Mar 07 2011
Education 2.0
The internet has certainly transformed the way humans create, communicate, and consume information. We are still on the steep part of the curve, in fact, and the world of information continues to go through rapid change and experimentation. This is being brought about partly by software applications and websites (such as WordPress, Facebook, Twitter, etc) that provide tools for communication. The transformation is also being driven by hardware advances – it is now routine for many people to carry around smartphones, which are essentially hand-held computers that provide anytime communication, access to the internet, and a variety of applications.
And yet it feels as if the promise of the internet has not yet adequately penetrated areas that were thought 10-20 years ago to be low-hanging fruit. This includes, in my opinion, education. By now I would have thought that computers would dominate primary education.Yet their footprint remains modest.
Thirty years ago while I was in high school and computers were still incredibly primitive, I thought I was given a glimpse at the future of education. One of our science teachers (who, of course, also ran the computer lab) was a savvy computer user, and incorporated some educational computer programs into our classwork. I specifically remember a program that taught chemical nomenclature. You could play with the program like a game, and you received immediate feedback and correction for all of your answers. After about an hour playing with this program I felt I had truly mastered at least the basics of nomenclature – far faster than if I had studied the same material from a book or received a lecture.
To the 1980 version of myself it would likely seem incredible that thirty years later computers have still not been thoroughly integrated into education. The software and hardware technology is more than adequate. So what’s the problem.
Before I go on, I am sure that most people reading this can provide numerous examples of how computers are being used in their education (at whatever level). I am aware of all this. I bought plenty of educational computer games for my children, and many of them were quite good. My younger daughter virtually learned how to read playing with internet-based reading programs. Many schools have computers in the classroom, have smart-boards instead of blackboards, and students are encouraged to use computers to do some of their school projects. There is increasing educational information on the internet, and at my medical school students are increasingly relying on podcasts instead of lectures, and get all their class notes online.
I am sure there are many more examples as well, and this is all good. It is just far far less than what we could potentially have by now.
I am reminded of this by a recent survey of computer use in primary education. Dr. Jon Altuna, in his PhD thesis, explores the many advantages of internet learning in primary education, but also explores the limits of its use:
Despite its educational possibilities the researcher warns that there are numerous factors that limit the incorporation of Internet into the teaching of the curricular subject in question. These involve aspects such as the time dedicated weekly, technological and computer facilities, accessibility and connection to Internet, the school curriculum and, above all, the knowledge, training and involvement of the teaching staff.
That is in line with my experience – computer and internet use is largely an afterthought. Schools do it because they know they should, but there is a certain lack of vision for how computer technology can really transform education. This is not to suggest that computers should take over the role of the teacher or displace all other teaching methods. There are some things teachers are optimal for, and other teaching tasks that are best done with physical hands-on experience. Sometimes cracking open a book is the best option.
But there are certain learning tasks for which computers are vastly superior – like providing instant feedback, keeping the difficulty at the optimal level for the individual, individualized pacing of learning, and maintaining active attention for long periods of time. Dr. Altuna also points out that internet learning allows students to explore more, become more active (rather than just passive) in their own learning process, and for student to learn from each other.
For education 2.0 to become a reality, the use of the internet and computer technology in primary education needs to become more than an afterthought – more than just an obligatory added layer, and more than just teaching students computer skills themselves. We need a massive effort to develop a digital infrastructure dedicated to computer and internet-based learning. We need schools and teachers to experiment more, to find what computers will do best, and what they are not good for. Primarily, I think we just need the development of dedicated programs and content for education. We need the equivalent of Facebook and Twitter for primary education – killer apps, the kind that are so effective that after their incorporation people will look back and wonder what they did before the application was available.
This will take dedicated resources. But as we look to take our educational system into the 21st century (at least our politicians say they want to do this) we need look no further than this vastly untapped resource. Education 2.0 is overdue.
37 Responses to “Education 2.0”
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Very good post, I agree with most of you said, but it is very important that children learn to get up their lazy butts and explore the world, they shouldn’t just sit in front of a computer. The great Charles Darwin would have never discovered the process of Natural Selection and Evolution if he just sat behind a computer. Kids these day’s are rude and they get too much nonsense from the internet.
