, the many national languages and distinct dialects, and the fact that children learn two foreign languages while still in primary school - let alone the dubious influence of new media, texting, social media, and so on.
Image Description | N/A

How good is your grammar? Take the quiz

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Newspaper | The Independent
Date | 16.2.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | childhood, grammar, language threat, research/study, school, texting, threat, youth
Summary | According to a study, texting can have a bad impact on young people's use of grammar. The results show that the more people text, the lower their score on the test was. There is also a correlation between the use of adaptations (e.g. gr8 for great) and a lower score. If parents text their kids with a lot of adaptations, the kids will probably imitate their parents.
Image Description | Photograph of a page of a dictionary where the word "grammar" is in sharp focus.
Image Tags | dictionary

Why Handwriting Is Still Important

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 31.8.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | childhood, texting, word/writing
Summary | People are outraged after a journalist claims that handwriting is becoming a useless skill. Opponents are referencing instances where writing is unavoidable, such as signing a legal document, or is more appropriate, such as writing love letters or letters of condolence. Learning to write longhand is also very important for children to develop various skills.
Image Description | Black and white staged photograph from Getty: hand holding a pen and writing on a piece of paper.
Image Tags | hand(s)

BTDTGTTSAWIO – das FBI erklärt Slang

(BTDTGTTSAWIO – the FBI explains slang)

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Newspaper | Der Bund
Date | 19.6.2014
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | abbreviations, childhood, texting, youth
Summary | The FBI has published a list of social media/messaging app abbreviations which helps them in their hunt for criminals and which could help the broader public to keep an eye on their children. Some of these abbreviations are: SOMSW (someone over my shoulder watching), NIFOC (naked in front of computer), and BTDTGTTSAWIO (been there, done that, got the t-shirt and wore it out). The FBI’s publication has been criticized for being irrelevant because these abbreviations are rarely used.
Image Description | Photograph of a hand holding a smartphone and texting. Photograph of a hand holding a smartphone and texting.
Image Tags | hand(s), smartphone, text

Les mamans 2.0 ont tous les trucs pour garder leurs enfants à l'oeil

(Moms 2.0 have all the tricks to keep an eye on their kids)

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Newspaper | Le Matin Dimanche
Date | 11.5.2014
Language | French
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | childhood, smartphone, technology-free, texting, threat, youth
Summary | New technologies are changing family relations. Mothers think that giving their kids a phone will allow them to always keep in touch with them. However, the sooner children get a phone, the faster they grow apart from their parents. New technologies also change relations of authority in a family. Parents should not prohibit the use of screens; they should always talk to their kids about new media use. Parents who are not interested in new technologies are making a mistake; they are missing occasions to communicate with their kids and their authority is compromised.
Image Description | Illustration of a mother reading a "Happy Mother's day" text and being nostalgic of old times.
Image Tags | female(s), smartphone, text

Die iPad-Kindheit vs. Baumhaus

(The iPad-childhood vs. tree house)

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Newspaper | St. Galler Tagblatt
Date | 3.11.2015
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | childhood, texting, youth
Summary | Children today grow up very differently than one or two decades ago. Many children are entertained on digital playgrounds: games on tablets or smartphones. For youth today it is no longer extraordinary to receive 200 messages from 30 group chats every day.
Image Description | Photograph of a yellow notepad with a white pen on top of it.

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