THE IMPACTS OF GADGET AND INTERNET ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF CHARACTER EDUCATION ON EARLY CHILDHOOD

The use of gadgets, provided with the internet access, in early childhood today has become common in the daily lives of modern society. Various reasons are used by parents to permit young children to use gadgets. Even though it has benefits, it is undeniable that in fact internet access actually has negative effects on the growth and development process of young children. Using gadgets can even ruin the moral and character building of children which are not potentially expected by parents. This paper aims to describe the effects of Information Communication and Technology (ICT) on the character education of early childhood. This study belongs to descriptive qualitative where the data were gathered through library research and interviews. The result showed that giving access to gadget and internet in early childhood may contribute to positive and negative impacts. Children may have better motor skills, improved cognitive skills and competition skills while on the contrary, children may face serious issues such as speech delay, attention deficit, learning problems, even mental disorders that can impact to their characters. Therefore, serious attention is needed from the environment where the children grow and develop, such as parents, caregivers, educators in early childhood education schools, and the community holistically in order to minimize the negative influences of the internet towards the their character and moral buildings. Keywords: Character Education, Early Childhood Education (PAUD), Information Communication and Technology (ICT)