If it is used wrongly the internet/computer will divide us and create more havoc. However if it is used properly it can spread knowledge, critical thinking and most importantly Love.
We are Spiritual Beings having a human experience.
We are here to grow into Love and Oneness .
We are all one. There is no separation.
Love is all there is. Life/Love is eternal.
Death is just a movement from one plane of existence to another.
Here is a lovely quote for all of you
We have always been involved in spiritual evolution.
We are spiritual beings,
we have always been spiritual beings
and we will always be spiritual beings.
~ Gary Zukav ~
Love and Peace
Another one of my favorite bloggers, Matt Yglesias, has been kicking around these ideas on his blog for the last couple of months. He’s argued provocatively that the gains from computerization of education would be especially strong at the lower end of the quality scale (which, if you think about it, is where the really serious problems are.) But, in his analysis, progress is being held up by an overly traditional view of what a college education is. As a result we’re seeing more and more resources ploughed into traditional four-year colleges that don’t necessarily do a great job of educating marginal students.
See Needed: More Olive Gardens and Disrupting College (which is really a teaser for a Center for American Progress report promoting the idea. As a guy who recorded a Teaching Company lecture I’d guess you’d be pretty sympathetic to this kind of thinking.
Conrad Wolfram, has a pretty good TED talk about using computers to teach math. I agree that we have not really scratched the surface here and that software is probably at least as limiting as hardware.
http://www.ted.com/talks/conrad_wolfram_teaching_kids_real_math_with_computers.html
The main thrust of the talk is that computers are really good at computation, so why not let them handle the heavy workload and really focus on math concepts while in class.
@SA
I think you will find a warmer reception over at Pharyngula for your brand of nonsense! Since you do nothing but derail every post you reply to perhaps you should be banned and blocked unless you have something pertinent to say about the subject matter.
troll!
@Steve
The problem with distance learning via the internet is the loss of interactions with other students and the professor. That said, some classes would be easier to teach over the internet than others. How would you test the knowledge of the student without multiple guess answers?
Dear Happy Camper I will never comment on that horrible blog Pharyngula, while PZ Meyers gives us great insights on Biology he and his fans are extremely mean spirited and intolerant. The people here are very nice except for you. I don’t know why do you have so much hatred towards me, you are an angry, bitter person, you shouldn’t call yourself a happy camper, you should call yourself a rude, cold hearted camper.
You really hurt me.
Love and Peace
SA – Posting the same canned information over and over again on every post, regardless of the topic, is considered to be an abuse of the comments (often referred to as being a troll). It is a form of spamming. Feel free to post your relevant comments, as you did above, but leave off the canned spam. Consider this a friendly warning about internet etiquette. I will ban commenters who continue to abuse etiquette despite warnings.
Camper – I was not necessarily talking about distance learning, and I do not think teachers should be replaced. I am mostly talking about incorporating computers more effectively into the classroom. We could also experiment with using computer-based learning tasks as a substitute for some homework. Much of homework is about doing repetitive tasks for the purpose of drilling in certain information and concepts – and this is ideally suited for computer-based learning.
Sorry, I shall stop posting the same canned information over and over again.
Love and Peace
The issue you bring up is not necessarily about computer, but about effective instruction. Specifically, the things you mention are programmed instruction.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programmed_instruction
The wikipedia page can act as a mediocre primer for the topic. There are a fair number of books, chapters and refereed articles published on programmed instruction. As a graduate student, we have been discussing this heavily in one of my classes recently, and I personally believe the issue boils down to resources.
If you are going to use programmed instruction with out a computer a prime example is a first edition of Sidmans’ Neuroanatomy (a few new authors have been tacked onto the second addition and I can not speak to what was added). The book give a slow, detailed instruction in neuroanatomy. However, this book is a special case the first author is a professor of neurology at Harvard and the second author is a trained experimental psychologist with an excellent understanding of programmed instruction. From hearing one of the authors discuss the book, it took a fair bit of time to get everything just right so that students could fly through the material.
