How Classroom Technology is Holding Students Back (technologyreview.com) 87
Schools are increasingly adopting a "one-to-one" policy of giving each child a digital device -- often an iPad -- and most students in the U.S. now use digital learning tools in school. There's near-universal enthusiasm for technology on the part of educators. Unfortunately, the evidence is equivocal at best. Some studies have found positive effects, at least from moderate amounts of computer use, especially in math. But much of the data shows a negative impact. It looks like the most vulnerable students can be harmed the most by a heavy dose of technology -- or, at best, not helped. Why are these devices so unhelpful for learning? Various explanations have been offered. When students read text from a screen, they absorb less information than when they read it on paper, for example. But there are deeper reasons, too. Unless we pay attention to these, we risk embedding a deeper digital divide.
Because these devices are not supposed to teach yo (Score:5, Interesting)
These devices are supposed to make you consumers. Not creators. If you can create something yourself, you are less likely to consume something someone else made. You will have a hard time learning anything useful from a locked down device like an iPad where the express goal is to sell you something rather than enabling you to do anything on your own.
Re: Because these devices are not supposed to teac (Score:2)
A raspberry pi would be a far better choice
Re:Because these devices are not supposed to teach (Score:4, Interesting)
We keep trying all of these different solutions that are probably useless and have no real effect on learning. In part this is because there’s no end of companies looking to feed from the trough of taxpayer funding, but people like quick fix solutions like these instead of the kinds of hard work or less glamorous approaches that will have real results.
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Some apps suck. My daughter's favorite is the math (Score:4, Insightful)
I think "the evidence is equivocal", sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, simply because some apps suck and some don't. Trying to measure the effectiveness of "learning on a computer" is like trying to give a number to "is software high-quality?" It VERY much depends on which software you're looking at!
My kindergartner comes home and wants to play with math games provided by school district, often choosing the first and second-grade level because she's mastered the kindergarten stuff, partly by "playing the game". Once in a while she does third-grade level, which is challenging for her. Occasionally she reads story books in the district web portal, practicing her reading ability. I'm sure other districts use other apps and some of them suck.
Research indicates that the number one factor in learning is if the material is matched to the student's current level of understanding. If I tried to teach basic HTML to the Slashdot crowd, most wouldn't be learning anything because they already know what an img tag is. If I tried to teach "return to glibc", most wouldn't learn anything because they wouldn't know what the stack pointer is - the lesson would go over their head. To teach well you have to hit the sweet spot where the learner understands all of the pre-requisites and clearly understands what the teacher is saying, but doesn't yet know the point being taught.
Software CAN be made to adapt to each learner. Some of my daughter's classmates need to practice adding and subtracting one from a number, 5 - 1, 6 + 1, etc. My daughter needs to practice 17 - 5 and 19 + 2, numbers with multiple digits. Good software can note that she got the single-digit answers correct the first four or five times and move on to something slightly more difficult.
Re:Some apps suck. My daughter's favorite is the m (Score:4, Interesting)
Valid points, but insufficient. There is strong evidence that implementation is significant in generalization of the learning experience. So don't rely on the "math game" to teach arithmetic. Generalize the experience into other areas. Have her help with something else that uses arithmetic. Preferably several something elses.
And this is probably the real problem with computer learning. (My guess, admittedly.) It can teach basic skills, but the programs don't generalize it away from the program.
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Ableist much?
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I think "the evidence is equivocal", sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't
Self-paced e-learning works well for smart kids. They can move forward at their own pace.
It doesn't work well for dumb kids, who need additional help and often lack focus.
One option to stick with regular classrooms and use the NCLB philosophy of just getting everyone up to the minimum.
Another option is to use e-learning for the kids who adapt well to it and let the teacher focus on the slower kids.
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Exactly. Essentially we are indoctrinating our children in the "Cult of Mac".
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Exactly. Essentially we are indoctrinating our children in the "Cult of Mac".
