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Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

reuters.com

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Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#401

Post by lostlogin »

cornholio wrote: post #391
truncate wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally agree! For anyone who still thinks kids should use AI, another argument to make is we are still figuring out AI (hence the constant debate on it, hype, uncertainty, boundaries of its capabilities etc etc). I don't think anyone with right mind can disagree with that. Keeping that mind, wouldn't it make sense to at-the-very-least tread with caution when it comes to kids.

The counterargument is that kids will live in a world different from our own. For example, in many countries children lost the ability to write cursive; that used to be a critical skill comparable to literacy itself. But in our current society, that's no longer the case and you can be very successful without it, but there are other skills, such as using technology, that became critical. Any definitive claim to know w…

I went through a Steiner school from pre-school to end of high school. It’s highly opinionated and very controlling initially. When you paint, you start with one colour. Then another day you get the next (there were only primary colours, because of course).

You eat at your desk, then you’re allowed to play. This was dropped after a year or so.

You don’t learn to read until you’re 7, etc etc.

However, by the end of high school it was up to the individual how much they achieved, and there was minimal pressure. As long as you weren’t messing with other kids, you could do a little or much as you please, and consequences were minimal.

Tools and skills were introduced at a developmentally appropriate age - not sure who chose that age though.

There was a lot wrong with the school and the system, but there was a lot more that was right in my opinion.

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#402

Post by WalterBright »

lazyasciiart wrote: post #351
KPGv2 wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd ban all technology in the classroom. What works is chalkboard and chalk, pencil and paper. You've prohibited technology and then listed four technologies. "Technology" needs a more concrete definition. Calculators? Computers? TVs? Overhead projectors? Musical instruments?

They appear to be equating technology with products that did not exist when they were in elementary school.

That would be correct! And all the technology added since has resulted in no discernible improvement in educational results.

In college, the classes were a lecture with a professor, 9 blackboards and colored chalk. Not even handouts (well, there was one on time dilation).

Calculators utterly wiped out slide rules when I was in college, though nobody learned any math from a calculator. Calculators just made for quicker work to more significant figures.

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#403

Post by CraigRood »

doctorpangloss wrote: post #354
NDlurker wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand what the controversy is in the US about banning phones in schools. I graduated highschool in the mid 2000s and cell phones were just starting to gain adoption in my town in the last couple years I was in school. I don't recall anyone using a phone in class, but Game Boys were definitely not allowed. I was surprised when I found out that kids were regularly on their phones in class. Why was that eve…

a large florida school district banned cell phones in schools, and after two years, the total benefit that was measured to be likely caused by this was +0.9 percentiles on their standardized achievement test. in comparison, if you study ONE HOUR for the SAT, you gain approximately 0.9 percentiles on the test. how do dozens if not low hundreds of hours of time you are not spending on your phone at school translate to…

Schooling is more than just exams, I'm sorry. There is no need for a cell phone in a classroom.

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#404

Post by breppp »

simonw wrote: post #56

> Pupils from first through seventh grade, aged 6 to 13, should as a general rule not be using AI, while those in lower secondary school, aged 14 to 16, can cautiously adopt tools under teachers' supervision, the government said. Sounds right to me. Kids under 13 need to learn to read, write and comprehend text. Generative AI is not going to help them with those skills. They can play with AI at home, and after 13 the…

> Facing a broad decline in education test scores, the government in 2024 banned smartphones from schools and has given teachers back more powers to enforce discipline in the classroom.

Isn't that expected in most countries in Europe? There's an aging overall population that is shrinking and immigration is rising. So you get a progressively rising percentage of immigrants among school students, many of those coming from 3rd world countries with non-functioning education systems.

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#405

Post by padolsey »

WalterBright wrote: post #324

I'd ban all technology in the classroom. What works is chalkboard and chalk, pencil and paper. You'll never get strong by watching a video of people lifting weights. Similarly, you'll never understand math by watching a video or having an AI do the work for you. And, somehow, writing out the words and equations by hand is very effective for learning. https://www.holdenluntz.com/artists/keystone-press-agency/al...

Chalkboard, pencil and paper are also technology. Ban them. Instead rely purely on the vocal chords to tell stories of old.

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#406

Post by em500 »

alchemism wrote: post #370
Nux wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Return to pen and paper, particularly for testing. Extend school time for doing supervised "homework" that doesn't involve the Internet. Like that?

Yes, make the teachers on $25-35K annual salaries do /more/ work for no extra money. I'm sure that will fix education.

Just to be accurate, median annual salary is over $62k accross the US for kindergarten and elementary school teachers, with California nearing 100k.