The resources necessary to effectively teach using programmed instruction are large, it requires an understanding of the material, of how components of the material relate to each other, how people need to respond and be able to work with the material, how people will need to extend the material, and most importantly what are the component steps that you need to teach so that when you get to the final topic the person has the necessary skills and behaviors to actually be able to learn the content. It takes time for people to be sensitive enough to be able to teach using programmed instruction, because you need to able to respond and change to your pupil based off of every answer that they give. I am not sure computers can respond in such a dynamic manner at this point with out extremely heavy coding, and that coding would have to be different for each topic.
Of course it’s about resources – as I said, we have the technology, we have developed software applications for more difficult tasks, and we even have a pretty good idea of how to integrate computers more (or as you say, programmed learning).
My primary point is that we need to allocate resources to develop this further – it’s a worthwhile investment.
I do think that textbooks at this time are mostly a drag on the system – a massive waste of resources. Schools should phase out textbooks, and save a ton of money by not having to purchase more. Use digital resources for information, and then explore how best to integrate programmed learning with the digital information sources.
I am not saying this will be easy. It will take human resources more than anything else. But a lot of these resources can come from current waste in the system and what will be replaced.
Steve,
I work for the most widely-used online homework system in the world. We have hundreds of thousands of students use our system each year. Our system is not designed to be an afterthought, and that is certainly not how it is used. Students log in to our application while they are in class and use it for labs and other activities, as well as quizzes, tests, and homework for lecture classes.
No major introductory science textbook in the US is published nowadays without having some internet education component. Often, it’s our application. Not only is the industry moving in a direction of internet-supplemented or even internet-based education, but it is already happening. As someone who is working at the forefront of online education, we are much, much farther along than you suggest in this post.
As a person who has done quite a bit of contract work at various school systems (ranging from the very small to the largest in the state), there are a couple of issues facing the roll out of various “Education 2.0″ programs:
1. Infrastructure. Yes, computers can handle the work, and the software is capable, but the networking infrastructure, the core components that allow computers to communicate, is bogged down from both a technology and process perspective. The technology is a moving target, and the use of bandwidth has changed immensely in just the last few years (traffic has now moved from a burstable nature to a streaming nature). The actual technology, from undersized bandwidth to outdated routers and firewalls, seems to be undersized and overtaxed. The processes are so slow in public school systems that by the time new technology is funded and placed, the approved projects are already a year out of date…a long time in the technology field.
2. Staff. This includes everyone from the administrators making the decisions to the behind the scenes people putting together the vision…or, as Dr. Novella has put it, the lack of vision. The lack of vision seems to come from a staff that was not properly trained to use technology in the first place, to groups of IT staff that are specialized on the computer side of things but have no vision for how to implement it throughout a school system (part of number 1). If the administrators do not have any clear direction for how inter-school communication should work, then they are not likely to hire people in the IT infrastructure that have that vision either.
Without a vision, a staff that can create a vision, and an IT infrastructure build to support that vision, many of our schools may have the latest and greatest computers for the individual that are relegated to streaming videos…and not very well. Where the power from using computers is centralized data storage, and that means being able to take what the kids are currently doing with computers, mining that data, and then using it to further develop programs more efficiently. But this cannot be done when the ability to transport that information to central storage is woefully underpowered. And we haven’t even started to discuss how to keep that information secure…
To share my experience as a music teacher:
When I taught band in a traditional middle school, the tech department pretty much laughed at me when I asked for a computer that I could use in my classroom – the budget just wasn’t there. (I had an immobile old iMac in my office for checking email and doing grades). So much of the internet was blocked that I couldn’t use sites such as YouTube anyway. If I wanted to play music for my students, I was limited to CD’s that I already owned or the few that the school owned. Because of this, I barely covered one of the musical standards that is listening to and analyzing music.
At this school, one computer in a practice room was provided for students to use the program SmartMusic, though as much as I tried to get students to use it, they hardly ever did. SmartMusic provides musicians instant feedback and is like RockBand but without any sort of cool interface at all. It could be a great program in helping students put in the time they need to gain musical skills, but it’s just not that fun after the first time you use it and the instant feedback doesn’t always work that well.
After leaving that school, I am now teaching a music appreciation class for an online school. While looking for a computer based music theory program, I found there are lots of companies that are trying, but just not doing a good job.
