Answer two of the following questions, and respond to at least one other student’s post afterward for a total of at least 400 words. 

1. According to Sternheimer, what are some of the ways broader society tends to construct idealized, uniform, and nostalgic views of “childhood”? Do you believe that there has been a trend towards protection over preparation? How have your own childhood experiences reflected (or disputed) these ideas?

2. How have notions of childhood changed from the Victorian Era through the postwar economic boom? What socioeconomic factors were involved in these transitions? In what ways do you think this has changed in the past twenty years, and what role do you think media and economic factors have played?

3. According to Sternheimer, what media and public fears seem to permeate discussions over children and technology? What evidence exists that cyberbullying is related to suicide rates in teens, or that internet predators represent a major threat to kids? Are there more direct threats in kids’ lives that tend to get ignored in these discussions? If so, why do you think that this might be the case?

And please give a response to this post: (xiaowei yu)

My answer to question 1:

Everyone has their own diverse childhood. It is hard to provide a definition that everyone agrees with. For some people, childhood might represent happiness. For others, childhood might be painful. According to Sternheimer (2013), people struggle to maintain the sense that childhood means carefree innocence and blame popular culture. Besides, people tend to define children as a unitary group and focus on how they are different from adults. However, people should pay attention to and understand the various experiences and various situations of different children. Children’s realities have an influence on their childhood. 

I do believe there has been a trend towards protection over preparation. It is important for children to prepare the ability to face the reality of the world (Sternheimer, 2013). Nowadays, parents and adults have fears of changes and unknown. People tend to protect children from potential dangers. People have not realized the best way to protect the children is to let them have the knowledge. Although time changes, people are still trying to maintain the innocence of childhood. In my childhood, I had the freedom to know about the reality of this world. At that time, the technology was still not that developed. The main resource was the television. I was always watching the TV series and TV shows with my family.