Bsam, do you want the US to require everyone to buy a computer or for the educational system to buy all those computers? Partially what ruined my elementary education was being instructed to the point where all you could do with the apple II was literally wait for the teacher to pull up the question and then you type it. This was considered advanced in the second and third grades but I was doing that all day long at home with my own pc, so when I got to the stage of working with those the teacher would work hard to pull up a question so it was more like an experiment for the teacher than anything. It won't produce well rounded people, and probably won't produce students prepared to complete college coursework. I will add here that the ASVAB AFTQT IQ score percentile is worth $265 per percentile point in annual income by the time you are 40 in 2000 dollars and was the most significant predictor of income.
Brother Bwo, I'm on Saturn, you're on Mars. It's plain, we ain't gonna agree. Progress will prevail. Have a nice rest of your life.
The teachers are getting sick of being made fun of mid-sentence having to prepare lectures and forgetting their talking points. Computers won't solve this, but should be in every classroom.
It's been my experience from taking some of the online 'MOOC' courses like coursera that there is one incredible advantage over in-class teachers: I can pause the video and take notes; pause to reflect on the preceding point; and I can replay the video over and over again until my brain can remember it. (Ok, that's several points) Plus I can watch when I'm optimally ready for the info, like awake enough, in the mood, or after finishing up something else that was distracting. Plus, the computer graded exercises give me instant feedback, instead of homework that comes back a week later, or the text that lists only the answers in the back. It helps a lot to get feedback when the problem is fresh in the mind. Ultimately though if you want to learn something, you have to take the material, however it was presented, and use it yourself to solve some problem on your own.
Google "Finland's School Success". The Scandinavian country is an education superpower because it values equality more than excellence. Compared with the stereotype education model -- long hours of exhaustive cramming and rote memorization -- Finland's success is especially intriguing because Finnish schools assign less homework and engage children in more creative play. And there are no private schools in Finland.
Interesting article--thank you for posting. I completely relate to this: "Research has shown that those students (all of us, really) remember a new word or fact best when they learn it and then relearn it when they are just on the cusp of forgetting it."
A computer can't replace schools. Learning from a computer screen is dry and boring and unimaginative. Don't think so then go take an online class, it's a miserable way to learn. The class room environment with an engaged teacher, kids interacting with each other learning how to be part of a group is all part of learning and growing up. Regardless of how tech advanced we get we will always be a social people, it's who we are.
This is intriguing. I wonder if traditional universities and colleges will ever be usurped by computerized teaching, or whether it will always be regarded as an extra and not as credible. Seems to me like computer learning could be more beneficial to the student than traditional classrooms.