Students Do Better Without Computers

Gogogoch writes "The Telegraph is reporting a large study that shows that the less students use computers at school and at home, the better they do in international tests of literacy and math. The more access they had to computers at home, the lower they scored in tests, partly because they diverted attention from homework. Students tended to do worse in schools generously equipped with computers, apparently because computerised instruction replaced more effective forms of teaching. " Worth noting that it took almost 20 years for PCs in the corporate environment to actually have a positive impact on productivity; might the same be true in education?

Comments

Stoll's "High Tech Heretic"

[peter303]

Clifford Stoll's 2000 book High Tech Heretic made a similar claim about the dangers of computers in basic education.

(Stoll posts in ./ under his own name and aliases.)

Re:Stoll's "High Tech Heretic"

[FidelCatsro]

Speaking as someone who has disphraxia and dyslexia , i have used computers since a very young age to communicate in a litterary form(my handwritting is totaly illegable and my spelling is dire) also i have used it for visual learning .
The day it was discoverd when i was in primary 3( about 7 years old) I went from a D student to a straight A student, other students in my class also used computers to learn ( this is back in the mid 1980s) .Some of them tended to fool around and just did not get anything done , others like me , found it a great help .
I have used them all my life and to me they were and still are invaluable , so i imagine its best to see this as a situation where you just have to have the right tool for the job .;) tell you one thing though , i dont know a single CS student who would be better off without a computer though(except for some things)

It's also a money issue

[MC68000]

Computers cost quite a lot of money. Furthermore, in the US, the federal program that provides low income schools with computers is notoriously inefficient and corrupt. Such money can be spent on other things.

I know of an inner city high school that had a crumbling building but was equipped with an ultramodern computer lab (we all know that it takes a 3 Ghz Pentium 4 with 1024 MB ram to do high school research) and a $100,000 3D printer. It's just sad how beauracracy manages to waste our money.

Re:What Matters

[tomhudson]

Didn't read the article, did you. Their report also noted that being able to use a computer at work - one of the justifications for devoting so much teaching time to ICT (information and communications technology) - had no greater impact on employability or wage levels than being able to use a telephone or a pencil. So no, your post has been proven wrong. But thanks for playing.

Re:use them properly

[cvd6262]

Amen.

I teach in the school of ed at a university, classes meant to help future teachers understand the proper way of using tech to teach something else. Even by the end of the semester, after lectures, assignments, expert models, and micro-teaching with feedback, some of them still don't get it.

I find the ones who understand us quickly are the science teachers. The English teachers are usually second to get it, followed by history, dance, and everyone else. The interesting thing is that this trend seems to be independent of the time we spend, and the resources that are available in each field. Science does have tools like Logger Pro, but we cover video editing for the dance people, and they just don't see its usefullness.

And you just don't get any better examples ...

[khasim]

... than right here.

What Matters (Score:5, Insightful)
The guy didn't read the article, yet felt qualified to comment on it anyway. Other people who didn't read the article found his comments "insightful" despite the fact that they contradicted the findings of the article.

Re:What Matters (Score:3, Informative)
You did read the article and quoted part of it, yet your rating isn't as high as the guy's who skipped the reading.

Welcome to Real Life. It's just like this in the work force which is why the article makes so much sense.

It isn't what you know. It isn't what other people know. It's how well you can re-state their pre-existing opinions to impress them. It's all about what other people (who didn't do the reading) BELIEVE you know.

Re:Hormonal

[mrm677]

Japanese schools work better than ours because they are extremely competitive, do not refuse to provide higher level instruction to those who excel and because they innovate. The parents there also regard school very highly and go out of their way to make sure their kids are competitive.

No, the problem is that every student in the U.S. gets a secondary education (high school). On the other hand, Japan weeds out the very best at an earlier age. A kid's future is decided before he or she grows up.

Re:Hormonal

[b17bmbr]

I am a history teacher, and part fo the problem is that the educational establishment, i.e. teacher colleges, etc., stress all kinds of crap about engaging them, motivating them, etc. We have to de facto compete with the freakin computer, television, ipod, cell phone, etc., while the kids are sold a bill of goods about how learning should be "relevant" and "personal". I want to scream. Kids don't read or write anymore. I did my MA thesis on technology and writing, and guess what, writing suffers immeasurably when using a computer. Hell, I'm a geek like everyone else around /. But, the problem is education is denigrated today. It's all about whether it will earn you a dollar.