Whatever you want to call it, the computer age, the information generation, or the digital revolution, it his here and it is here to stay. We may be able to move past it but never reverse it. So it is now up to us to deal with it. One aspect of this technology era is the impact of computers and the internet on our children and their education. How will our children be able to keep up with the ever changing technologies and inventions that are saturating our society?
Many schools have answered this dilemma by applying the use of computers and the internet in classrooms across the country. Government agencies and major corporations have teamed up in order to supply the increasing demand of such tools. Now whether it is to create a smarter citizen or a hungrier consumer is beside the point. How they got there or why they got there is not as important as what to do with them. So I think that we all need to understand that using computers as a tool to help students learn is a necessary and natural evolution of the educational process.
There are those new age Luddites and some educators that say we already have the necessary tools our children need to learn. Computers are not needed to accomplish this task when they have up-to- date textbooks and educated teachers to help them develop. I could see their point since I certainly did not need a computer to help me do math growing up. Neither did my parents or grandparents. So why should my children need computers?
My grandparents learned how to do basic math by using their fingers, a pencil, a paper and a teacher. They probably only learned just enough to know how may chicken, pigs, and cows they had on the ranch. My parents, who moved to the city, learned more complex forms of math like word problems and algebra with the help of a textbook and times table. They used math to help them do their taxes, pay the bills, and for all other day to day applications. I added a calculator to the arsenal of tools and used it to help me conquer statistics and trigonometry. This will help me in the future to open up my own business.
The key word here is up-to-date. History shows us that the older generations did not need computers, for one, because they had not been invented yet. More importantly though they were already using the most advanced technologies that were available at that time such as up-to-date textbooks and in my case calculators. Just as I had incorporated the use of calculators in my studies so has the younger generation incorporated the use of computers. My nieces are using these tools and adding interactive computer software such as Disneys Math Quest with Aladdin. Where they go from here, one can only speculate. For my children it will probably be the same and for my grandchildren I can only imagine.
The point is that each generation is using the tools available at that time to help them learn. With each new generation the level and pace of education increases. My oldest niece Ashlee is now learning algebra in the sixth grade, whereas I did not learn it until the eighth grade, and my parents did not learn until perhaps high school. Now I am not saying that todays kids are smarter than yesterdays, only that they are learning to use the necessary tools they need to survive in their future and omitting those that no longer apply.
Stephen Talbott, author of The Future Does Not Compute, states, The most critical element in the classroom is the immediate presence and vision of the teacher, his ability to inspire, his devotion to truth and reverence for beauty, his moral dignity–all of which the child observes and absorbs in a way impossible through electronic correspondence.
Although his illusion of the inspiring and moral teacher is a bit unrealistic, I agree that the teacher is the most important element in the education of a child. Computers should not take the place of human interaction between a student and his peers or jeopardize the student-teacher relationship. Students need to interact with their teacher both in class and in private console. Students need some type of one-on-one interaction. They also need to interact with their peers to learn tolerance of diversity in culture. If computers are meant to replace teachers then the education system will fail.
Computers are not intended for that. They are intended to assist the teacher in the development of the child. They are to be used as a tool of instruction such as the chalkboard or the textbook. They are to be used as an amplifier of knowledge that enhances and expands the pupils range of information. They are to be used as a parameter of individual capabilities. No longer can the gifted student be held behind by the pace of the rest of the class. They are now free to enhance their growth through the use of computers while still maintaining their connection with their teacher and peers. The struggling student can also benefit by not being afraid to ask questions for fear of ridicule. The computer does not judge.
The teacher is also free to interact with each individual student while they are using the computer, enhancing a one-on-one relationship. A task not easily met with an ever increasing class size where privacy is hard to come by. Privacy can be met not only after school or outside of class but now during as well as the teacher can now be connected to each students computer and offer advice and instructions.
The teacher can also give specialized attention to those who need it and know which students need it by investigating the progress of each students interaction with the computer. Their progress can be found almost instantaneously with accurate reports being made to the teacher on a day to day basis. This completely nullifies the problem of not catching those students that slip through the cracks of the education system. Students that are out sick for long periods of time no longer need to play catch up in class when all the materials needed for their assignment can be zapped to their own home computers in a matter of seconds. Not to mention the on-line interaction they can receive with the teacher and their peers while at home and sick in bed.
