Blockchain and Cryptocurrency are both two topics people are talking about all the time these days. And is just that apparently this type of technology has come to stay, and every day more and more users are introducing themselves into the growing of these financial innovations.
Even the youngest ones at home are starting to be more familiarized with these topics. And how not to? If they hear their parents and other adults talking about Bitcoin, Trading, cryptocurrency, etc., every day and everywhere. This technology has brought several benefits to the economy around the world, and faster than we think, is starting to make its way into other areas such as children education.
In this sense, there are several initiatives being developed at the moment, to explain to kids what is Blockchain and Cryptocurrency. For example, a school in Melbourne, Australia is moving forward to the next digital revolution, by teaching their students about this technology and its possible applications.
Under the guidance of Kieran Nolan, a teacher at this school and former network engineer, students of the Elementary school Wooranna Park, are learning the basics of blockchain technology. In the three weeks course, they learn to program a digital coin called "WoorannaCoin", that is built using this technology.
Best of all is that the students are using this system to apply it to something else, some of them even building a "transparent and secure voting system", while others are learning about the fundraising methods with the "Initial Coin Offering". So, they are not only learning about technology and economy, but they are also using it to learn practical life skills, that according to their teacher, are the skills they are going to need in the future.
Now, what are some of the advantages of introducing cryptocurrency into children education?
One of the biggest advantages is that, even though it doesn't seem like it, it is easier to teach kids about cryptocurrency than adults. And this is because children today are being born and raised in a digital world, so it's easier for them to understand what this is all about. Unlike us adults, that are still trying to understand where this digital money comes from, as we are still thinking about paper money, the one that we can touch and see.
It teaches them about personal responsibility. When it comes to cryptocurrency, everyone is their own bank, which means, everyone is responsible for keeping their savings safe. For example, if you forget the password of your bank account, you just need to call the bank, follow a few steps and you'll be able to restore it, sometimes you don't even have to call the bank. But if you forget your Bitcoin private key, it might not be that easy. This way, kids will learn that they can't always depend on others to help them and be more cautious with their actions.
On the other hand, it also teaches them to save up and not to have debts. The whole economic system around the world is based on debts. Everything we want to buy or have, you can usually get it by having a credit, and the offers are so attractive that we definitely go into debt. By introducing cryptocurrency to education, we are teaching kids to save up. The value of cryptocurrency it usually increases every day, so they learn to save up and wait for it to have a much better value to use it when they actually need it.
Experts in different countries in Europe say that the technology used to create cryptocurrencies can work for children and teens education. For example, it could work to save Works and experiments worth to be distributed, manage data from the students, create an institutional framework with global reach, and finally, empower students when they are still young, to make future research.
Cryptocurrency is already changing the way we look at economy these days, so in the future, when today's kids become adults, this might be the only way to make transactions.
Besides, the recent interest of schools in teaching their students about it, has made that big companies in the tech field dedicate some of their funds to create programs for these schools, providing them with all sort of materials, tech labs, computers and other stuff, ensuring the education of many more children around the world.
Even games have been developed to teach children from 6 years old, about cryptocurrency and how it Works. Even the popular virtual game "Minecraft" has included a coin named "Bits", that the users receive as a reward for different achievements, that they can later spend in the game.
Now, when it comes to cryptocurrency, not everything is pretty and good, and especially when it comes to kids, so we should be very careful about what they are really learning.
Some people say that there is a lot of confusion and opacity around cryptocurrency, which has led to many illegal activities deriving from it, so, it is important to be cautious on the way we teach this to kids.
It has a fluctuating value. Some people may see this as an advantage because it apparently increases every day, but Bitcoin, for example, has experimented some surprising drops, so depending only on cryptocurrency to teach kids about saving money, might not be such a good idea.
It has little use in real life. Even though cryptocurrency aims to be the way transactions are going to be handled in the future, in the present, they don't have such a real use, so it could be difficult to explain its appliance, being more theoretical than practical.
Without a doubt, cryptocurrency is a topic that needs to be researched more a more to keep developing it, however, if kids are the future of the society, including this subject in the present educational systems, could be extremely beneficial for the future of economics around the world.