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The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

americanaffairsjournal.org

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Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#251

Post by TazeTSchnitzel »

thayne wrote: post #221
gvjddbnvdrbv wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The ideal way to teach spelling is (1) get kids to read a whole lot, (2) show students their mistakes in context when they make them on as short a feedback loop as possible, without judgment. Speaking as a dyslexic person this is garbage. Learning to spell required weekly word lists, spelling tests and hours of study. The memory skills this built have seriously helped me in my life.

This hints at the biggest problem with our education system. Different children learn in different ways. Word lists and spelling tests may have been effective for you, but they weren't for me (reading hundreds of books otoh did improve my spelling). Unfortunately, I don't really have a practical solution.

ISTR there is no scientific basis for “children learn in different ways”. If a child has dyslexia or something like that, sure, that can affect things, but good teaching strategies should work for the vast majority of children.

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#252

Post by shard »

knolax wrote: post #214
shard wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you describe includes English, however, due to its heritage of being a conglomerate of several different languages. That's why English spellings bees are a thing -- the spelling and pronunciations don't always match up. We'd need to switch to something like Korean, where deviations between spelling and pronunciation can be counted on one, maybe two hands.

I actually count English spelling as a strength and not a weakness, otherwise we'd have the situation of multiple semantically distinct and unrelated words being spelled the same[0] while at the same time having to maintain distinct orthographies for every minor dialect[1]. [0] https://ko.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%EC%88%98%EB%8F%84_(%EB%8F%9... [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/North%E2%80%93South_differen...

English is also unable to avoid the issue of having multiple semantically distinct and unrelated words being spelled the same, for example "stock" or "light" or "scale". I don't know enough about languages to say which ones have avoided this issue. Regarding your second point about not having to maintain distinct orthographies, could you explain in more detail how English avoids that?

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#253

Post by elfexec »

plughs wrote: post #8

Our elementary school uses chromebooks from 1st grade on, and I do see a lot of downsides. The most outrageous problem, IMO, is that there are 'modules' that must be completed, and kids with computer access at home can work on them at home. Kids from low income families are screwed over - again. Other problems - spellcheck is always on, why learn real spelling when the computer fixes it for you? - The de-emphasis on…

> Kids from low income families are screwed over - again.

No matter what, there will be disadvantages, but it's not the end of the world. At least they have less screentime at home right?

> Tech parents are always like "f yea, of course you block youtube"

"Always"? I highly doubt that. Actually, I bet most tech parents guide their kids on which youtube channels to watch because most tech parents watch youtube.

> I don't want to have to sit next to them all night making sure that they are only doing 'productive' work.

They are kids. Why are you concerned about 'productive' work. Sounds like you are dealing with a company and employees rather than a family and kids.

Calm down. Everything will be okay. People really do turn into their parents.

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#254

Post by shard »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #171
kochikame wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you live in a Chinese-speaking country then, yes, it's a bad thing. There are plenty of situations in which you still have to write; at the post office, applying for things, hospitals, places like that. Maybe not every day, I'll grant you that, but you are going to hit barriers when required to write your address or apply for a driving license or similar. You don't want to be the guy painstakingly copying characte…

I lived in Beijing for 9 years and it didn't seem to be a problem. Yes, I occasionally had to really write something in Chinese (e.g. at the bank when making an account changed), but my hand was basically held while writing it. The post office and hospital never required me to write in Chinese.

If you have a Caucasian appearance, might not part of it be that the Chinese simply excused you from having to write Chinese more than they would someone who appeared Chinese?

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#255

Post by shard »

mrr54 wrote: post #163
dnqthao wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like English spelling has any rules. There are a lot of irregularities with English spelling that students need to learn by heart how the word is spelled compared to how it is pronounced.

English spelling absolutely has rules. The famous 'ghoti' example (where supposedly it should be able to be pronounced 'fish' because of 'gh' in rough, 'ti' in 'nation', etc.) is nonsense because there's only one way that word can be pronounced in English and that's 'goatee'. Irregularities don't mean it doesn't have rules. The most common 1-2k words are much less regular than the rest of the language, but learning h…

Funny, I always pronounced "ghoti" like "Gotti".

