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'Beware Silicon Valley's Gifts To Our Schools' (nationalreview.com)
schwit1 shares a National Review report: After three years, there is no proof that Apple's, Google's, and Microsoft's infiltration of the classroom is producing actual academic improvement and results. Take Facebook's efforts for an example. The company -- under fire for privacy breaches worldwide -- is peddling something called "Summit Learning," a web-based curriculum bankrolled by CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan. Last month, students in New York City schools walked out in protest of the program. "It's annoying to just sit there staring at one screen for so long," freshman Mitchel Storman, 14, told the New York Post. He spends close to five hours a day on Summit classes in algebra, biology, English, world history, and physics. Teacher interaction is minimal. "You have to teach yourself," Storman rightly complained. No outside research supports any claim that Summit Learning actually enhances, um, learning. What more studies are showing, however, is that endless hours of screen time are turning kids into zombies who are more easily distracted, less happy, less socially adept, and less physically fit. Standing up to the Silicon Valley Santas and asserting your family's "right to no" may well be the best long-term gift you can give your school-age children.
Judging from the criticisms, Summit Learning sounds far better than regular education.
"You have to teach yourself," Storman rightly complained
Being able to learn yourself is the most important skill you can have. Unfortunately, many people never acquire that skill so have to be constantly spoon fed information, are left unable to do anything if it's not explained to them, and can't work through problems themselves. If children become more capable of learning on their own, it will greatly empower them and give them far more opportunities in the future. Teaching them that they don't need a teacher to learn, and can learn on their own initiative, is a very good start.
"It's annoying to just sit there staring at one screen for so long," freshman Mitchel Storman
There's a serious problem with this instant gratification generation. You can't expect everything in life to be a computer game with flashing lights to entertain you, and where you constantly level up, even if you're bad at the game. Learning is rarely fun, but you learn in order to acquire skills that can help you in the future. If he can't sit in front of a monitor for five hours per day, then he's going to have real problems in the workplace where he'll be putting in double that time.
students in New York City schools walked out in protest
Once again, we see the problem isn't the course, but the students. We've seen the issues with millennials in the workplace, with them constantly whining, protesting, being offended and then quitting because they're bored. What seems to have been lacking in the last few decades is discipline. In the past nobody would walk out of a lesson in protest, and if they did they'd receive a damn good caning. Now, this sort of behaviour is tolerated, and even encouraged. Lunatics in government tell us we need to listen to the views of 'young people' and so policy ends up being set based on the views of 14-year-olds who lack the experience to know what's best for them. These students are being presented with a great opportunity to learn, and yet all they're doing is walking out in protest becuase they think they're above all of this learning nonsense. They need to be told to sit down, shut up, and start working.