My spouse has an educational app business. She used to develop for both iOS and Android. But 95% of her customers were using iPads. It just wasn't worth doing Android for a 5% bump. So she dumped Android and is now iOS only.
The app developers focus on iPads because that is what the customers want.
The schools and parents buy iPads because that is what the apps run on.
It is a chicken-and-egg problem.
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How are these schools getting such huge funding to buy them all iPads?
Compared to the other costs of education, iPads are not a significant expense.
In 2016, American public schools spent $13,847 per student [ed.gov].
If an iPad costs $500 and lasts for 3 years, it is barely 1% of expenses.
I remember schools didn't even have a budget to buy new books.
You remember incorrectly. Books are not a significant expense for schools. Way less than 1% of their budgets.
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It's what the teachers want, because they need an overpriced piece of garbage in order to feel better about themselves and their shit existence.
Goddamn, talk about a lot of assumptions about people you don't know.
First, iPads aren't garbage. They certainly may or may not be overpriced, depending on what sort of deal that you can get. Historically, Apple has offered deep, deep discounts to schools for Apple hardware, which is what got Apple IIs into the classroom, then the Macintosh, then the iPad. I don't know if they do that much any more.
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It depends on the grade.
In K-2, most educational apps run on tablets, and those are mostly iPads.
In higher grades, the students use laptops, and those are mostly Chromebooks.
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Australian Schools generally Windows (Score:2)
Actually, bring your own device which means the same thing.
My daughter uses Musescore for music writing, Inventor for CAD. Not sure how those run on Chrome!
But that said, they need my help setting up their computers properly, e.g. with cloud backups. School IT can only help with simple things. Surprisingly, the school is not riddled with malware.
But I can understand the appeal of a stateless, thin Chromebook.
Until, of course, HTML3, which has local running databases etc. and the state goes back!
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Your comment would make more sense if we were discussing computer science, programming and engineering. But for basic elementary education it doesn't seem to apply. Text books (and the schools that own them) didn't lend themselves to much modification, and writing in them was discouraged, to the point of maybe forcing your parents to buy them if you did it too much.
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These devices are supposed to make you consumers. Not creators.
Kids are supposed to be consumers of educational material (and they can still be interactive consumers) so that's not really the point. The problem is that this is a band-wagon that lots of schools are jumping on without any real clue about how to use the technology to improve education. What needs to happen is that new technology is not rolled out until there is a clear and specific plan for how it will be used to benefit education.
Technology magnifies the capabilities of an individual. It definitely c
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Indeed. And the other thing is why should these devices be helpful even if they were not locked down? "New" = "better" does not apply in many, many cases and this stupidity about "digital learning" is now already quite a while old. The traditional distance-educators have never expected anything besides some efficiency increases and some cost decreases and that is what they get. But their content is already optimized for students learning alone with material on paper. For some reason, everybody else expects
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Actually, digital *can* improve flash card style memorization. And can make basic facts more fun to memorize.
Those are pretty limited targets though, and even there the key word is "can". And they come with a built in problem. Learning the facts in one context doesn't automatically generalize them to other contexts. This needs to be done outside the program framework.
But I suspect that spell checkers together with word processors can improve spelling in a relatively painless way. Of course, writing ess
The problem is deeper than that. (Score:3, Insightful)
A computer in your pocket is an educational tool nearly without equal. Giving them to every public school student is worthless, because most of those kids have absolutely no interest in pursuing an education as it's presented to them by the school. That's not because they're lazy or petulant. It's because schools are very bad at educating. They are pure garbage, and their main purpose is murdering children's natural curiosity, replacing it with reliance on authority to teach everything that might apply to them. A computer won't help those kids learn, not because there's anything distracting or undesirable about the devices, but because they're *in school.*
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A computer is not and educational device anymore than a dictionary is. You can't give someone a dictionary and expect that to be the only way they learn how to speak a foreign language.
It's also not about being in school, but how about how the school teaches. Schools usually teach basic skills -- but often, not how to apply them. A computer won't even teach the skills, let alone how to apply them.
