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Microsoft To Teachers: Using Pens and Paper Not Fair To Students
Freshly Exhumed writes: Pens and paper have no place in the modern classroom, according to Lia De Cicco Remu, director of Partners in Learning at Microsoft Canada. "When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself?" De Cicco Remu, a former teacher, asked the Georgia Straight by phone from Toronto. "Kids don't express themselves with chalk or in cursive. Kids text." Given the Microsoft Study Finds Technology Hurting Attention Spans story posted to Slashdot in the last few days it would seem that Redmond's Marketing and R&D people are at cross-purposes.
I've never considered the sales and marketing people to be the smartest part of any organisation. They have a limited scope of action and limited deliverables. Calling this out is right. I wonder if they also think children should stop learning maths as we all have calculators - or more likely that we all have calc.exe.
I never get used to these constant resurrections
I used chalk to write this post, you insensitive clod.
No point in learning anything... you get *better* answers for most of your school problems from google, and this trend will only continue---so no point in learning anything, since you'll never actually need it in life anyway.
chalkboards and whiteboards are entirely reasonable in lectures and are still used in modern settings in business all the time.
Go into a lot of meeting rooms and you're gong to find a whiteboard which is basically the same thing as a chalkboard.
This notion that you have to use technology for everything is goofy.. and frankly I suspect they might be trying to sell us something rather than giving good advice.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Hammer salesman: See that problem? That's a nail. Over there? Another nail. Got a question? Nail.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
Thus in the future noone will know how to do basic math, since eveyone wil rely on a calculator.
I write on paper all the time. I'm a sysadmin. When a Windows machine goes belly up, writing a note and tagging the front of the machine is safer than hoping the other sysadmins will search the ticket system for the computer before using it elsewhere. Writing improves manual dexterity in young children and has been shown to improve memory. And no, "let Bing be your memory" is not a valid response.
My kids don't text, because my kids don't have phones, and they are not going to until they are 16, when they will be allowed to use their own money that they have worked for and earned at a job to pay for their own individual cell phones, if that's how they choose to spend it.
I'm teaching my kids to value things like reading books, interacting face-to-face with other human beings, outdoor activities, and other things that people apparently used to do before they became slaves to their smartphones.
Now, get off my lawn.
Indeed it is not fair to deny children the virtues of Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel and Microsoft PowerPoint. Every kid should have the right to express their ideas through these masterpieces of technology while communicating with others through Microsoft OneDrive, Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft Skype on their Microsoft Surface.
Think of the children! What will happen to them when we are constantly punishing them by moving a pen on a paper? Maybe they will start taking notes on real paper instead of Microsoft OneNote, the horror. Think of what will happen when they are forced to work with those life-threatening paper books! They could consume information without the safety of Microsoft Windows!
Please safe our future generation and give out children Microsoft Everything!
At least the lumber, plastic and ink industry don't collude with each other and the state or have a capitalist billionaire visionary with a crypto-communist penchant. As far as I know anyway.
It has been well established for many years now that both learning and using "cursive" writing (I know it as "joined" writing) is important for the development of young brains.
For example: http://davidsortino.blogs.pres...
This is irresponsible marketing, and with continuing cuts in education, stands a very good chance of not being challenged by educators before politicians base policy on it.
What a complete crock of excrement. I am amazed at the stupidity of these people. I wonder if they have ever used a whiteboard or had to take impromptu notes in a meeting. We as a society are dumbing down the curriculum to such a point that many kids today are no longer required to be able to do basic arithmetic with the excuse of "They will have access to a calculator, so it's not important." Spelling requirements are just as bad with multiple choice spelling tests along with the excuse of "They will have spell checkers available so they only need to recognize the proper word from a list." Current educational "standards" along with the recent trend of large corporations trying to indoctrinate new customers are brainwashing society's children. This blatant push by the Microsoft sales and marketing team is just one more example.
Can we have these people rounded up and executed before they do too much harm?
And no, I'm not some luddite who hates texting. I don't think there's any reason to force kids to become experts in cursive because no one writes stuff out in long hand now. My school attempted to get me to write legibly and while they improved matters a little, my handwriting still sucked.
Text is fine for, you, know, texty things. Kid's aren't morons. And they don't use things where text doesn't work. They're perfectly capable of using audio and pictures and even video where appropriate.
But I look forward to see Microsoft (R) (tm) trying to sell a "solution" to goverments for a Very Large Fee (R) (tm) so "eliminate" pens only to find that oddly enough no one wants to draw a picture using texts.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
I saw the post about the attention span study, but, you know....
We still use a lot of whiteboards at work to collaborate on ideas. It's not chalk on a blackboard, but still serves the same purpose of displaying a drawing or diagram for multiple people to view and make comments.
dicks and tits in tinder, kik and snapchat I guess.
To be even handed, Apple takes exactly the same position. To view a real clusterf--k, check out the FBI criminal investigation into iPad purchasing at the LA Unified School District.
Why is Snark Required?
This is really anti-education. While handwriting isn't something as important as it was in the past, it is very important. While you can write on a tablet, I have yet to find one that is as decent as writing on paper. It's bad enough we let students graduate who can't read, but are we going to start letting students graduate without knowing how to write either?