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#256

Post by seanmcdirmid »

vonseel wrote: post #236
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lived in Beijing for 9 years and it didn't seem to be a problem. Yes, I occasionally had to really write something in Chinese (e.g. at the bank when making an account changed), but my hand was basically held while writing it. The post office and hospital never required me to write in Chinese.

My 69 year old father lived in Beijing for a few years recently and I'm pretty sure the company he worked for must have taken care of things like that for them because I can't imagine that man ever attempting to write Chinese. I guess there's probably a pretty strong market for translators in the big Asian cities with American/European presence.

The company didn’t even have to provide anybody. There was always at least one English speaker at the bank, even though I could get by in Chinese verbally, it’s just one weird rule that requires me to write anything by my own hand at all (other than my signature). A lot of places are like that: they’ll easily take care of the paperwork for you if they know you can’t. Even for foreigners that don’t speak Chinese, they get by, especially in a first tier.

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#257

Post by germinalphrase »

pier25 wrote: post #110

It totally is. I worked in EdTech for the past 4 years and was in contact with the education world. Digital devices are harmful to younger kids. The brain develops much better when using fine motor skills such as writing with pen and paper. France banned all digital devices in primary schools for a reason and all countries should do it. The most important factor in getting quality education are not digital devices or…

As a teacher, I would love to see less technology in my classroom (both personal and school provided) and better tools to support my professional practice (specifically, around persistent assessment).

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#258

Post by tasogare »

raverbashing wrote: post #188
shard wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In related news, the younger generation of kids in Asian countries are getting worse and worse at writing Chinese characters because they can just type the Romanized versions without learning how to write it. Personally I am able to read Chinese at a moderately high level (can read newspapers) but I cannot write most characters off the top of my head. This is what happens when you emphasize reading over physical writ…

I think some countries should just bite the bullet and start replacing their archaic writing systems with something more modern Phonetical alphabet, standardized spelling, etc Few people nowadays have the time and willingness to learn thousand of characters and their stroke orders. Not to mention the whole "every character has several unrelated pronunciations, but hey, context, right?!" of Japanese.

Chinese writing is adapted to write the Chinese language. The only place where this is an issue is languages where there was no standardization (namely every other Chinese languages except Standard mandarin) because even natives don't know which character to use. More interestingly, once someone has knowledge of Chinese character, he can guess the meaning of text in other languages; for instance Korean written in mixed script is incredibly readable to some one with Japanese reading ability.

The Voyager Golden Record has a record of Minnan language which transcription in Chinese character is: 太空朋友，恁好。恁食飽未？有閒著來阮遮坐哦! Anyone in this thread reading some Chinese can guess accurately what the first sentence means. Probably the second too. The third is more difficult but looks like an invitation. Now compare with the romanization: Thài-khong pêng-iú, lín-hó. Lín chia̍h-pá--bē? Ū-êng, to̍h lâi gún chia chē--ô·! Besides pêng-iú looking like Mandarin pengyou is this totally foreign.

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#259

Post by shard »

is0tope wrote: post #136
Spooky23 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Chromebooks are awesome, but not at grade 1. Kids are too developmentally different at that age. They range from the kids whose parents delay kindergarten a year to make them better at sports to the kids put into school early to save money on daycare. Using a trackpad and keyboard is too abstract. My kids' school uses iPads as limited enrichment devices until grade 3. As a reward, they get to independently us…

> kids whose parents delay kindergarten a year to make them better at sports Unrelated, but could you explain this?

On a similar note, I've read about parents in China scheduling the conception and birth of their child so that the child can be the oldest at school. Although it's only a few months' difference, but in kindergarten and elementary school, that head start could mean quite a difference in academic performance.

Re: The technology pushed into schools today is a threat to child development

#260

Post by Dylan16807 »

shard wrote: post #255
mrr54 wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

English spelling absolutely has rules. The famous 'ghoti' example (where supposedly it should be able to be pronounced 'fish' because of 'gh' in rough, 'ti' in 'nation', etc.) is nonsense because there's only one way that word can be pronounced in English and that's 'goatee'. Irregularities don't mean it doesn't have rules. The most common 1-2k words are much less regular than the rest of the language, but learning h…

Funny, I always pronounced "ghoti" like "Gotti".

Slight difference in vowel, otherwise the same, that's valid enough. English isn't great at telling you the exact vowel, probably because people keep making them shift.
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