In one example the 1st article tells students to combine '8' and '3'. My first answers would have been 38 or
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"with 30 other kids all trying to get the teacher's attention for help or confirmation."
When I was in school, every one of those 31 children was trying to be ignored, trying to not be picked by the teacher to answer some question. Not one child wanted to be there, even the few who somehow recognized that being taught was a necessity.
A kid who doesn't know something wants to be left alone, not given extra attention that makes him look and feel stupid.
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Of course I haven't -- I'm going by the base article and what is being used
in public schools. It isn 't the cream of the crop!
The commercial offerings are often better -- but the article talks about
giving devices to kids in public schools. It all comes down to costs -- as I mentioned. To make the low-bid in a public school system, alot of corners are cut. You point out differences between public and private offerings.
Do you think you'd get the same quality from a public school? I'm guessing that isn't
Re: The problem is deeper than that. (Score:2)
Why is it in the school? Most schools have zero power over kids. Itâ(TM)s the parents fault 99%.
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Now Skeeter... (Score:2)
You didn't read the article. ... Read the article.
I don't know who you think you are, but we don't take kindly to your type 'round here...
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Banal statement. Now support it with empirical fact.
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I disagree. We had a branch of the city library in our school. _That_ was an impressive educational tool. A computer in your pocket with internet access is a somewhat reasonable approximation, but not nearly as good. Still, while some pupils were found in the library quite often, most only went there when they had no choice. A computer will not change that. In fact, a computer makes it easy to spend all your time watching funny videos instead of doing something actually educational. Hence it may even be det
Re: The problem is deeper than that. (Score:2)
I'd rather have my child watch funny videos all day than waste their time on the shit done in schools. Here's a list of Youtube channels with funny videos: Numberphile, Binging with Babish, pocket83, Forgotten Weapons, Adam Neely, The Locking Lawyer, EmpLemon... I could go on forever. You'll get your fill of cute animals and staged fights, but it's very hard to *avoid* learning when the most popular cable TV replacement is also the world's biggest crowdsourced video library. The education you get from them
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School is that bad now? Well, then you have a point.
Don't worry... (Score:5, Funny)
Don't worry. Similar concerns occurred decades ago with the introduction of film projectors into US schools. Science, history, and world cultures curricula really embraced this and look at the advances in US students have made compared to other countries that eschewed this and solely rely on classroom lecturing and student-teacher interaction.
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don't just throw technology at the problem (Score:2, Insightful)
"Pencil and paper IS high tech" + more (Score:1)
"Pencil and paper IS high tech"
THIS.
Compared to chalk and slate, pencil or pen and paper is high tech. Both are cheap enough to use as much as you want, and paper is cheap enough to store that you can keep it indefinitely, well, for the rest of the school year anyway.
On the other hand, film/VHS/DVD/computer-video lessons do have value over books for some things. There's something "magically enticing" about watching a replay of the first moon landing that I just can't get from a book. That kind of "magic" is gold in the classroom.
There
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throwing tablets at children is simply an attempt to educate via immersion in money, and it's a lazy cop-out.
I'm not sure the motivation is a lazy cop-out; more of an example of the general public's fascination with computers and technology in general being applied by "educators" to the K-12 schooling challenge. I haven't seen a reasoned evaluation of technologies and careful implementation of possible solutions during my children's K-12 years (just ending). I've seen knee-jerk poorly planned mass implementations of technology.
The technology isn't all bad, but it isn't a panacea and (in my experience) has done
Ironic... (Score:3)
An electronic calculator is very useful... to those who have invested the time and effort to learn arithmetic. To those who haven't, it's either a (small) boat anchor or a deadly pitfall.
I still remember, about 45 years ago, going into a shop that was advertising a 25% sale and asking to buy a clock radio priced at £24 (sterling). The young sales guy fumbled with his calculator for ages, then announced that I must pay £31.87.
