Technology in the Classroom: Adblock

 

A stop sign

What is an Adblocker?

We all know the feeling of annoyance when an ad interrupts a video or when a popup blocks us from reading a page.  Fortunately, there are small programs and extensions that block these nuisances; the aptly titled adblockers.  These work by scrubbing a webpage clean of its ads to better the user experience.  The right adblocker can block popups, banners, videos, and other different types of advertisements.  By using an adblocker, websites are not only cleaner and less obnoxious-looking, but they are also safer.  By removing unwanted targeted ads, the user can't click on links that will take them to malicious websites that compromise their data and online security through the use of phishing and viruses, even the FBI put out a statement advising people to use an adblocker for this very reason.  One downside, however, is that the person or organization whose content you're looking at does not get ad revenue from your visit.  It is worth noting, though, that the people who know to use an adblock wouldn't typically click the ads regardless.

Its Place in the Classroom

Child covering their eyes

I believe that all computers used in schools should have adblockers on by default.  Too often have I seen teachers frustrated with ads that block the material they are trying to use for instruction.  This makes teachers less inclined to use valuable resources, such as YouTube, for supplemental instruction.  In addition to them being annoying in general, they can also show inappropriate content without cause.  I highly recommend turning off targeted ads for safety reasons, but a downside is that this makes ads unpredictable and could possibly show inappropriate images or words.  For instance, this exact scenario happened in a class of mine recently when an irrelevant and inappropriate ad popped up.  I also don't think that the loss of ad revenue is a big problem for these content creators because (generally) any group or person who is uploading educational content has some type of external sponsor, so the ads just generate a compatibly smaller portion of their income.  I think that all in all, there is no reason not to use an adblocker as an educator or student.  The benefits far exceed the slight negatives of using them and keep everyone safer online.