EdTech Transparency

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Kids are not on grade level anymore so Ed tech is the solution. Kids can do the exact work on their grade level. If not the teacher would be making 10 different worksheet packets, and then parents would be complaining about that. I do agree that worksheets and paper and pencil are way bette.

Kids aren’t on grade level anymore because teachers aren’t teaching. They are nearly EdTech supervisors now. There is no direct instruction, no books, no writing

I'm a public elementary school teacher. My students receive direct instruction, write full sentences with a pencil, and read books daily.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Kids are not on grade level anymore so Ed tech is the solution. Kids can do the exact work on their grade level. If not the teacher would be making 10 different worksheet packets, and then parents would be complaining about that. I do agree that worksheets and paper and pencil are way bette.

Kids aren’t on grade level anymore because teachers aren’t teaching. They are nearly EdTech supervisors now. There is no direct instruction, no books, no writing

I'm a public elementary school teacher. My students receive direct instruction, write full sentences with a pencil, and read books daily.

This needs to be vast majority of instruction and exercises - and it isn’t,
I don’t believe it is in your classroom either. In many, many classrooms it isn’t done at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Decisions like this are usually made at the school district level, so complaining to your principal will have little effect-- it's out of their hands.

Do teachers find them more useful? If so, good luck going against the wishes of the teacher's union. Time to move to private if you feel so strongly about it.

Which privates aren't using tablets and Chromebooks daily?

Schools following Classical Christian, Waldorf, or Montessori methodologies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Decisions like this are usually made at the school district level, so complaining to your principal will have little effect-- it's out of their hands.

Do teachers find them more useful? If so, good luck going against the wishes of the teacher's union. Time to move to private if you feel so strongly about it.

Which privates aren't using tablets and Chromebooks daily?

Schools following Classical Christian, Waldorf, or Montessori methodologies.

Guess the families who can’t afford private are out of luck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Decisions like this are usually made at the school district level, so complaining to your principal will have little effect-- it's out of their hands.

Do teachers find them more useful? If so, good luck going against the wishes of the teacher's union. Time to move to private if you feel so strongly about it.

Which privates aren't using tablets and Chromebooks daily?

Schools following Classical Christian, Waldorf, or Montessori methodologies.

Guess the families who can’t afford private are out of luck.

Even if you can afford any private, these privates are the minority of private schools and not available options for even those that can afford it. I’ve looked

[Anonymous]

A lot of factors have influenced educational technology adoption over the last two decades. Your complaints aren’t going to overcome most of these factors.

Curriculum is dictated by state standards, and a lot of states have had some version of “21st century skills” that are tied to technology use across the curriculum. These skills can range from keyboarding, to evaluating the validity of online sources, to learning programming languages.

Another driving factor is book publishing. Increasingly, textbooks are available only as interactive PDFs. Whereas schools used to hang onto hard-cover books for 15 years or more, now they must re-license them every school year. Also, school libraries are understaffed and under resourced in many districts, so teachers rely on online resources for research projects.

Accommodating learning differences is another significant driver of ed tech. As one example, offering speech-to-text and typing options can be helpful to children with fine motor challenges and language-based learning disabilities that affect spelling. Schools also rely heavily on audiobook programs like Learning Ally to help children with dyslexia and reading comprehension challenges access grade-level curriculum. There’s also the issue of differentiation. Teachers are expected to provide engaging, accessible lessons to the entire class. Even in private schools where I have taught, ability ranges in classrooms are broad with some children placing below the 10th percentile on standardized tests, while others place at the 99th percentile. As long ago as 2010, I had an administrator tell me “Just put kids on Khan Academy” when I asked him/her how to best accommodate middle school children whose math skills were so weak they didn’t know their addition or multiplication facts. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to use effective direct instruction and help my students. I did have a real time management issue, however, as I tried to prepare kids for pre-algebra and remediate third-grade skills inside of a 45-minute class period with no support from aids or learning specialists.

We’ve had decades of parent complaints about students inattentive students who refuse to use plan books not knowing the homework and parents not having access to grades. Schools have turned to off-the-shelf software, like Google Classroom and Schoology, to solve these issues. For equity schools then issue devices so that families have access to the online information.

No parent complaint about ed tech is going to do away with the factors that influence teacher and administrator reliance on that technology. Nor are individual public schools in charge of contract negotiations and purchasing decisions. If you have an example of a specific harm from technology, raise it with your school board or private school head. If they hear enough feedback, they may take steps to mitigate the more harmful aspects. But if you think you can complain to the point where your school won’t use laptops or Web-based software any longer, that’s an unreasonable expectation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Decisions like this are usually made at the school district level, so complaining to your principal will have little effect-- it's out of their hands.

Do teachers find them more useful? If so, good luck going against the wishes of the teacher's union. Time to move to private if you feel so strongly about it.

Which privates aren't using tablets and Chromebooks daily?

Schools following Classical Christian, Waldorf, or Montessori methodologies.

Guess the families who can’t afford private are out of luck.

Sort of; in this area, the only options I'm aware of to avoid rampant ed tech are homeschooling and moving the heck out of this area to a place with a more robust school choice system.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A lot of factors have influenced educational technology adoption over the last two decades. Your complaints aren’t going to overcome most of these factors.

Curriculum is dictated by state standards, and a lot of states have had some version of “21st century skills” that are tied to technology use across the curriculum. These skills can range from keyboarding, to evaluating the validity of online sources, to learning programming languages.

Another driving factor is book publishing. Increasingly, textbooks are available only as interactive PDFs. Whereas schools used to hang onto hard-cover books for 15 years or more, now they must re-license them every school year. Also, school libraries are understaffed and under resourced in many districts, so teachers rely on online resources for research projects.