The general educational platform that this online school uses is full of bugs. Or they update it and things break. For the kids using it, there is the constant battle of work getting lost or not being able to get to what they need. Not a great way to go to school.
In a nutshell, as a music teacher I try to use technology. I really do. It just seems that the technology is either not developed enough to be any good or the school doesn’t have the budget for it.
There is no doubt that computers could be used more effectively and more widely. Over the years there was great expectations as to their use and effectiveness but the development has been slower than we anticipated, mainly, as stated above, due to the lack of resources and not just a little resistance from classical educators.
I also agree that text books should be phased out. They are more of a money maker for the publishers than they are good educational tools. I see, especially at the college level, new editions being produced each year, forcing students to spend unreasonable amounts for such little change from one edition to the next. If the text were on computer then those changes could be incorporated on a continual basis without additional cost to students and school districts.
I think the ultimate philosophy of education is to progress students to a point where they can teach themselves, independent of the instructor and I think computers could be invaluable to that end.
Our lives are so filled with the technology that it is hard to believe there would not be a greater push to incorporate them into the classroom. However, it is a classical state of affairs, especially in the public education sector, that the public does not want to commit more funds to education and thus the slow incorporation of computers into the classroom. Now, as the economy falters, there will be even more resistance. Basically, its a “those who have, have” situation. There are probably exceptions but they are not the rule.
Austin,
Thanks for the info. I pretty much could guarantee that the comments would fill with people giving examples of the use of digital technology in education. I tried to make it clear that I understand that it is happening, and even gave examples. My complaint is that it is not nearly enough, and it is not being thoughtfully integrated to take maximal advantage of digital methods.
Online homework apps are actually a good example. I have looked into them before, and while this is heading in the right direction, it’s not there yet (either in penetration or execution).
For example, here is a study that shows no advantage to online homework (http://physics.wku.edu/~bonham/Publications/HomeworkCompare.pdf) There are advantages and disadvantages to such systems, and we are not even close to figuring out (let alone executing) systems that exploit the advantages and mitigate the disadvantages. For example, probably a mixed approach is best, using online homework for those kinds of tasks to which they are optimally suited, but more traditional homework for other tasks.
In other words – simply using a computer to do a task that can be accomplished in a traditional way is not what I am talking about. I am not talking about writing assignments on Word rather than pen and paper (while this can be time saving). I have seen in the school systems, at mutliple levels, this simplistic approach serving as “using computers in the classroom.” One university essentially forced students to use laptops to take notes in class. How inane.
I am talking mostly about programmed learning – doing things with computers that you cannot otherwise do in a classroom.
But again – I am sure there is a lot out there already. It’s just not widely implemented. I may do a follow up to this post highlighting the best of what already exists.
Steve
I am curious as to what is your yardstick for not living up to promises.
Like all technology what people perceive as promise usually is not what we finally get. In a recent podcast you indicated how difficult the prediction of advancement can be. If someone told me 20 years ago we would be using an item like an IPad in education I would have though about star trek TNG use of the “Padd”. Which seemed like distant future at that time, and in retrospect is less impressive than an IPad. Hardware and infrastructure advancement for high speed internet impaired, until recently, a major benefit of computer/technology uses. Certainly constantly switching 4.5″ floppy disks 20 years ago too use a word processor program gave me no idea about email or instant communication. I used to have to fill out a form and wait weeks for literature reviews through the medical library. Now my children can do a more in-depth review through Pubmed in 20 minutes. It is only 15 years ago cell phones were rare and Iphones a dream. Given how cheap an internet connection and hardware interfaces are recently is there a realistic ability to reshape the classroom.
I get what you are saying, and I agree. Still I am not quite as disappointed as you appear to be.
Steve
@nwtk2007
“I also agree that text books should be phased out. They are more of a money maker for the publishers than they are good educational tools. I see, especially at the college level, new editions being produced each year, forcing students to spend unreasonable amounts for such little change from one edition to the next. ”
The problem there is mostly with he current publication industry setup, not with the concept of a physical textbook. My calculus textbook from 20 years ago is probably just fine, and nearly all the revisions of it scene then are mostly un-needed, but the book itself is useful.
