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$30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

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Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#111

Post by TimorousBestie »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #27
telman17 wrote: post #11

This article tries to put the blame on laptops when the real culprit could simply be boiled down to a failure in classroom management and lack of enforcement against cell phones in class, whiny parents who rage when their children are told they can't be playing video games in class, and teachers who are using computer programs to teach the kids instead of actually teaching. Ban phones from class. For real. Lock down…

If we're spouting off unsubstantiated claims. I'll add teachers unions and the mandatory spend of tax money on their near monopolies versus a voucher system that allows parents to choose the best education the money can buy. (To be clear I do think we should fund educating our children, I disagree with forcing the purchase to go to a specific solution / system)

Teachers’ unions are pretty inconsequential in much of the United States.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/states-with...

Also, https://teacherquality.nctq.org/contract-database/collective...

Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#112

Post by bandrami »

crims0n wrote: post #82
gdelfino01 wrote: post #55

Bring back the indestructible Apple ][e and put let the kids program in logo (turtle graphics) for 1 or 2 hours per week max. The will not hurt them while society takes a few years to figure out how the introduction of technology in education went so catastrophically bad.

You joke but I think there is value in ripping all tech out except for a computer lab where kids can learn something productive like programming, graphic design, etc. Tech is ubiquitous now, there is no reason to need exposure to it in school (anymore). We should be doing what maximizes learning - which we now know is not tech.

I do miss the days before wireless and mobile when the Internet was a place in your home or school that you sat at.

Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#114

Post by thegreatpeter »

mschuster91 wrote: post #52
japhyr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the real culprit could simply be boiled down to a failure in classroom management and lack of enforcement against cell phones in class I was a middle school and high school math and science teacher from 1994 through 2019. I watched the advent of internet in schools, then desktop computers in classrooms, and finally smartphones in students' hands. I've lived a life of watching teachers and schools get blamed for not…

And on top of that, in many countries (not just the US) teachers, school and the students themselves don't have anywhere near the financial resources that they need. Schools are (literally) falling apart, here in Germany it became apparent during Covid that a ton of schools had windows that rotted so far they couldn't be opened, in the US there are states that introduced 4 day school weeks due to budget constraints […

[flagged]

Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#115

Post by xethos »

telman17 wrote: post #19
japhyr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the real culprit could simply be boiled down to a failure in classroom management and lack of enforcement against cell phones in class I was a middle school and high school math and science teacher from 1994 through 2019. I watched the advent of internet in schools, then desktop computers in classrooms, and finally smartphones in students' hands. I've lived a life of watching teachers and schools get blamed for not…

I can definitely see the push for using technology in schools - what you're saying makes sense. It's not the individual teachers I blame. I come from a family of educators and a lot of the crappy enforcement falls to the district level, who just want to make the parents happy. There is literally no reason a child needs a cell phone in class. Computers are great. Lock them down. There is nothing unreasonable about thi…

Are we sure it isn't the offensively-well-funded tech industry that's being referenced here?

Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#116

Post by yieldcrv »

bob001 wrote: post #10
yieldcrv wrote: post #6

brainrot, they know

So was writing and yet here you are doing just that.

consensus is out of touch on this topic to see why my comment was substantive, that's consistent but I always forget how old the population is on HN

Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#117

Post by somenameforme »

mschuster91 wrote: post #102
MichaelRo wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno, maybe it differs by country/location but my perception is that school was never capable to educate beyond some basic mediocrity level. Mostly it's an institution imposed by the state to process the children while parents are working. And the way to actually teach your kids something never really changed since the times of the elite few versus the mass of peasants: private tutoring. Now it's true that with ba…

> But the reality never changed and never will: the vast majority of people are not very bright Nature vs nurture, the old argument... Of course, you got what one might flippantly call "the inbreds from Alabama", or those whose parents suffered from substance abuse or other issues (obviously, for the mother the risk is much higher, but also the father's health has a notable impact on sperm quality). These kids, parti…

Places like China and Vietnam are the ones rocking the test scores. These places operate on a tiny fraction of the $ per student of most places in the world, even PPP adjusted. And I think China's increasingly absurd achievements [1] make it clear that this goes beyond the test.