Be seeing you...
If I'm communicating in a way that requires an official verifiable multi-person "paper-trail" I use email.
If I'm writing an academic publication (conference paper, journal article etc) I'll use a computer (LaTeX).
If I'm working out some theory quickly, I'll use paper.
If I'm making some quick notes, I'll use paper.
If I'm trying to express an idea to a colleague (or they to me), we'll use paper.
In the vast majority of the lectures I received, it was a whiteboard and whiteboard markers.
In only a couple of units were slideshows used, but that's because it was much simpler to show examples of bode plots etc without having to re-draw them every time, or show photos/movies of engineering machinery for example.
In high school, tablets didn't exist, the internet did, but almost none of the electronic resources I use today did.
We survived. We graduated. Many of us have done or are now doing doctorates.
In primary school computer usage was almost nil. If we wanted information, we went to the school library and used the dewey decimal system.
Parents need to stop using technology to babysit their kids and actually take an active role in their education and life from an early age.
Serious thing are ALWAYS done on a paper sheet by a pencil.
I've never considered the sales and marketing people to be the smartest part of any organisation.
Then you haven't actually tried to do what they do and certainly don't understand it. My guess is that you'd fail rather badly if you tried. Companies like Coca-Cola, Johnson & Johnson, Proctor & Gamble and the like didn't get to the size they are because they had idiots in the sales and marketing departments. I've worked directly with some of the marketing folks at Proctor and Gamble and they are exceptionally bright and very good at their job. Sure there are plenty of idiots out there too but saying all sales and marketing people are dumb is just as idiotic as saying all engineers are brilliant. Both statements are demonstrably false.
Well, not technically, but I'm a software developer and I use a whiteboard almost every day. I suppose the real problem is that when I want a digital artifact, I use my non-Microsoft phone to take a picture of it. Maybe all they need to do is develop a set of markers whose ink is only visible to their own cameras.
everyday my kids use pen, paper, crayons and other things to express themselves.
Well, now I know which company I'm not going to touch with a ten foot pole when it comes to primary education....
it's about learning
I'm a millennial. Many of my generation express themselves with less eloquence on social media than you'd find among third world students where English is a third language. What they need is someone to tell them that they don't give a fried-in-the-sun rat shit how they express themselves-that if they want to be treated like they have an opinion more valuable than that of a coked out hamster-they'd better shape up.
Or the terrorists win! Think of the children...
I think the Georgia Straight got a sales call confused with news. As handy as computers are a pen and paper works much better very often. Android, Surface and iPad just don't really work that well to replace a pencil and paper. Until there is a commercially viable 40"x60" Surface with proper drafting table UI we will still be using paper for a long time.
It all starts at 0
In the real world, I use whiteboards and make handwritten notes every day. It's about convenience and flexability.
I like MS OneNote and use it to keep projected organized.. often they start with a whiteboard scan that I paste into my opening page.
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."
I am a teacher that has been highly into technology as a hobby from growing up with computers around me. I consider myself to be very literate in technology - much more so than my fellow teachers most of the time. I've watched districts roll out technology as the savior of classrooms multiple times, and have shaken my head as the technology has failed due to poor understanding of the infrastructure needed to pull off the new 'greatest thing ever!' The fallacy here is related to the other article referenced, kids attention spans are shrinking. So are adults! Technology has some wonderful uses, but at times it's getting shoved into the classroom as the savior of education - when it's not necessarily.
Add to that what happens in the real world and you lose power from a major storm like we did Friday. Our IT department must not have everything properly isolated on UPS supplies or something, because it took all weekend and until late yesterday afternoon before they got our phone and internet system back up. Last I checked our Microsoft Exchange server is still down. If we depend totally on technology in situations like that we'll be even more out of luck. Our attendance systems were fun yesterday...
I think kids go to school to learn new things, like expressing themselves with chalk and writing in cursive. Why would you teach things they already know? Kids learn wonderful things like art and music in school. If Microsoft has its way, they would only learn Powerpoint.
I've been a mathematics teacher for nine years. And with the utmost sincerity, let me say this: Shut the fuck up.
Take your baseless opinions regarding educational matters and keep them to yourself. Microsoft has had as much success running schools as they had selling MP3 players. Note taking has been proven time-and-time again to be a very effective and powerful mnemonic device for learning. Studies have also shown that note taking with a pen/pencil and paper is more effective than note taking with a laptop. Furthermore, I can ask my students to have a notebook and pencil the first day of class, and for those who forgot or cannot afford it, I have plenty of spares to give them. I cannot expect the same out of a laptop or other digital device. Until you have research clearly demonstrating that any digital device is superior for learning development and comprehension, stay out of my classroom.