“If the text were on computer then those changes could be incorporated on a continual basis without additional cost to students and school districts.”
I think it’s probably a little naive to think that publishers would so easily switch to a model of delivering updates for free. This is generally not how software distribution works.
It seems more likely they would try switching to a subscription based service, where for an annual licensing fee, you are entitled to any updates made while you hold a valid subscription. The other possibility is that the publisher would make the texts available only online.
It also depends on the student, and how they allocate their time. Along with all the different flavors of education with computers.
My daughter is presently taking a totally online distance course at the local community college. She is struggling, especially with the deadlines. There is a forum for the students to interact, and the instructor is also available online. But she does not like it. Even though she grew up with educational games (Rabbit Reader, Bailey’s Book House, Math Blaster, Pajama Sam, etc), but those were fun… not work.
It does have a paper version of the textbook though. Which is fortunate, because she just took it to school to catch up on reading between andduring her high school classes.
Next quarter she is taking a hybrid class. It meets for two and half hours on Wednesday evening, and then there are online reading, quizzes, and submission of essays. Hopefully, it will go better.
Since she passed the Math Compass test (second try), she will now be able to do her senior year full time at the community college (it is a state program that lets motivated students earn both college and high school credit at the same time). She is going to stick with as many traditional classes as possible. But there will be some computerized components, more likely in the foreign language labs and physics class.
Karl Withakay:
Actually, the updates in textbooks are mostly the problems at the end of the chapters. I took a graduate level engineering math class last year that used an updated edition of the same book I had as an undergraduate thirty years ago. Much it was the same, except the problems were different.
Oh, and the sample computer code for one chapter on numerical methods. Fortran is out, Matlab is in (or Mathematica in the case for the class I took).
If we are talking about just an electronic version of a printed textbook like a PDF, I still see numerous advantages to a physical textbook. I prefer to use a printed textbook to the PDF version for learning. I am better able to skim and page through a printed text.
However, if we are talking about a a truly electronic text, designed from the start to be an electronic resource, that’s where the digital advantages would outweigh what I like about physical books. Imagine a “digital textbook” that was more akin to a web experience. Hyperlinks to internal and external resources, animated & interactive illustrations, inline virtual lab experiments, etc.
The basis for this type of thing already exists, as seen here: http://phet.colorado.edu/
There are projects to make computers a central part of learning. Not everyone agrees with their techniques but OLPC http://one.laptop.org/
and by extension the software project spun off of it SugarLabs http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Welcome_to_the_Sugar_Labs_wiki
SugarLabs is focusing on software and there are pilots around the world using this software on OLPC and generic PC hardware.
We still have a huge way to go, this is at least one project that is focusing on this type of learning.
Steve, have you read Seymour Papert or Alan Kay’s writings, or seen presentations on it this?
http://www.ted.com/talks/alan_kay_shares_a_powerful_idea_about_ideas.html
SA,
“Sorry, I shall stop posting the same canned information over and over again.
”
Love and Peace
I see from the other thread that I correctly deduced your sex.
Now I’m going to have a stab at your nationality.
You are English, right?
Hey, a Y.E.R. Am I right?
locutus – my current opinions are mostly based on our current technology and software sophistication. It’s mainly that we have not implemented what we are capable of. It’s not about the rate of technological progress, which I agree, if anything, has exceeded expectations.
My personal opinion is that there is a lack of leadership and vision in the education community in taking advantage of the technology. I have met with teachers who barely know how to use e-mail. And for those who are savvy, they may lack the resources to implements their ideas.
In an environment in which much is being said about beefing up education, this an area that is worth investing in.
—–by Novella – “I have met with teachers who barely know how to use e-mail. And for those who are savvy, they may lack the resources to implements their ideas.”
Unfortunately, I have met them also, and worse. Increase teacher pay to reasonable amounts (In other words, finally pay them what their services are worth.) and this is not a problem.
You are also right that there needs to be both leadership and vision. And it must come from the top, nationally. And not from a political position. Its obvious, at least here in Texas, that the top, upper level leadership here, the governor, is totally inadequate to the task of moving education in any direction but backwards. Here, in the state ranked 49th in education nation wide, our governor strives to become numero uno, number one in being the worst of the states.
