Do Home Computers Help Or Hinder Education? 305
theodp writes "The NY Times reports on economists' efforts to measure a home computer's educational impact on schoolchildren in low-income households. Taking widely varying routes, they are arriving at similar conclusions: little or no educational benefit is found. Worse, computers seem to have further separated children in low-income households, whose test scores often decline after the machine arrives, from their more privileged counterparts. Abroad, researchers found that children in Romanian households who won a $300 voucher to help them buy computers received significantly lower school grades in math, English and Romanian. Stateside, students in a North Carolina study posted significantly lower math test scores after the first broadband provider showed up in their neighborhood, and significantly lower reading scores as well when the number of broadband providers increased. And a Texas study found that 'there was no evidence linking technology immersion with student self-directed learning or their general satisfaction with schoolwork.'"
Here's some money for a crappy computer... (Score:5, Insightful)
... why aren't you doing better?
Sample Sizes (Score:5, Insightful)
Three groups or cohorts of students were included in this study, with Cohort 1 followed for four years, Cohort 2 for three years, and Cohort 3 for two years (Table 2.2). Cohort 1 (ninth graders) included a total of 5,217 students, with 2,469 treatment students enrolled at high schools and 2,748 control students enrolled at high schools; Cohort 2 (eighth graders) included 5,436 students, with 2,578 at treatment middle schools and 2,858 at control middle schools; and Cohort 3 (seventh graders) included 5,392 students, with 2,547 students at treatment middle schools and 2,845 at control middle schools.
The Romanian study [uchicago.edu] apparently successfully interviewed 858 families in two Romanian counties (Valcea and Covasna). With 1,100 children interviewed and some 1,800 survey sets. Just to put some perspective on how comprehensive each of these reports are. Couldn't get access to the other reports.
Personally I think we're still in a transition period and now that those homes have computers starting when the child is born (and whose parents had computers) we will start to see better parenting skills and regulation with computer usage. It could become just another carrot for the kid or even a method to teach the child proper time management (similar to the classic homework before TV law).
Non Sequitur (Score:5, Insightful)
The UK has just announced a program to get everyone online. However, 20% of school leavers in the UK are functionally illiterate and innumerate. Getting those people online isn't going to benefit anyone, in fact it'll just increase the amount of crap that's already on the Internet.
Like most tools... (Score:3, Insightful)
Like most tools computers, or the internet, can both help or harm education. The problem our generation has is that we've decided we can use technology as a substitute for things which that technology is poorly equipped to substitute. Take for example the "smart whiteboards" - outside of TED I have never once in a teaching context seen one of them used well. The fact that even lecturers within technology still use a whiteboard or blackboard should hint to other subject teachers that these aren't magic bullets for improving education.
The funny thing is that in my experience technology is used the worst the more further removed you are from subjects that really understand that technology. For example, in Science, Engineering, and IT you might actually find less computer usage than some classes in English or History which have no place using computers at all. What we essentially have is teachers swinging the technology magic wand like it is a black box that good grades come out of on their own... Very few people that know technology would believe this "black box" magic bull. But naturally there are companies lined up to sell schools software and hardware that might give students great grades just by the school spending money.
Basically people want to "buy" grades and technology is the latest trend in that vein. The old trend was buying teachers silly short courses on various vodo tricks.
Parents just want someone else to raise their kid and they feel less guilty about a computer than a TV or games console. Bad parenting will result in more time spent on 4chan and worse grades.
Re:Here's some money for a crappy computer... (Score:4, Insightful)
Without parents that are involved with their children and are at least semi-computer literate, the kid will do nothing but Facebook or Half Life all day.
Do Home Computers Help Or Hinder Education? (Score:0, Insightful)
Yes.
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:4, Insightful)
That would be cool... unfortunately, games have become very watered down. Even simple challenges in games are documented and detailed on sites like GameFAQs within the first few days of release. If a kid is stuck on a puzzle that would challenge their critical thinking skills they are more likely to alt-tab to read the answer on the web than the are to complete the objective on their own. It's not fun for them to have to think! ;)
If someone figures out a way to get past rudimentary math skills in a game (Inventory space / x bullets per y clips) then you'll have a winner but I can't think of any situation where you're going to challenge kids enough for them to do it in game and no so much that they feel frustrated with the game and look up the answer.
Re:Darn Newfangled (Score:4, Insightful)
And giving the kid a computer and broadband won't make up for a crappy parent.
Re:Here's some money for a crappy computer... (Score:5, Insightful)
What's your point? That giving them five times as much money for a loaded machine, complete with a dual GPU gaming video card and a glowing blue power supply will somehow make the kid's parents better at raising a kid? That a faster machine or more screen resolution will magically create critical thinking habits, creativity, or a longer attention span? That understanding causality, better parsing of complex sentences, abstract thinking using symbols in place of real numbers, and all of those other useful things either work, or don't, based on CPU speed, the amount of RAM you have, or how many USB ports?