As a person with poor handwriting but above average intelligence, I struggled intensely with cursive and pen/paper based school work. The ideas were on the paper, but my handwriting was a major cause of poor grades. My parents even sent me to physical therapy because of it and ultimately the studies done on my handwriting boiled down to "you have bad handwriting". Obviously I can communicate just fine, but if you ask me to write you a letter or to physically write a document for work, I'll disappoint you with my handwriting. I can create amazingly concise and visually appealing documentation, I write tech specs all day long some weeks/months, but I still can't put pen to paper and come out with anything people enjoy looking at. My daughter is going through school and having some of the same problems I did. It's tough to go through it again with teachers asking if she's just too dumb to write like a "normal person" and calling us in for conferences to "stage an intervention" on how bad her handwriting is. Yet when she's allowed to type her work, she's all A's. She's in the 98 percentile nationwide in math, spacial, language arts. She reads at a college level at 9 years old, and yet when people like us recommend "maybe we shouldn't spend so much time focusing on what our hands can produce as we do what our brains can produce" people freak out. Just look at the comments here: "What a complete crock of excrement. I am amazed at the stupidity of these people." or "Might as well cut out arts and humanities..." If you've never experienced what it's like to have truly poor handwriting in spite of all attempts to correct it while growing up in the American school system, then you don't really understand the point. I actively avoid expressing myself in handwritten mediums. I can write music, I can write software, I can create art. But I express my thoughts digitally every single time I can because it more faithfully communicates them to you. My daughter does not express herself in written word, she uses a keyboard. I don't feel like that makes her less intelligent.
Well I guess I don't need to potty train my kid either because he already shits in a diaper.
Given the Microsoft Study Finds Technology Hurting Attention Spans story posted to Slashdot in the last few days it would seem that Redmond's Marketing and R&D people are at cross-purposes.
You assume Microsoft thinks short attention span is a bad.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
Lia lia pants on fia.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Kids don't express themselves in chalk?
She doesn't have children. I have chalk pictures all over my driveway.
Vermifax
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No conflict of interest here. Nope, no sireeee.
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If we want kids to learn computer technology, rather than be slaves to it, give them Linux laptops. Bill wants them to be addicted to his crapware. Stop listening to people that have their, not your, interests at heart. Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer are better Democrats than Barry O; they all want the downtrodden to remain that way and be beholden to them. Great. Paragons of virtue.
"When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself?"
Yesterday afternoon, out on the sidewalk.
Meh, Microsoft.
"You should never doubt what nobody is sure about." -- Willy Wonka
After having seen what Microsoft did to operating systems it seems like a *very bad idea* to let them even come near education.
With all the faults the current system may have, they could only make it much worse.
We can't make money off of them if they use pen and paper.
Out of curiosity, Microsoft, the schools where the elite 1% send their kids, do they still teach them to write with pen and paper? It's a rhetorical question, because the answer is "Yes." So, if the rich and famous are taught to write with pen and paper, why shouldn't the common person?
Man, those are some brass ones, even for a company flack. "Think of the children!" has hit a new level of self-serving.
Luke, help me take this mask off
Wat? R u 4 reel?!!!
Pen & paper is a fundamental technology. And hallmarks of the KISS principle.
We still use em for transportation, transport (shopping carts!), etc.
They're both simple, cheap, and unencumbered by defects or patents.
Writing is not just about expression - it teaches fine motor control, attention, patience. To say it's obsolete would be laughable, if it wasn't such an utterly sinister proposition.
We already forgot how to hunt with our hands, make fire,clothing for ourselves and farm (for the majority of people) now we should unlearn writing?
WTF........the day the end of the worl comes,,,,,north america and all the rest of the supposedly modern world will simply be just a bunch of idiots eating themselves out.
I can see it now.....
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
I am sick and tired of this despicable company and its attempts to influence the education of our children.
When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself
When was the last time this guy saw a piece of chalk in a classroom... or saw a classroom, for that matter?
Kids text.
Know what else kids do? Hang around in shopping malls looking miserable. Many will also drink alcohol if they can get hold of it, or jiggle around in darkened rooms to music that consists of some guy making misogynistic comments over a drum machine.
So perhaps we should turn all the schools into shopping malls with rave venues, and serve lots of alcopops? Kids would be much happier. Whether they'd actually learn anything is questionable, but at least they'd stay in school. Except: they wouldn't because any cool thing to do becomes uncool as soon as an educational institution tries to do it.
Seriously - school curricula do need to make better use of technology, but that entails a major shift in the curriculum and assessment, to stop training kids to do things that technology can do better, and start teaching them to use technology properly. You don't do that by throwing a lot of tablets at schools and using them to deliver powerpoint-ized versions of the old curriculum. Shading bubbles on screen is no better than filling bubbles on paper. Nor do you learn how to interact constructively with people or construct and defend an argument by "liking" a picture of someone in Japan lighting a fart (...you didn't actually like it but all your mates 'liked' it so you went along in case anybody unfriended you).
Or, for any under-20s reading:
TLDNR: OP == TW@! TXT SUX! P3N+PPR FTW! KGOML!
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
I'm tired of the pro-tech (sales monkeys) people acting as though a kids development will be hampered by them being exposed to fundamental tools like chalk, paper, pencils, etc. On one hand they boast about how simple to use tech is these days that even a 3 year old can use it. Then they try to ram tech down your throats at the first opportunity.
Why the fuck are iPad's being used as part of a gym class now in my kids school? To justify the expense of the new shiny tech that everyone is using for fear of the boogeyman jumping out and teaching kids how to do stuff without the school sponsored electronic crack dispensers!