I have always found it amazing how we under-fund the nation’s number one natural resource.
And yes, text books can be and are very useful, and to me too, much easier to use than computer readers. But the educational website, as described above by Karl Withakey, in conjunction with textbooks and good teachers could turn the tide.
Steven:
You mention that you and your kids have experienced good education programs, which contrasts greatly with my experience, which was that they were either utter crap, or not really educational (as in, it would be a normal game, with education thrown in as a distraction). I’d be greatly appreciative if you could point me in the direction of ones that you have found helpful/useful.
@billyjoe7: LOL no my dear friend, I am from New York.
Hey Dr. Novella,
My school district currently has a one-to-one laptop initiative for secondary students (6th-12th grades), which has been going nearly four years now, and it has done quite well. I am surprised, however, how much backlash has come about since its implementation, both from parents and educators. The most common complaint is the money issue and how the district shouldn’t be wasting money on laptops and technology for every student. What is generally misunderstood is that the technology budget is completely separate from the operational budget that pays salaries and funds school programs, which is getting drastically cut each year. Training is also scarce, with maybe one hour a month. This makes the use of technology intimidating for teachers who may be uncomfortable with it.
There are minor problems that come with providing so many laptops, mainly maintenance (which has steadily decreased as student have become more familiar with taking care of their laptops) and keeping students focused on the task at hand (getting them off games, non-related sites, etc.). Another problem, of course, is internet filtering. Mundane topic searches can produce some, shall we say, unexpected results, so the filter is put into high gear, so it becomes quite cumbersome to find information that can be accessed by all.
As far as applications are concerned, our Apple laptops come with a variety of project- and education-oriented software (i.e. GarageBand, Keynote, iMovie, ComicLife, etc.) Web-based operations become a bit more difficult mostly because licenses and subscriptions have to be bought and that can often cost into the millions. Some great online tools that are currently being used in our local schools have been Google Earth, wikis, blogs, netTrekker, TeenBiz, and a variety of online resources. I was recently in a workshop that deals with an online essay-writing program,WriteToLearn, that allows students to write their essay and get immediate feedback. I have yet to use the program with my students, but many applications like these are just now being programmed. The WriteToLearn program has state-of-the-art AI capabilities, but like you said it can’t replace good, old-fashioned teacher-driven revisions.
As far as outright interactive educational tools, I can only speak for my own subject area, language arts, and there aren’t too many apps, aside from WriteToLearn, that are as useful as I need them to be. Unfortunately, there aren’t too many free apps or web-based programs that can be used in class that I find beneficial or meet the needs of my curriculum or students. If anyone out there has some suggestions for free educational websites, I’d love to check them out.
Karl Withakay:
Last quarter my son had an option to buy that version for his statics textbook. It was half the price of the bound copy. He chose to have me pay for the bound copy, because the electronic version was online and access expired after six months. He thought he would refer to it later (for statics? I’m not so sure, you learn to balance forces and then you are set — I still see little imaginary arrows on truss bridges!).
Most of his college classes include online access to material, labs and quizzes. Also many of the bound textbooks come with CDs with supplemental material, like graphics for cell metabolism and quizzes.
Khanacademy is education 2.0, and it’s exactly what you’re describing. (It’s not just video lectures by the way, it has interactive problems and social aspects.)
- Kids these day’s are rude and they get too much nonsense from the internet. -
and they need to get off your lawn godamnit.
Ah Pharyngula. The place where unicorns go to die.
I would say the main underlying problem is that the physical aspects of the school change much more slowly than the technology. There are going to be teachers who have taught there for 40 years or more and buildings from the 1960′s. Sticking computers on top of this is really the only way it’s going to work because integration is always going to hit out of date obstacles.
Even the latest tech isn’t going to work with tech from 5 years ago sometimes. So you end up with fashion fracturing at all levels that only gets worse the more layers you try to stick on top.
SA,
“LOL no my dear friend, I am from New York.”
Bummer.
Looks like you just lost your convert.
In any case, besides moderates like S Novella, I am a big fan of PZ Myers, R Dawkins, and C Hitchens.
So you would’ve had your work cut out.