Anyone wth the slightest understanding of arithmetic would have known the discounted price would have to be less than £24. Most educated eight-year-olds could have worked out £18 in their heads.
What goes for calculators and arithmetic goes, on a much bigger scale, for computers. "To err is human..."
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Maybe 8 year olds from 45 years ago. Today's 8 year olds will need to whip out their Apple Watches or equivalent.
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According to Robert A Heinlein, when he was at school (about 1910) all school children learned their tables by heart - up to 20 x 20 (or higher). When you think how useful we find it throughout our lives to know our puny 12 x 12 tables...
Up to the 1950s, at least in Britain, many children were taught to memorize whole lengthy poems. A lot of people can still recite them today, when they have forgotten most of what happened in between.
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Well, that's fine if they're decent poems, like, say, "The Ballad of Blasphemous Bill" or "The Ballad of Boh Da Thone", acceptable if they're short enough, like "The eentsy weentsy spider". Unforgivable if they're stuff like "The Rape of the Lock", and impossible if they're like a lot of the drivel out there.
Ask random people a dumb question (Score:5, Informative)
...and we'll give you dumb answers. Since I have kids, and this debate is raging on in their middle/elementary schools, I'll give at least half-assed more informed answers.
1) The digital material is excessively reliant on video. Video is "live" and it flies at you and is gone. It can be helpful to illustrate concepts (especially math and science), but it is difficult to go back and find that one point you weren't clear on, it's hard to search, and especially for visual learners, things said as words get lost quickly. I have personally spent a lot of time training myself to be more of an audio learner lately, at an old age, because so many things now are not documented in words. It's still not natural and I will always, always, go find something to read rather than sit through some shitty video.
2) What I've seen so far from these devices is "push only". If there's any feedback loop from the student its usually really simple multiple choice questions that don't require much thought or effort. If you want students to really understand, you need to ask deeper questions. Those do not always lend themselves to button pushing (and require instructor review). This was the norm before devices, but now they've tried to streamline this process. I question why this is being used to supplant the previous feedback loop of education. Teachers are still a critical asset in the education process, but I feel like there is an attempt to design them out (possibly for very poor areas globally, where educated teachers may not exist?)
3) The devices are not set up in a way to let you either quickly find information, or quickly reference information, or "study" (hit target areas). They're pretty much set up to blast information at you sequentially. When it's time to study for the test, or solve a complicated problem, the device is often ignored as a source of information.
4) Parents are out of the loop. The devices, or web portals, are locked down to student login/passwords. Parents, who are often left with a lot of the drilling and help support, often have no idea what is being taught in class nor how to help. With math it's easy, I may teach it differently, but math is math. I can re-derive and solve the problems. I can find real life examples of where it's used and why it's important. It's not quite so easy, especially with social studies or language arts, wherein the topic is a specific passage I've probably never read, or a particular event I may only half remember is being discussed. I either sit there and get my kid to log in, and then sit through their lesson and help. That often is too time consuming, and my help is mediocre at best. If I had a text book, i would be able to do this much faster. I understand how to help, but I often don't understand the context.
I think when we talk about "devices" there's a much deeper discussion that needs to be had than just about the electronics aspect. The presentation and interaction and teacher role with these things is also being changed, and didn't necessarily need to be. They're not eBook readers, there is a lot more of an agenda being pushed from all levels. I do not think we know how to use this medium properly.
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The devices are not set up in a way to let you either quickly find information, or quickly reference information, or "study" (hit target areas).
This! Couple this with a kid struggling with their "new math" homework and this Computer Scientist cannot help his own child with there Math homework. Sure we can get the right answer, but not credit.
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This! Couple this with a kid struggling with their "new math" homework and this Computer Scientist cannot help his own child with there Math homework. Sure we can get the right answer, but not credit.
I hope you aren't also helping them with their English homework! :)
Sorry, easy shot I know, but couldn't resist.
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These points really stand out. BIG PROBLEMS.