She highlighted Office 365 and OneNote as Microsoft products well-suited for the classroom.
Shove it up your cunt, dumb bitch.
What's that? a misogynistic goldfish...
To kick Microsoft out of schools and scorn everything they say...
Kids also pee their pants and pick their nose....so your point would be.....
In all fairness, the sales and marketing folks just have to be smarter than the general public/potential customers (typically a low bar), and aren't always entirely honest.
So you are saying they have to be smarter than average by definition. Curious argument you have there.
More importantly, their domain of expertise is not in how things actually work, but in how to sell something to someone, so paying them heed in regards to public policy is probably not wise.
I work with sales people on a daily basis. They know quite well how things actually work and more than a few of them are engineers by training. The sales reps for my company all have engineering degrees and are probably more competent with CAD and product design than 99% of the people reading this. The sales reps that sell equipment to my company know in exquisite detail how their products work and are quite capable of repairing it when the need arises. If you want to be good at selling something you have to understand what it is you are selling and how it will matter to the person you are selling it to. There certainly are sales people who aren't very bright but they tend not to do very well.
> "When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself?" De Cicco Remu, a former teacher, asked
It was quite a long time ago, but I still remember it. I expressed myself by throwing the chalk at the teacher.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
In other words, this marketing nimrod wants students to be using "pen and paper" that she can sell.
"When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself?"
Last week. Whiteboard marker, to be precise, but if we had a blackboard in the meeting room, it would have been a piece of chalk.
Everyone who knows something about presentations also understands that Powerpoint is a horrible abuse and failure in at least as many situations as those where it is a useful tool. There are things that you can best show in animated slides, others are best described with prosa text, yet others with short and memorable phrases. In addition, everyone learns slightly differently. Some people can't remember anything in a lecture unless they take notes while for others watching all the slides or the scribbles on the blackboard is the most important and for yet others hearing the professor / teacher / workshop-giver is the main part.
The so typical and almost always wrong our-one-size-fits-all Microsoft approach will not solve any problems, it'll make it worse.
If kids these days don't know how to express themselves with pen & paper, then maybe that is something you should teach them? It's a useful skill, and even though I've been a computer guy since the C64 was state-of-the-art, for some tasks I still prefer a notebook over any iPad app, and the reasons are purely practical.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Try to do calculus problems without pen and paper. Would Microsoft suggest using MS Word Equation Editor?! Just give me a minute while I swallow my vomit. Ok, I'm fine now.
I'm a LaTeX aficionado. I do quite a reasonable amount of math type-setting. I use LaTeX because the output looks amazing, and because I can use my keyboard alone, instead of having to click on menus and buttons. However, it is still an order of magnitude slower than good old fashioned hand-written problem solving.
This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when first he appears as a protector - Plato (423 to 327 BC)
Actually, ironically, one of the best reasons to use pen and paper is for maths. It's rather hard to express matrices, vectors, integrals etc. in a text message. You need LaTeX and a graphical display and its a lot slower than pen and paper. An equation editor is even slower.
They draw dinosaurs, flowers, spiderman, farm animals, hopscotch, race tracks, cities. The driveway and sidewalk are fully engulfed my mid-spring and only 'reset's when it rains. Kids at play. With chalk. MSFT sales people are free to come by and observe.
My wife is a teacher and every couple of years some numbskulled administrator comes up with another brainstorm that boils down to thinking that throwing some more computers into the mix will fix everything. Of course computers are going to be part of these kids' world, so they need to learn about them, but figuring that kids learn better just because a computer is in front of them is a wrong-headed notion that's not borne out by the research.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
My networking prof wrote with chalk the entire semester this past winter. My wife plans to teach our daughter calligraphy (as she learns it... but don't worry, she's quite good with a pen and seems a perfect expansion of her skills... she does detailed pen drawings of animals all the time). At my last job we had a whiteboard. Often, the board was covered with drawings.
Personally, almost every time I start to write a program for myself, my classes or a job, I start with pencil and paper. If I need to draw a picture or a diagram, I can. There's something infinitely more creative to writing on paper than there is writing in notepad++. I do that too, but usually after I've written it out on paper.
I agree with everyone else who says M$ is just after more money.
Ever wonder where all that fund raising and grant money is going. Ever wonder why we seem to keep spending more and more in the schools with no results. My wife took up the PTA treasure position last year and the cost of technology is astronomical compared to other expenses. Sure, technology has its place and we need some of it but most of it seems useless. Why do teachers need a supper advanced projector or a smart board? Why do the kids need an iPad? Do those things really help teach the subject matter better? Many people learned math with a pencil and paper and trust me pencil and paper cost way less than an iPad. Plus, I suspect the paper is better because its not distracting kids with animations and digital rewards for every small accomplishment.
I just glad I got the in-school Brawndo concession signed before they took away all the pens.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Me sitting in front of HR person
HR person: "We're pretty concerned about this particular essay you wrote in third grade......."
Your "permanent record" can now contain every spelling mistake you ever made.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
While using "technology" ( streaming video ) to deliver training for the certifications I'm pursuing, I have found that taking notes via pen and paper is what helps me to retain it. I have tried using a laptop and the info just doesn't stick.