@Steve
Your point about textbooks is a good one. Many textbooks are expensive to produce due to the fact that limited publication runs of specialized subject matter. I remember purchasing Invertebrate Biology by Barnes costing me over $70 (that hurts) back in the mid 1970′s from the book store. In addition maybe digital format textbooks may reduce the impact of people like those on the Texas School Board.
That said I have a few concerns about taking digital media too far in the classroom. Maybe my main concern is the ethereal nature of digital media. I like books and like the idea of being able to hold a book in my hand. I think most of us have had hardware fail, data corrupted or lost and batteries go dead at the worst time. Some subjects I don’t believe lend themselves well to a digital classroom such as mathematics. If you have to rely on a calculator for simple math you have a problem with the fundamentals. If you can not do most of your mathematics longhand and have to rely on a computer then the computer just becomes a crutch(except for very complicated calculations). On the other hand I can find information much faster and easier with digital media. The devil is in the details.
Maybe I’m just a luddite. Now where’s my slide rule?
@BillyJoe7: I love Christopher Hitchens. In my humble opinion Christopher Hitchens is a highly evolved Soul that choose to come to planet earth to teach us critical thinking and to break down barriers, he is amazing. Look at how humble and loving the great Christopher Hitchens is compared to PZ Meyers.
Even Richard Dawkins is a wonderful person.
People like PZ Meyers can come across as extremely arrogant and superior. He doesn’t have a nice word for anyone, not even for Atheists, look at how rude he was in his post about Ray Kurzweil. And his disciples are some of the harshest, most bitter people that I have ever come across. PZ Meyers is hot tempered and mean spirited.
Love and Peace
Steve I know this is a day later, but my overall point was that only recently has technology become cheap and easily useful enough to be of use in the classroom. My brother is a high school english teacher that exploits all aspects of technology open to him IE: online grade books, teaching materials ebooks, etc. His objection is that very few parents take advantage of the information he offers, and most of the technology the kids take advantage of have to do with cutting corners. I realize that this is as anecdotal as your email comment, but it does stress the dangers of advancing tech focused classrooms. When generally the kids are tech proficient and the the parents/teachers are probably on average tech knowledgeable. There are many issues. As a technologically savvy and highly educated physician your are most likely a minority as the average school age child’s parent. There are many facets to this issue and pushing forward has many pitfalls, some we cannot even see right now. You are seeing the potential which is obviously very high. In my humble opinion reshaping the classroom has been truly practical for probably the last 2-3years at the most, given tech and availability of resources. During that same time we have seen a downward spiral in funding. Never mind the shelf life and steady advancement of tech meaning constant upgrades. I hate to sound like I am against improving the classroom. I do see the issues and think there are reasonable arguments to go slowly that go beyond technologically incompetent administration/teachers.
SA,
“I love Christopher Hitchens. In my humble opinion Christopher Hitchens is a highly evolved Soul that choose to come to planet earth to teach us critical thinking and to break down barriers, he is amazing.”
He is one of the world’s foremost intellectuals. And he smashes barriers. And he has no time for nonsense – like religion and belief in god.
“Even Richard Dawkins is a wonderful person.”
Yes, I enjoyed his book: The God Delusion.
“People like PZ Meyers can come across as extremely arrogant and superior. He doesn’t have a nice word for anyone, not even for Atheists, look at how rude he was in his post about Ray Kurzweil.”
He just tells it like it is.
And Ray Kurzweil’s idea of the computer singularity is nuts.
Using computers in place of traditional teaching methods in a straight substitution is not really USING computers in education, is it?
What I’d like to see is a system that changed the way info is distributed. For example, take a math class. Teacher demonstrates the topic, then the students begin to work on their computers. For the students who grasp concepts quickly, there is increasingly challenging work provided until mastery is gained, and then they get a reward, such as time to read or play a game. Teacher is notified that the student is advanced in this level. For students who don’t get it as quickly, there is instant feedback, analysis of where the student went wrong and an alert given to the teacher that this student needs assistance. Such a program would keep students engaged and allow teachers to better direct their resources.
Development of something like this would probably need federal curriculum standards tho – when you patchwork things into so many different curricula, it would be hard to come up with something useful.