I think the nurture argument can still apply there - Chinese parent is a meme all its own, and for a good reason. But this isn't something that can be achieved with money or digital tech. It's a combined mix of culture and parenting within that culture. Perhaps if the people so invested in trying to improve the education of children were, themselves, having more kids - we might not have such a problem.

[1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47067496

Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#118

Post by intended »

MichaelRo wrote: post #89
mschuster91 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And on top of that, in many countries (not just the US) teachers, school and the students themselves don't have anywhere near the financial resources that they need. Schools are (literally) falling apart, here in Germany it became apparent during Covid that a ton of schools had windows that rotted so far they couldn't be opened, in the US there are states that introduced 4 day school weeks due to budget constraints […

I dunno, maybe it differs by country/location but my perception is that school was never capable to educate beyond some basic mediocrity level. Mostly it's an institution imposed by the state to process the children while parents are working. And the way to actually teach your kids something never really changed since the times of the elite few versus the mass of peasants: private tutoring. Now it's true that with ba…

Schools can educate well beyond that level, provided they are resourced. Bloom’s 2 sigma problem comes to mind (1).

Education also ends up suffering because its seen as a support role, teachers are not valued, and “He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches".

Education is also political today. Science based education is an outright target. Increasing government spending to improve outcomes is also a contested issue, and in America this is met with arguments about bad teachers, unions, and privatization/vouchers.

There is much that can be done to improve educational outcomes, but like everything, it is contested.

(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom%27s_2_sigma_problem

Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#119

Post by BLKNSLVR »

vjvjvjvjghv wrote: post #75
bryanrasmussen wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>whiny parents who rage when their children are told they can't be playing video games in class you have stats on that? It seems like an outlier. >teachers who are using computer programs to teach the kids instead of actually teaching. before laptops there were bad teachers who used books to teach the kids instead of actually teaching - as in: "read chapter 7, there will be a test!" if after laptops there is a worse…

">whiny parents who rage when their children are told they can't be playing video games in class you have stats on that? It seems like an outlier." I know several teachers who retired because over the last decades student discipline has declined and teachers don't get support from either parents or principals. Basically teachers have no tools for discipling students while on the other hand parents demand all kinds of…

This equates to the experience of the various teachers in my social orbit.

Re: $30B for laptops yielded a generation less cognitively capable than parents

#120

Post by vineyardmike »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #27
telman17 wrote: post #11

This article tries to put the blame on laptops when the real culprit could simply be boiled down to a failure in classroom management and lack of enforcement against cell phones in class, whiny parents who rage when their children are told they can't be playing video games in class, and teachers who are using computer programs to teach the kids instead of actually teaching. Ban phones from class. For real. Lock down…

If we're spouting off unsubstantiated claims. I'll add teachers unions and the mandatory spend of tax money on their near monopolies versus a voucher system that allows parents to choose the best education the money can buy. (To be clear I do think we should fund educating our children, I disagree with forcing the purchase to go to a specific solution / system)

I'm glad you recognize that you're participating in unsubstantiated claims, because that is most of the literature in support of vouchers.

Vouchers sound good if you don't think about it with any real veracity or intellectually serious rigor, but (in America) are basically a shitty partisan scam. They're basically universally used as a method to divert tax funds to schools that would otherwise be unfundable via taxes (eg. religious or discriminatory).

Why do we think parents are actually capable of choosing the "best" option, and why wouldn't 100% of parents choose that option? Parents are famously bad at making decisions, as illustrated by home schooling, religious dogmatism in private schools, parents trying to opt-out their students from scientific and health education, and the general history of parental intervention in public schools.

Why would some schools take $X per student and generate better outcomes than others? They won't and the secret is that private schools will charge more than the voucher price to produce better outcomes, but then you've essentially drained the funding of a public good to subsidize a private school that some students won't be able to attend.

As a thought experiment, can we use a voucher system to fund alternative fire or police departments? Can I apply my voucher to an FDA with a properly credentialed head? Or are schools the only "monopoly" run by the government we should break up.

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