ONLY by writing it down manually do I remember it.
No matter how I try to emulate it with tech like a pen / tablet combo, it just isn't the same.
One of my professors once said this, "I've never had a piece of paper fail to boot."
An IT professor, granted a security guy, and they all tend to have a luddite streak in them
I'm working on an MS degree in Computer/Electrical Engineering. I find that I write a lot faster than I could type, particularly the large amounts of crazy math in several classes I've taken, such as refreshers on advanced math, circuit analysis, analog electronics, Fourier transforms, etc. The equations, symbols, and complex diagrams would be very hard for me with my laptop.
One might argue that writing is OK to do if it's on a tablet. Well, I find myself very frequently flipping back and forth amongst several pages, which may or may not be in linear order. Some may be from a few weeks ago. My several fingers allow me to quickly hold a page and flip to it. I would not want to be doing tremendous amounts of spastic swiping to go back and forth like Johnny 5 could flip paper pages.
My stack of tree slices isn't as compact as a tablet, but it doesn't lose power or require charging or a power cord to use it. It's not as hard to see in sunlight or other glare situations. I need a stylus in either case (pen/pencil being the paper-compatible stylus types) My observation has been that pen or pencil on paper give me a higher-resolution writing experience, the wider lines from a tablet stylus make my writing/printing less readable unless I exaggerate and write very large to space things out more. Paper is more apocalypse-resistant, in that, should I survive, I'll still be able to read my notes and textbooks a few days (and more) after doomsday, while tablets will quickly become useless.
Yea, I otherwise went through school before tablets (Well, I guess there were Newtons), and a few years before PDAs or laptops that would survive a couple classes without being plugged in. I grew up with paper. But so far I really have found it more practical to use for writing and taking class notes than a tablet.
This is always a conundrum to me. If you spend no money at all on marketing, you get no customers and your business grinds to a halt. Yet, for every dollar you spend on marketing, the return is only pennies on the dollar.
That's not even remotely true. While it's certainly possible to squander marketing dollars doing something dumb, properly done marketing has a substantial ROI. Let me give you an example which is close to a lot of the people here. Take any software company. Microsoft, Oracle, etc, it doesn't matter which one. Look on their income statements. You'll see that engineering accounts for about 10%-20% of their total costs. The majority of the rest of the cost of these very profitable enterprises is sales, marketing and administration. Their net profit margins will be somewhere between 15%-30%. How is this possible if they were taking a loss on marketing and sales which accounts for close to half of all their expenses? This business model would make no sense at all if the return on marketing and sales was pennies on the dollar. In actual fact it is about a 2X or 3X multiple return on money invested in marketing. Sometimes more.
Companies don't dump lots of money into marketing because they are stupid. They do it because it brings a substantial return on the money invested in it. If it didn't work then there would be no reason to ever market anything.
https://yourlogicalfallacyis.c...
Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree. -Martin Luther
This seems shortsighted at best.
At worst it is arrogant, uncaring marketing to sell more S/W to the detriment of the student.
First, reading, writing and arithmetic and useful, fundamental skills.
Writing is both about coming up with the words and presenting them.
A student without handwriting ability, in front of a group of folks with a whiteboard is at a serious disadvantage.
No amount of power point expertise will help this.
Requiring the use of the computer eliminates makes it much harder to brainstorm and think in the moment.
That's why ancient chalkboards, now called whiteboards are still around.
A big whiteboard has access to many more pixels that a powerpoint slide.
It is much easier to make a sketch on the whiteboard and take a picture that use the computer.
(Of course, you pay later if you have to edit the picture after the whiteboard has been erased.)
Seems like Jeb just did a similar career limiting foot in mouth without engaging brain exercise last week?
This sounds like something Apple would say. Even the technology people send their kids to schools with more hands on and less tech. They actually understand technology can sometimes not be the best way to teach kids. My Wife is a Fourth grade teacher and her kids can use technology just fine but its the hands on science experiments and things like hatching chicks in a incubator that seems to really excite them. I know my wife always questions what is the difference between reading a chapter on a device vs in a book? The only difference is the means not the content. Pen and paper still are important and provide a means at teaching penmanship and creative writing. I just read where Los Angeles has cancelled their iPad program because of poor and expensive curriculum and because many iPads disappear. Go figure right?
I think this bias comes largely from IT workers who have to deal with rank and file marketing employees who are often clueless when it comes to a lot of technology.
And I assure you this bias works the other way around. Finance and accounting people think that IT workers are utterly clueless morons when it comes to money. Sales and marketing people thing IT people have no concept of what their customers actually care about and no idea how to talk to another human being. Everyone tends to think their job is the hardest and that no one else really gets what they do.
I'm sure I too am biased because of this, but it also seems like your low-level IT employee has more practical intelligence than a lot of low-level marketing employees who seem to trade on good looks and social skills versus any specific practical skill or insight with marketing, at least at the undergrad-only level of education.