They possibilities are limitless. Unfortunately some possibilities can be harmful. Take for example the issue of pornography leaking into school computers where students can download it form countless sites off the internet. This is a very real possibility as it has happened before. This is where teachers, administrators, and parents must take full responsibility by denying access of these sites with parental control features and demanding only the best software available to prevent this from happening. Constant supervision is the key.
We can not and should not assume it is the responsibility of the websites to control their content. Their interests do not lie with our childrens innocence. However they do have the right of freedom of speech. A right bestowed to all of us by our constitution and so fighting them is not the answer. A parent must know at all times who or what their children are in the presence of when they are not around. Let us not make the same mistake we did with television. We have a chance to correct this before it becomes a widespread problem, especially since this problem is more notably present in the home where a parent has full control of the situation.
Another more visible problem in schools with computers is the big corporate push to advertise in schools. You already see this with youth clothing made to boldly display its logos such as baseball like jerseys that say FUBU or t-shirts that have the Nike Swoosh symbol on them. For girls it is designer clothing like Calvin Klein or Donna Karen. On computers it is the bothersome and annoying pop-up advertisements you get while on-line. Even more interesting is the recent battle between Microsoft and Apple for supply rights to schools as noted by journalist Joe Wilcox of news.com in a story titled Apple: Microsoft Should Pay $1 BillionCash.
In this story Microsoft settles in court to over 100 consumer lawsuits where they will give $500 million in free software and $500 million to charitable foundations for these schools. Apple says that this is a ploy to gain a piece of the school market by almost forcing schools to purchase Microsoft compatible components to run their free software. So the war of advertising amongst the mega-corporations lives on only now the new battlefields are our schools.
Once again the key is constant supervision and the ability of parents to say no. They must say no to the corporate Trojan Horses and enticements of free, and no to their kids stranglehold over their pocketbooks. Most students do not have jobs. So without any income they can not afford to buy anything and are forced to go through mom and dad for finances. So why does it seem that most teenagers dress nicer than I do? Just say no does not only apply to kids. On the subject of freebees: Do you remember the math software I told you about that my nieces use? It was a freebee from school to help them learn. It was donated by the Disney Corporation and it is loaded with nothing but Disney type math games. So not only can Mickey make you laugh but he can help you count too. Parents beware and pay attention. This is why you are the parents because you make the rules.
It seems like almost every day that you hear about how the public school systems are failing and there is not enough money to support theses schools. Even private schools are starting to catch some of the heat as well. People blame the government for investing more money into national defense and crime instead of education. Well instead of blaming everything on the government, which Im not saying is not totally at fault, why not seek solutions? Lets take a step back and see where the world is heading and what type of information are children going to need to survive in it in the future.
The days of learning about woodshop, metal shop, home economics, and other similar classes are just about over. Not that they are useless. They did serve a purpose but they world is changing and those type of classes are just not needed anymore. What you need now are mandatory computer classes in all schools at differing levels of sophistication. Why? Well you have to ask yourself if a child is more likely to come across a computer on a day to day basis than he is a tack welder.
The current way of teaching is quickly becoming outdated as well. The way we and our parents learned no longer applies. Elliot Soloway an associate professor at the University of Michigan both in the School of Education and the Department of Electrical Engineering in Computer Science state, All the standards indicate that we can no longer teach kids isolated, decontextualized skills and assume theyll put them together. Thats how we learned. Now, if we want to ask kids to build models of complex stream ecosystems, for example, we have to give them a new set of tools.
There was an interesting report written by Victoria Irwin in the Christian Science Monitor titled Hop, Skipand Software?; Educators Debate Whether Computer Use for Young Students Makes Them Better Learners or Not. It stated that, In the late 1990s, the Educational Testing Service found that middle schools students with well trained teachers who used computers for simulations and applications in math classes outperformed students on standardized tests who had not used them for that purpose.
The sooner we start to realize the ease and benefits of using computers in the classroom the sooner we can become comfortable with the fact that it is a natural and necessary evolution of the educational system. When the first printing press was invented, it revolutionized the educational process by allowing mass production of books. The educational system had to be restructured from a master-apprentice relationship to a lecturer-student method. When the Industrial Revolution began and quickly concentrated mass population of cities.
The educational system had to be revised from a collection of children studying in a single schoolhouse to an individualized system of teacher specialization. Now with the coming of the Computer Age, the learning process must be redefined. Yes it is not perfect but nothing new ever is. It takes time for people to learn and adjust to unforeseen dilemmas. Contrary To Jerry Manders belief, not everything can be predicted but then again that is a whole new subject entirely.