Or is it possible that a kid living in a household that doesn't have the culture, or the inclination, or the time dedicated to being a thoughtful, inquisitive person sees being handed a computer (any computer) as getting just another form of distracting entertainment? It's not about how "crappy" the computer is, it's about how crappy the kid's household culture is.
Replace "computer" with "TV"... (Score:5, Insightful)
...and ask yourself if you'd be surprised by these results. Most home computers (like TVs) are entertainment devices that are occasionally educational, rather than educational devices that are occasionally entertaining.
Beyond that, fundamental education (language, math, reasoning, general and specific knowledge) is hard and involves study, memorization, drill, and test. People have been hoping for 40 years or so that computers would somehow magically make that go away. Or to paraphrase South Park:
1) Computers in classrooms and homes
2) ?
3) Smart, well-educated kids!
Sorry, doesn't work that way. ..bruce..
Re:Non Sequitur (Score:5, Insightful)
The computer is just a tool. I'd think it has no direct effect on education whatsoever. Smart kids with supportive parents will gain a great deal from having a computer. Dumb kids with dumber parents will spend hours on Youtube, twitter etc and learn nothing of consequence.
Exactly. If the parents are buying the computer as a teacher in the same sense that they bought the TV as a babysitter then they're doing it wrong. Kids who want to learn and grow will see it as a tool to help them perform that task, whereas kids who want to play Farmville and watch YouTube will see it as a tool to help them perform _that_ task. Perhaps the presence of the computer in the home strengthens the divide, but the divide has already been there. The student has to want to learn. There are exceptions, but generally (at least in American culture) low-income households and neighborhoods don't place a very high social value on education, and kids pick up on that at a much earlier age than a home PC can affect.
Multiplicative, not additive. (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:5, Insightful)
There are a lot of educational games that are indeed fun. Before my kids were in preschool they had Sesame Street games (remember the Count?), and about the 1st grade I got them The Magic School Bus and Carmen Santiago, and some others I can't remember (my youngest is now 23 and managing a GameStop store). But a computer without educational games certainly won't help, and I can see how it can hinder.
However, why are economists studying this and why is anyone lending the study credence? It should be studied by psychologists, sociologists, or education specialists. If an astronomer does a study about the mating habits of blue finches, would you lend that study any credence? I wouldn't, and I won't take any study about education by economists seriously.
Actually I wouldn't take a study about anything by an economist seriously. If economics (and political "science") were anything more than mathematic snake oil, there would be no hunger or poverty.
Missing from Summary but in TFA (Score:4, Insightful)
In all cases, the kids in homes with computers improved their ...
One would almost think that the main purposed of giving poor kids access to computers at home should be to increase their computer skills (given that in today's and future society one can pretty much forget about any kind of specialized non-physical work if one doesn't have computer skills).
That said, what these studies seem to indicate is how important some form of supervision is for limiting the negative impact of computers (i.e. increase in time wasted on leisure activities) for kids.
I bet if a study was done involving getting TVs for TV-less poor families with kids, we would get the same negative results without the positive one.
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:4, Insightful)
Even kids who read silly novels are learning something that is useful for school.
Good interactive fiction aka text adventure games. You can't make a kid want to read, no different than an adult. But once they're reading you can get them very motivated / interested in what they're reading.
A much more interesting study would have been comparing hand/eye coordination before and after the computer arrived. My guess is aerobic fitness dropped but hand/eye coordination increased dramatically.
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:3, Insightful)
If someone figures out a way to get past rudimentary math skills in a game (Inventory space / x bullets per y clips) then you'll have a winner but I can't think of any situation where you're going to challenge kids enough for them to do it in game and no so much that they feel frustrated with the game and look up the answer.
EVE online? Which is basically a spreadsheet with a fancy 3d screen saver? Its way too grindy for my taste, so impatient kids will not tolerate it. But something like it might do OK...
Re:Do education hinder education? (Score:2, Insightful)
Incorrect, the problem is that they spend too much time trying to force students to conform to their way of learning rather than figuring out the best solution for that students learning. Some people learn best by memorization(which is what greatly promoted currently), some people, like me, prefer to remember as little information as possible due to semi-poor memory capacity and rely on our derivation/reasoning abilities to get us to the information. The problem is the current system has been in place so long that those at the top are more of the folks that are good at memorization and not much else. As a result their understanding of new concepts that go contrary to what they have already memorized is shit.
Re:Here's some money for a crappy computer... (Score:3, Insightful)
>>>>the kid will do nothing but Facebook or Half Life all day.
Precisely. Back in the 70s and 80s having a computer meant learning to program, or learning basic office skills (word processing), otherwise it just sat there. But nowadays handing-out a computer is like having-out a television. It's used for entertainment not learning.