Their error is generally that they think their abilities in IT actually mean they are smarter when in actual fact they are at best only smarter in certain ways. They also frequently mistake lack of interest with lack of aptitude. All the sales people for my company are degreed engineers and very competent ones at that. People go into sales and marketing because they find it interesting and challenging (and yes financially rewarding) and you know what? They are right. It is challenging and it can be interesting. Sales is an exceedingly hard job - much harder than most IT jobs in my opinion. I think this because at different points in my career I've done both and I'm roughly equally competent (read mediocre) at both. I'm both an engineer and an accountant by training and to be honest, the most difficult things in business are rarely the technical stuff. Not that the technical stuff is trivial - it isn't by any means. But the most difficult jobs involve managing and selling to people and those who can do those things well are hugely valuable.
.... visual expression through drawing and diagrams are the most efficient way to communicate most technical concepts. That's why every office has markers and whiteboards!!!!
Took me ten years of using a computer for work to fully realise that a pencil and paper were probably the most important tools.
A pencil and paper are invaluable for programing and generally getting things done, early stages of fleshing out ideas, brainstorming, quick checklists, instant notes, and on and on. Anything that ends up being needed for more than the current work session, or if it's truly important, gets transferred into the computer. Post-it notes are like some magical creation from another realm (and fittingly - not without danger).
Every few years I'll try the latest iteration of software attempts to solve the already solved problem, and nothing comes close.
The end game here is to phase out cursive entirely, then a couple generations down the road, nobody can read it, and thus the US Constitution (written in cursive) will be meaningless gibberish to the common man, and then "they" can tell them what it actually "says" with their own injected bias.
Next up, a cashless society...
I'm a programmer, but I still tend to do my thinking, planning, sketching ideas, note taking, etc. with paper and pencils/pens. I just find that I can think better with those tools than some program on a tablet or laptop. It's easier to draw sketches and it doesn't feel so permanent like putting it into a computer does so I'm more apt to play around with ideas and throwaway what doesn't work.
Try to design the next lambourghini model using only twitter.
What knuckledraggers do they let out of school these days,
-- Another senseless waste of fine bytes.
"When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself?"
That would be this morning. Any other questions?
“Why do you expect a kid to go to school and sit in the same seat everyday with pens and paper?”
Um, because they use pens and paper at home too. Any more?
“So classroom—what classroom? Learning is anytime, anywhere. Kids are learning everywhere. As long as they have that device and they have that connectivity to the cloud, they can do their work anywhere. So that’s why the tools become so important.”
That's funny. When "the tools" are a pen and paper, the tools aren't so important and learning can actually be any time, any where. It's when you try to artificially tie the act of thinking to having a Microsoft(tm) Device(tm) connected to the Cloud(tm) that you lose the ability to "do work anywhere".
This is my lawn. You may get off of it now. You are dismissed.
So what are the creative drawings that cover my driveway several times a week? What are the drawings and stories they are starting to write. I will acknowledge that similar to myself, my oldest does not like writing by hand (minor learning disability diagnosed in me in middle school) so he does better with a keyboard, but the others like writing and as they are getting older they are expressing themselves. My middle child will play on computers but I doubt they will be his primary outlet for energy and expression. It's just not in his personality, he gets bored staring at a screen.
Anyone who tries to push a monolithic educational style is trying to harm our educational system and our kids. There are many different learning styles, a competent teacher knows how to find and engage the learning styles of all her students, not just the ones that do well with keyboards.
Kids express themselves in many media and forms.
I'm too lazy to compose a creative sig.
I can understand the consensus here in favor of chalkboards. Yes, they're useful.
But cursive needs to DIAF. The only thing I write as an adult in cursive is my own signature. If I want to write something quickly, I'll type waaaaay faster than I could ever write longhand. If I need to leave a physical note, I'll do it in sans serif so they can actually read the damn thing. If you want to make something pretty just go all out and learn calligraphy; don't burden everyone else with your squiggles in the workplace.
kids don't talk, they text. WTF are we or anyone listening to Microsoft? Profit seeking bastards should just STFU.
We use a chalkboard all the time for sketching out open source solutions. Of course it helps that we painted a whole wall with chalkboard paint. Somehow a whiteboard is not as satisfying.
I can totally believe that Microsoft doesn't have enough creativity to make use of a chalkboard any more. It's sad if true.
- Paul
M$: Our users prefer to interact with PCs using hoofs and snouts.
> "Kids don't express themselves with chalk or in cursive. Kids text."
Kids also scribble and carve into desks and spray paint on the walls on occasion. In the past they passed notes to each other, as well. No one has suggested adopting those as main methods of performing and submitting work. Schools should be getting kids ready for college, where college should finish getting them ready for the workplace. And not many workplaces will do much of their work via texting.
Since they don't make Paper or Pens and can't charge a license fee for them. They are "unfair"
Ha HA
Hitting keys on a keyboard doesn't connect up the same synaptic paths as writing does.
A keyboard is too abstract, even if you learn to touch-type. (which is far harder than learning to write in many various styles)
Writing and sketching is more exact and easier for the brain to interpret.
Writing also creates logical connections between letters, which eventually led to the creation of cursive.