[1] https://www.onetonline.org/link/localwages/25-2021.00?st=CA

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#407

Post by himata4113 »

The fundemental problem is motivation not AI and this is simply the result of a larger societal shift that happened to correlate with the advent of AI.

Personally I've never done any homework or assignments, when I was outside school it was over. However, this motivated me to do really well in tests which in-turn made me extremely active during the limited time I had in school and I became pretty damn efficient at absorbing information and picking things up. So on the surface at minimum it appears that we should stop grading on activities outside school.

To be honest, what worked the best for me was what my history teacher did, 5 minute tests at the start of the lesson, then 10-20 minutes of teaching + self study assignments, remaining time is grading + answering any questions and if grading goes fast they usually had time to continue teaching for a few more minutes before the lesson ended. Group study was also heavily utilized as a form to take the load off themselves when they were overwhelmed from work due to 12th grade students especially right before exams, most of our classes became group study. All the students from their class always performed exceptionally well in nationals even though it was a mid tier public school. I will recognize that I am a bit special and that students are extremely varied I picked up on this when I discovered that someone in 11th grade still couldn't grasp the pythagorean theorem.

I don't really have a solution to the motivation problem when phones are just so addicting and have an atmosphere of their own, the best way I can put it is that your child becomes an outcast if they can't play roblox because everyone in their school does which is a very real thing my friend experienced with their kids.

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#408

Post by kelseyfrog »

tacomagick wrote: post #295
testfrequency wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone says this..it’s not working! The more kids are online, the less traditional parenting is working. It worked when I was younger, I didn’t know any better. Nowadays, a kid can go on Reddit or Roblox and be told otherwise. We had Wikipedia and Encyclopaedia Britannica.. ..now kids have /r/ihatemyfamily or #fuckeverything

So your solution is to deanonymize the whole internet? Also can't teenagers ever vent? I would much rather them use websites such as Reddit or Facebook to socialize instead of Instagram or Tiktok to just scroll endlessly. We should target the social media apps for their predatory algorithms I believe.

Come up with a solution that works instead of a slogan.

The last person who divulged any details about what he meant when he said 'parents should parent' went on to reveal that parents should learn to manually configure home routers, a solution that is technologically unattainable for most parents. Again I ask, do you have a solution or a slogan?

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#409

Post by [deleted] »

bborud wrote: post #206
throw93934i wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> all Norwegians learn at least But this is not about Norwegian kids. And many imigrants have no use for Norwegian (obscure) language. I have polish and ukrainian friends in Norway.

So now you are arguing what? That the AI tools, that so thoroughly failed to educate you on education, should be used to teach immigrants in their mother tongue? And keep in mind, if you move to a country you kind of have to accept that they won’t be able to offer you education in every possible language. In fact, learning the language is often a prerequisite for permanent residency. I am not going to ask you how you…

[deleted]

Re: Norway imposes near ban on AI in elementary school

#410

Post by throwaway202528 »

bobro wrote: post #355
ransom1538 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Teacher uses AI, creates lesson plan -> AI creates assignments -> Teacher gives assignments to students -> Students use AI to do assignment -> Teacher grades with AI -> Principal uses AI to monitor teachers progress. This is happening at schools nationwide. It is unstoppable at this point. It's a bizarre charade.

> eacher uses AI, creates lesson plan -> AI creates assignments -> Teacher gives assignments to students | Up to this point, it's actually completely fine. LLMs do an excellent job up to here. > | Teacher grades with AI -> Principal uses AI to monitor teachers progress. Again, this is probably mostly fine. Assuming they are taking it seriously, this is also fine. > Students use AI to do assignment This is singularly…

AI shouldn't really be needed for every lesson plan as:

* Lessons can have a generic core to base off, like learning objectives, content, methods, vocab, tools, experiments, etc.

* Routines are important for kids, so the same set of learning methods, activities are familiar and don't need to be taught themselves - there is no need (indeed it is detrimental) to have new activities each class.

* The teacher should know their class better than AI for customisation (for now, until every student gets monitored for everything); a lot of customisation from systematic marking, etc, can exist without AI and simply by being planned and using deterministic tools.

AI can spice things up, for sure. But using AI systematically for lesson planning suggests -

A. The teacher doesn't have access to what should be a solved problem: tens of thousands of teachers repeating the same lesson plan from scratch - even with AI - across the country is not efficient.

B. The teacher doens't have planning time or skills in order to implement a systematic course plan, formative assessment and on-going improvement system.

Using AI to rush or bootstrap A or B suggests their problem is systematic and that AI will not solve this. In programming lingo, AI use hides further accumulation of technical debt.

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