Gen Z teachers are the first cohort of classroom 糖心动漫vlog that entered adolescence just as smartphones became ubiquitous. They grew up with much of their social lives online, shifting in their consumption habits from YouTube to Snapchat to TikTok as platforms rose and fell.
Those experiences, in turn, have given Gen Z teachers distinct perspectives on how technology should be used in the classroom. One the one hand, it gives them more common ground to connect with students over video trends or Fortnite strategies. But it can also make them more vulnerable to the consequences of online activity.
And for some, entering teaching is making them rethink what how they want to model appropriate tech use for the next generation of students.
Lia Quintero, 18, a first-year student in the Fresno, Calif., district鈥檚 Teacher Academy program鈥攁 pathway into the profession鈥攕ays her own experience in school coping with tech-heavy instruction has made her look for ways to shed some digital activity with elementary students she supports during her student-teaching.
鈥淚t makes Gen Z resilient that we had to deal with electronics being shoved in our faces. We are trying to strive for better,鈥� said Quintero, a senior at Hoover High School. 鈥淜ids nowadays enjoy being on their phones and everything, but they鈥檙e not going to remember the game they played on their laptop. They鈥檙e going to remember the lesson we were doing because I wanted it to be fun for them.鈥�
That doesn鈥檛 mean that Gen Z teachers are about to become Luddites. Many of them consider technologies like AI both a boon and an inevitability for students鈥� future careers, and they work to integrate it thoughtfully into lessons.
鈥淎s much as older teachers see social media and content as a distraction from learning, I try to use it as an anchor,鈥� said Nash Tilman, 18, Quintero鈥檚 peer in the Fresno Teacher Academy program. He tries to draw connections between English/language arts in the classroom and the language his 6th graders use online. 鈥淭here鈥檚 language everywhere you go. Even in the most distracting form, I think that it can still be used as a device to keep kids focused.鈥�
Similarly, Katrina Sacurom, a 5th grade teacher at Shawnee Trail Elementary in Frisco, Texas, has personalized her school鈥檚 AI writing tool to mimic her own teaching style, questioning her students and encouraging them to be more reflective about their writing.
鈥淢y kids like to joke that they have access to me whenever they want, because they think I speak very similarly to the way that the school AI speaks to them,鈥� she laughs. 鈥淚 take it as a compliment.鈥�
Growing up with technology at her fingertips, she says, has helped her use it more meaningfully with the students and, especially, families. It helps her let them know about their children鈥檚 accomplishments in her class or beyond.
Setting appropriate professional boundaries on tech use
Gen Z鈥檚 digital savviness can have drawbacks too. For one, it can make it harder for some teachers to draw professional lines with their students and families.
Young teachers 鈥渨ill get into a conversation where it鈥檚, 鈥極h, yeah, you play Fortnite? Me too! What鈥檚 your gamer tag?鈥� And then here [they] are, playing video games and online chatting with kids鈥攁nd they just weren鈥檛 thinking of that as a professional issue,鈥� said Megan Booth, a former high school principal and now a human resources supervisor for the Knox County, Tenn., public schools. 鈥淚t鈥檚 so integrated into their lives to have an online presence that they don鈥檛 realize until it鈥檚 explicitly stated to them we have to separate our digital lives from our professional lives.鈥�
Her district recently rolled out a yearlong training program for young teachers, including more professional development around technology etiquette and boundaries. 鈥淭here are things that are OK to say or do in a traditional professional setting with adults, that are not OK to do or say in a school setting with children,鈥� Booth said.
TikTok allows Emily Box to showcase 鈥渢he fun side of being a dance teacher,鈥� but she has to balance the ability to engage her students and parents at Mountain Valley Middle School near San Antonio with the challenge of maintaining personal boundaries.
She allows students and parents to follow her public social media but won鈥檛 follow back or open message requests. And Box requires students and parents to sign off on an etiquette compact about the school messaging app she uses to communicate about school clubs and teams. They must agree to answer questions from their teacher promptly and with proper honorifics, and to ask questions only at set times of day.
One common factor that unites all of the Gen Z teachers, regardless of their own personal dispositions towards technology: Wanting to make sure that students explore it safely.
Christian Jovel-Arias, 26, a 5th grade bilingual English/language arts and math teacher at John Quincy Adams Elementary in Dallas, said he feels an intense responsibility to teach his students how to be good digital citizens because of his own experiences online.
鈥淭he kids will be talking about some video 鈥� and the sad part is, yeah, I鈥檝e probably seen it too, because I鈥檓 online just as much,鈥� Jovel-Arias said. 鈥淚 get very worried about what my kids are consuming [digitally], because even as an adult with critical thought, I鈥檓 like, gosh, this stuff is very dark.鈥