Re:Here's some money for a crappy computer... (Score:3, Insightful)
I think his point was nothing to do with how good the computer was, but rather that simply throwing money or equipment at a problem does nothing if you don't also provide some kind of training or direction. They could do something like provide a math/language based puzzle game and have the kids complete a puzzle each week as part of their homework.
I remember a demo of a text (kind of, it had pictures as well but it was command line driven) adventure game I had as a kid, it was a dungeon game with trolls etc, but it also had you complete simple math puzzles to get further in your quest, it was great.
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:2, Insightful)
But a computer without educational games certainly won't help, and I can see how it can hinder.
Bull shit. There are dozens of ways computers can be helpful without the need for educational games. My first introduction to programming was writing small perl programs to aid in understanding math homework better and getting it done quicker. After I got into this, one of my favorite pass-times quickly became solving problems on projecteuler.net, which led to a better understanding of programming and mathematical concepts.
In my opinion, it isn't the computer that is causing the poor school performance, but the application of the computer to perform worthless activities such as posting to Facebook, browsing Youtube, etc, for hours on end. Anything (television, talking on the phone, banging your head against a wall, etc) will cause poor school performance if it replaces study time with mindless nonsense.
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:5, Insightful)
However, why are economists studying this and why is anyone lending the study credence?
Why wouldn't they? Do economists not understand mathematical models? Do they not understand statistics? They don't have a good grasp of how to properly stratify income groups? Or is it impossible for an economist to specialize in the area of education? I think a far more likely explanation is that you just don't generally understand economics.
In fact, did you even read his CV before making such a statement? Ofer Malamud is an education specialist [uchicago.edu].
Just a sampling of paper titles:
“General Education vs. Vocational Training: Evidence from an Economy in Transition"
“The Structure of European Higher Education in the Wake of the Bologna Reforms"
“Breadth vs. Depth: The Timing of Specialization in Higher Education"
I would address your snake-oil comment, but you apparently hold up sociology as more scientifically rigorous. I don't see much hope for you.
Re:This does not mesh with my personal experience. (Score:5, Insightful)
Congratulations, you're a self-motivated learner. Providing resources to such a person is generally an enabling thing, regardless of what the resource is. The Internet can be a very powerful tool in such hands. However, many people just don't have that sort of drive, and will instead waste time on the Internet doing Facebook, instant messaging, games, and other not-particularly-educational things.
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:3, Insightful)
I think there's two problems.
First, people try to divide up games into "educational" and "entertainment." That means "educational" games cannot have gore, cuss words, or anything that promotes that "edgy" feel that attracts a lot of gamers.
Second, with voice chat there is now a social component to games and it is a primary driver for a good number of gamers. That means there's built-in "cheating" for a good many puzzle/challenge formats -- just ask other players for "the answer" and learn nothing.
I've long said we need a separate ratings agency that totally ignores whether or not something is smut and just gives a rating for skill building potential/educational content. "Game Developers" that work for companies that can afford to promote and advertise their games will code whatever the boss demands. Unless there's something that will help sales to be gained by adding intellectually challenging content, the bosses won't ask for it. It's a small thing, but a rating might do that -- if it is one people can trust.
Re:Like most tools... (Score:3, Insightful)
The funny thing is that in my experience technology is used the worst the more further removed you are from subjects that really understand that technology. For example, in Science, Engineering, and IT you might actually find less computer usage than some classes in English or History which have no place using computers at all.
History would be an amazing application of computers. Every event in history is connected to many other events. What better way to convey that than with hypertext? English too. I bet you could make a great game out of diagramming sentences. My girlfriend's 2nd grader has learned a lot about grammar by doing mad libs on the web.
I pretty much agree with the rest of your post. It's not a magic wand, you have to use them thoughtfully, with purpose, and most teachers aren't ready to do that.
what is lost what is gained (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Darn Newfangled (Score:3, Insightful)
"Usually" may sound like it starts with "you", but it really doesn't.
Re:Here's some money for a crappy computer... (Score:3, Insightful)
Heh, I'd say having too good a computer keeps you from learning too much about it. I spent countless hours tweaking DOS drivers and emm386 settings and benchmarking the math co-processor to see if I could get my crappy games running faster.
In the same vein, my main "computer" as an adolescent was my TI-85 graphing calculator. I read through the entire manual front to back on the school bus and tried out every function and wrote some simple programs in their language, and admired the assembly programmers who could do much more interesting things with it.
I wouldn't even attempt doing something like that with the general-purpose computers or even the smartphones I use now :P .
Re:A challenge to game designers (Score:3, Insightful)
The other thing to come to mind is they are probably making the mistake of equating hindering schoolwork with hindering education. Just because you're not learning what the state says you should doesn't mean you're not learning.
Re:Maybe it's the Internet. (Score:3, Insightful)