3) The devices are not set up in a way to let you either quickly find information, or quickly reference information, or "study" (hit target areas). They're pretty much set up to blast information at you sequentially. When it's time to study for the test, or solve a complicated problem, the device is often ignored as a source of information.
4) Parents are out of the loop. The devices, or web portals, are locked down to student login/passwords. Parents, who are ofte
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4) Parents are out of the loop. The devices, or web portals, are locked down to student login/passwords. Parents, who are often left with a lot of the drilling and help support, often have no idea what is being taught in class nor how to help. With math it's easy, I may teach it differently, but math is math. I can re-derive and solve the problems. I can find real life examples of where it's used and why it's important. It's not quite so easy, especially with social studies or language arts, wherein the topic is a specific passage I've probably never read, or a particular event I may only half remember is being discussed. I either sit there and get my kid to log in, and then sit through their lesson and help. That often is too time consuming, and my help is mediocre at best. If I had a text book, i would be able to do this much faster. I understand how to help, but I often don't understand the context.
It is even worse in some cases... yes, parents are out of the loop, but at the same time the school seems to think that the new technologies embed the parent more firmly than ever into the educational system...
My local school district suggested (when first distributing a laptop to every middle/high school student) that parents regularly review the contents of their student's laptops, and always know the password to their student's accounts so that they could access their work. Right. I know my way aroun
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Why bother to learn something that's always there (Score:3)
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Not every body learns the same way. These systems allow for the diversity of learning styles far better than the listen to the teacher lecture method ever did.
Stated objective (Score:2)
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The stated objective is to improve learning outcomes. The actual objective is to add a layer of additional managability on the teachers and to make grading and assigment managment easier for the staff.
Bingo - you hit the nail on the head. Students are the material that is being processed by the machine whose two parts are the school management (principal and administrative staff) and the school labor (teachers). Management seeks to control and get the most efficiency out of labor, but the measurement of efficiency is not the effective education of students, just the process of presenting material and assigning grades.
Computers bad for kids learning (Score:5, Interesting)
I have two kids in school. I'm a computer nerd. I hate my kids having to using computers in school. Here is why.
1. They are very stressful for the kids.
2. They have assignments due at midnight, which leads to issues at home.
3. If you fat finger the finish button, you either submit incomplete or never submit. I've seen both happen from my own fingers trying to help my kid submit something. The lag on Chromebooks cannot be underestimated. The bad no-confirm design on assignments as well.
4. If their battery dies, they cannot finish assignments or participate in class activities. So there are rules. If they forget to charge them, they get a demerit. More stress on the kid, since the batteries might drain to 10% in one day at school and they can't plug in charge at their desk.
5. The chromebooks my kids use are so slow, I pull my hair out every time I have to help them do assignments.
6. Studying for tests is horrible because you are studying from a laptop. You can't hold a weightless piece of paper and bring it to your messy desk, or sofa, or read it on the bus or between classes. How the hell do you teach your kids to cram a few more points before the test if they have to power up a laptop that is off limits because it is test day? Parents can't easily read off points to the kid and mark stars on the hard parts to come back to study more later, or make corrections, because it is all some editable monstrosity of a study guide on a website.
7. Teachers use online materials as a crutch. They don't give handouts because that would take them more time, they post it online. You better hope your kid knows where to go to find it, because the parent sure doesn't have any knowledge of the beyond messy school website that probably spans every class and every grade and every teacher that ever existed.
There is more, but those are the ones that come to mind.
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It's always the same story (Score:1)
Parents (Score:2)
Itâ(TM)s simple. Most parents have zero real interest in truly ensuring their kids are educated. They are more interested in blindly making them happy with toys and vacations or whatever. They kinda want their kid to be educated but really not to the point where they want to do whatever it takes to ensure it.
It varies from culture to culture, person to person.
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ItÃ(TM)s simple. Most parents have zero real interest in truly ensuring their kids are educated. They are more interested in blindly making them happy with toys and vacations or whatever. They kinda want their kid to be educated but really not to the point where they want to do whatever it takes to ensure it.