The ability to both read and write in either forms also increases general intelligence in that area. (even though a large number of peoples cursive is ATROCIOUS)
Where's the connections with keyboard buttons? Very little besides shift+key.
Each letter is a discrete entity, even if they do form words on a screen. It is interpreted very differently in the brain.
Sketching, likewise, was always a fun side thing to do when in class. Those that sketched typically had better results in all areas in my experience. (and were generally happier)
Those that focused more on the drawing, however, tended to fair less in the end. (but likely excelled at image-related classes, don't quote me though)
It is far more obtuse to sketch with a mouse, not to mention open another program usually, or click a toolbar to open a very poor vector drawing mode, great for simple drawing, awful for sketching. (and I say that even though I draw with a mouse using a hotkey to slow mouse to the slowest speed for easier controlling)
It is far easier to sketch with a pencil than it is a program. It is incredibly easier to get in to and get better overall results. Even with dedicated drawing programs.
If for some reason you're fine with moving education away from analog (e.g., pen, paper) to digital (e.g., tablets), then please ensure that it is not done half-way.
First of all, teach visual design and typesetting. Those students who do not get these concepts shall be limited to usage of Palatino and/or Helvetica with pre-determined color pallets. We have enough PowerPoint jockeys who use Comic Sans and this madness must be stopped before it consumes the globe. Also, ban PowerPoint and force kids to use something that allows for creativity.
Secondly, forbid people who do not know how to write by hand from writing ever. The cursive notes I have been receiving from the digital generation may as well be in hieroglyphics.
"When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself? Kids don't express themselves with chalk or in cursive. Kids text."
Yeah, well, kids aren't trying to teach 30 other kids long division, are they? Fucking idiot. Took me 2 whole seconds to tear down your premise.
Kids also push each other to be first in line (no matter WHAT they're lining up for, they want to be first) and call each other "poopyhead." Does that indicate radical new teaching methods? LET'S DO WHAT CHILDREN DO, HERP DERP! Fucking A.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
The issue is whether the kid should adapt or whether the school should adapt. The ability to print with a pen or pencil or even a finger in the mud can be crucial. The issue goes back at least 100 years when some people noticed that educated kids had far less memory ability than kids who did not learn to read and write. We have made certain mistakes and classes to simply increase memory as well as classes designed to require fixing on a topic with deep concentration have been severely lessened in the educational system. Even radical practices that have no place at all in modern life had some value. The great Samuel Johnson was asked about new laws (about 1630) that stopped teachers from torturing or even killing students. Dr. Johnson remarked that if one student is lost the entire school is lost. What he meant was that any student who displayed behavior problems or learning problems was like a rotten apple in a barrel of apples and would ruin the quality of the school for everyone. To that extent beatings and even killing should not be banned.
"Pens and paper have no place in the modern classroom, according to Lia De Cicco Remu,"
Poppycock. One expresses themselves differently via pen, pencil, paint brush, computer keyboard, thumb-type, mechanical typewriter, or electronic dictation... each are notably distinct. Remove any one and you limit the modes of expression available. At our collective, expressive peril.
When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself?
Just about every job interview I've ever had, including the one at Microsoft.
Computers are great. My job depends on them. But they DO make you decide to do things the way the programmer thought of doing it, and refusing to let you do it a different way. Unless you're basically running scripting programs you wrote yourself, even then you're limited in what you can get away with by what the language allows.
In the classroom, they really don't help.
Pen and paper get out of your way and let you work with them.
Computers are nagging little bastards that insist on making you notice them.
"Given the Microsoft Study Finds Technology Hurting Attention Spans story posted to Slashdot in the last few days it would seem that Redmond's Marketing and R&D people are at cross-purposes."
That doesn't surprise me one bit. Their dev tool stack is riddled with inconsistent BS.
You can totally get away without marketing. The problem is that if some competitor puts just a little more effort than "none" into it, they'll get some extra sales from people who don't give a shit whose they buy, but they remember the name. That only really matters, though, to *faceless* corporations and businesses. The ones that have national or international aims, therefore cannot have actual visibility to the user by being a company they know anyway.
Most SMEs have ZERO marketing. And they don't need it.
Indeed most businesses don't need it either. KFC, McD, Hoover, Ford, etc, all are well known enough that there's absolutely, and I really DO mean absolutely, do not need marketing.
But if there's one thing marketing can sell, it's the need for their services.
guaranteed until you hit a key.
Ahh... it all makes sense now.... Microsoft's engineers and designers don't use whiteboards or paper.
I would have liked to invite Lia De Cicco Remu to take a few high school math tests, no pen and paper allowed. The test should be answered as a Word document, using the equation editor for all math including lengthy interim calculations. I'll toss in a couple linear equation sets with three unknowns, some polynomial divisions and differentiating some reasonably complex functions, so there will be plenty of math to type in even though the problems themselves would not be too hard. The test would of course be time limited.
