Children's enjoyment and perception of computer use in the home and the school

This paper seeks to examine the nature and experiences of children's computer use in the home and school. Past research suggests a growing gap between computer use in the home and the school. This study was conducted to find out how children perceive and enjoy computer use in these two environments. Using a sample of year 3 and 5 pupils in three primary schools, qualitative and quantitative data were gathered. The results suggest that children make more use of the computer at home than at school. The most popular activity on the home computer which all children enjoyed was playing games. The most frequent activity at the school computer was word processing which pupils considered boring. Interesting gender differences showed that boys spent more lime playing computer games whereas girls spent more time on the Internet emailing friends. The study concludes that schools should learn from what works at home and enable children to work on activities they find valuable, motivational and worthwhile. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.