I have bent over backward trying to ensure my kids are educated, up to and including implementing, funding, and directly particpating in extra-curricular STEM education programs that benefit not only my kids but others as well. In my experience, the way that schools have deployed technology has overall hindered rather than helped (which is the subject of discussion for this thread). If your "simple" explanation is correct, then shouldn't my deep interest in truly ensuring my kids are educated have overcom
Depends on how you use it (Score:1)
Sure the patutor in the right setting like a one hour drop in lab can be a good tutor. Broderbund Math Blaster was great at that, Mavis teaches typing good job, Tetris was good at basic geometry and spacial awareness, etc. An iphone or ipad for every child 24/7/365, maybe not so much.
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Flicker may be important, but I suspect more important is the spatial memory stored in the muscles of which page to look in to find something in particular. Even remembering the page number I often rely on muscle memory to get me to about the right page quickly....and you can't do that, or anything analogous, on any ebook reader I've ever used. (Admittedly, not many, because I don't like them.)
Computers prevent deep concentration (Score:3)
Both my boys have Macs for school. They are required to use them as the school has eliminated physical text books and all assignments are turned in online. Most assignments are done through Google Docs in a browser.
The problem they have is it is too easy to pop up a new browser tab and waste time with games, social media, youTube, etc. There isn't an software I can install that will restrict them to just their homework (there's always a work around) and talking to them doesn't help because the impulse is just too strong and the barrier just too low.
Before they had school issued computers I could put them at the kitchen table with their book and papers and that's all they could do. Sure they could stare out the window but they definitely tried harder to concentration because they couldn't get to youTube or online gaming until their work was done.
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There isn't an software I can install that will restrict them to just their homework
All the laptops used in my school district have extreme lock-down. I just assumed any sane K-12 school would do that.
Problem is lack of software (Score:1)
Problem is lack of software. For example foreign language. Big part of this is simply memorizing words and repeating this over and over again. It takes about an hour to create a software from scratch that asks words and verifies the answers, even a school kid could make such software. Lack of computers is not the problem.
Now the question: Does the school provide this kind of software (preferably with pre-filled words from the chapters of the book)? No. Nothing. This fact alone shows painfully clearly that t
nonsense (Score:2)
Look at the incentives... (Score:2)
There's near-universal enthusiasm for technology on the part of educators.
This is because it means that teacher have to do less work.
Stop attacking the medium, attack the content (Score:2)
Computers are a tool, like a calculator, a hammer, a VCR, a note card, or a piece of chalk. Some of the things done with tools are good, and some are not. We will be able to use the tool successfully when we stop blaming the chalk for writing poorly, stop blaming the VCR for boring videos, etc. Use the tool well. Things that don't work, stop doing it that way.
People have different tool affinities. My oldest son has trouble writing, but loves typing. My wife hates typing and writing but will draw thing
Ask a principal, a district superintendent this... (Score:2)
What were the actual measurable outcomes laid down when you decided on tablets or chrome books?
How are you going to measure them?
And... Does the school/district have in place a financial plan in place to pay for them, support them, replace and maintain them? Where is this money coming from?
Cant buy IQ (Score:1)
If it did then all efforts from 970~2019 would have seen generational results.
Every generation got given computer and more math support.. every generation got average results after all the extra invetment..
All the extra gov, NGO, big tech, philanthropist spending results in is ads for tech brands and NGO virtue signalling.
state of mind (Score:1)
Education research is complex (Score:2)
OK, this study is echoing what many others have, including the OECD's (who do the PISA tests every 3 years), i.e. that there's in inverse correlation between ICT use in classrooms & academic performance in school pupils. Strictly speaking, this tells us that there's a correlation & nothing else. Any conclusions on whether iPads, Android tablets, Chromebooks, PCs, Macs, etc. cause better or worse learning are pure speculation. Also, any such speculation is scientifically invalid if it's explicitly or
I don't agree with you. Many modern technologies a (Score:1)