I have looked for all sorts of possible replacements for pen and paper for math and physics for high school students. There is no electronic tool which gives you the freedom and creative flexibility of pen and paper. I love using chalk, prefer it over whiteboards, and only rarely use powerpoints when teaching - which also helps me slow down to the same speed as the students are operating. The technologies that are supposed to be a replacement for the complete solving of a problem (not just a tiny piece such as drawing a graph or solving an equation) including any initial scribbling and eventually documenting the solution, such as tablet apps with free-hand drawing, smart boards, or software such as GeoGebra, have cumbersome interfaces that get in the way and interrupt the creative flow, or have other major limitations. With a pen and paper you have complete control.
You want students to focus on the subject matter and the stuff they are supposed to be learning, not mastery of some SW interface. The math and physics you learn will stay with you forever. The SW you use in school will not.
Yeah, and they also don't know shit. Should we just keep it that way? Maybe we keep them in diapers forever too?
X
NT
If bagged popcorn sells more than chips at the grocery store, would removing the chips make your store better than the one that had both? Would it make your popcorn sell better?
If typing is more important in business than writing, if you remove writing, will that make your school provide a better education than one that teaches both? Would it increase the quality of your technology programs?
If you only teach the most 'important' thing at school, and cut everything else, it doesn't mean that the education you'd get would be more valuable. If all we wanted to teach children was the absolute most valuable skill for becoming a member of the workforce in America, simply having them attend school M-F during working hours would suffice. No books/e-books or lectures would be necessary either, because no one in the American workforce reads books and listens to lectures all day either.
You could also just get rid of the teacher entirely; there's no teacher in the "real world" so listening to one all day isn't a valuable skill either.
The big fallacy here is that the act of reading a book is not meant to teach "book read'n skills". It's meant to teach the topic the book was on. The act of writing is not meant to teach "write'n ability", writing is a tool that's used to learn other things. It's also not obsolete.
"When was the last time you used a piece of chalk to express yourself?"
During a job interview for a STEM job.
ProTip: you can't just spellcheck and Bing your way though those. You'll need to be comfortable on a chalk/whiteboard.
This is NOT a drill!
if you can't write joined up and without the aid of a phablet, then I have NO INTEREST in employing you. Fuck off, out of my office.
Political debates have me rolling my eyes so much I think I got optical whiplash. I should sue. - Foamy The Squirrel
Microsoft says pen and paper isn't fair for students, and at the same time they're trying to push electronic devices that have pen input. So instead of actually innovating and creating a better solution, they've made the paper run on batteries. Problem solved?
More to the point, it's unfair to Microsoft's sales
... and so isn't tying your shoelaces and wiping your butt - surface pro will do it for you; you may end up with brown shoelaces if you change the order...
Imitate, assimilate, innovate - Clark Terry
Those who do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing - Salvador Dali
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
Microsoft people that made it a successful company were raised with pens, paper and chalk.
That set of tools is old fashioned but we know it works.
This notion comes up every now and then. Every couple of years either Microsoft, Apple, Dell, or whomever comes up with the "great new idea" to scam school administrators into giving notebooks or tablets to students. So far every scheme has failed. Most school districts try to lock down the system in order to keep kids off of Facebook and Youtube that either its so intrusive that no one will use them, or it's so laughable that even the sports jocks can get around the blocks. Then there is embezzlement of funds in California, illegally spying on students in Pennsylvania, and everything in between.
Learn from the past people. Most students are not professional touch typists and can take notes MUCH faster with paper and pencil.
You can get a notepad and a box of pencils any dollar store.
Let me know when they start selling computers.
The other day I was keeping an eye on my kids playing in the yard while also pondering some of NASA's current engineering design challenges when I had one of those "Ah Ha!" visions so I grabbed a piece of chalk and sketched out the concept right there on the concrete driveway while it was still clear in my mind's eye. Later that evening when the kids were asleep and I had the required peace and quiet I was able to use a computer to render the idea more neatly. The lesson there? It is the ideas that count, no the recording technology. A stick and some dirt would have been just as effective as a Microsoft Surface, if not more so! Fortunately there were no Romans around at the time. http://www.hellenicaworld.com/...
I'm pretty sure kids would express themselves using mud and dirt all over anything if they wouldn't be told not to.
So if your kid isn't expressing himself using a pencil, pen, or chalk it's probably because you didn't get him one. Because why clean up after a possible Picasso when you can just buy him an iPod and call it responsible parenting right?
Screw football sand broken windows. Just get him an xbox. When he's socially retarded and "n00b" is the first thing out of his mouth you can always blame the school system and get him some therapy. Overweight while being number one at NHL 3067? No problem we'll just buy him those kinect workout games.
Welcome to the future. It's fat, socially awkward and quite rude. Well if you can actually understand the insults coming out of their mouths.
If not, would some in Human Resources please process her paperwork a little faster? Thank you from the entire civilized world.
MS is BS
But we are NOT interested;
Casteism
"Writeboard" is an interesting eggcorn. I'll have to use it in a story I'm writing where one part of the country speaks a derhotic "Elmer Fudd"-type dialect with labial /r/.
I've always hated cursive. It's always sloppy, impossible to read, and for the last 30 years has done nothing but piss me off. I'm glad to see it dead.
Unless you speak Arabic, in which case you even have to type in cursive.
Next up, comic sans.
If not Comic Sans, then which font to simulate neat manuscript writing would you recommend? Is Comic Neue fine?