Accommodating learning differences is another significant driver of ed tech. As one example, offering speech-to-text and typing options can be helpful to children with fine motor challenges and language-based learning disabilities that affect spelling. Schools also rely heavily on audiobook programs like Learning Ally to help children with dyslexia and reading comprehension challenges access grade-level curriculum. There’s also the issue of differentiation. Teachers are expected to provide engaging, accessible lessons to the entire class. Even in private schools where I have taught, ability ranges in classrooms are broad with some children placing below the 10th percentile on standardized tests, while others place at the 99th percentile. As long ago as 2010, I had an administrator tell me “Just put kids on Khan Academy” when I asked him/her how to best accommodate middle school children whose math skills were so weak they didn’t know their addition or multiplication facts. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to use effective direct instruction and help my students. I did have a real time management issue, however, as I tried to prepare kids for pre-algebra and remediate third-grade skills inside of a 45-minute class period with no support from aids or learning specialists.

We’ve had decades of parent complaints about students inattentive students who refuse to use plan books not knowing the homework and parents not having access to grades. Schools have turned to off-the-shelf software, like Google Classroom and Schoology, to solve these issues. For equity schools then issue devices so that families have access to the online information.

No parent complaint about ed tech is going to do away with the factors that influence teacher and administrator reliance on that technology. Nor are individual public schools in charge of contract negotiations and purchasing decisions. If you have an example of a specific harm from technology, raise it with your school board or private school head. If they hear enough feedback, they may take steps to mitigate the more harmful aspects. But if you think you can complain to the point where your school won’t use laptops or Web-based software any longer, that’s an unreasonable expectation.

If you have a specific harm
from technology, consider contacting the EdTech Law Center:

https://edtech.law/

Both Emily Cherkin and Dr Jared Cooney Horvath have resources for parents as well.

[Anonymous]

Most parents do not seem upset by the prevalence of tech in the classroom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Most parents do not seem upset by the prevalence of tech in the classroom.

Those are the same parents that let their kids have unrestricted access to Apple devices, who are texting my kid at all hours of the day and night, sending inappropriate messages and spending large amounts of time on social media. The parents are probably doing the same.

[Anonymous]

EdTech’s rampant use by FCPS is yet another reason to place your child in a quality private school asap.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A lot of factors have influenced educational technology adoption over the last two decades. Your complaints aren’t going to overcome most of these factors.

Curriculum is dictated by state standards, and a lot of states have had some version of “21st century skills” that are tied to technology use across the curriculum. These skills can range from keyboarding, to evaluating the validity of online sources, to learning programming languages.

Another driving factor is book publishing. Increasingly, textbooks are available only as interactive PDFs. Whereas schools used to hang onto hard-cover books for 15 years or more, now they must re-license them every school year. Also, school libraries are understaffed and under resourced in many districts, so teachers rely on online resources for research projects.

Accommodating learning differences is another significant driver of ed tech. As one example, offering speech-to-text and typing options can be helpful to children with fine motor challenges and language-based learning disabilities that affect spelling. Schools also rely heavily on audiobook programs like Learning Ally to help children with dyslexia and reading comprehension challenges access grade-level curriculum. There’s also the issue of differentiation. Teachers are expected to provide engaging, accessible lessons to the entire class. Even in private schools where I have taught, ability ranges in classrooms are broad with some children placing below the 10th percentile on standardized tests, while others place at the 99th percentile. As long ago as 2010, I had an administrator tell me “Just put kids on Khan Academy” when I asked him/her how to best accommodate middle school children whose math skills were so weak they didn’t know their addition or multiplication facts. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to use effective direct instruction and help my students. I did have a real time management issue, however, as I tried to prepare kids for pre-algebra and remediate third-grade skills inside of a 45-minute class period with no support from aids or learning specialists.

We’ve had decades of parent complaints about students inattentive students who refuse to use plan books not knowing the homework and parents not having access to grades. Schools have turned to off-the-shelf software, like Google Classroom and Schoology, to solve these issues. For equity schools then issue devices so that families have access to the online information.

No parent complaint about ed tech is going to do away with the factors that influence teacher and administrator reliance on that technology. Nor are individual public schools in charge of contract negotiations and purchasing decisions. If you have an example of a specific harm from technology, raise it with your school board or private school head. If they hear enough feedback, they may take steps to mitigate the more harmful aspects. But if you think you can complain to the point where your school won’t use laptops or Web-based software any longer, that’s an unreasonable expectation.

....and this resigned attitude is how we'll end up with AI schools as the public school experience

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Kids are not on grade level anymore so Ed tech is the solution. Kids can do the exact work on their grade level. If not the teacher would be making 10 different worksheet packets, and then parents would be complaining about that. I do agree that worksheets and paper and pencil are way bette.

Kids aren’t on grade level anymore because teachers aren’t teaching. They are nearly EdTech supervisors now. There is no direct instruction, no books, no writing

I'm a public elementary school teacher. My students receive direct instruction, write full sentences with a pencil, and read books daily.

That is great!

Sadly it is less widely done now than 20-25 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of factors have influenced educational technology adoption over the last two decades. Your complaints aren’t going to overcome most of these factors.

Curriculum is dictated by state standards, and a lot of states have had some version of “21st century skills” that are tied to technology use across the curriculum. These skills can range from keyboarding, to evaluating the validity of online sources, to learning programming languages.

Another driving factor is book publishing. Increasingly, textbooks are available only as interactive PDFs. Whereas schools used to hang onto hard-cover books for 15 years or more, now they must re-license them every school year. Also, school libraries are understaffed and under resourced in many districts, so teachers rely on online resources for research projects.

Accommodating learning differences is another significant driver of ed tech. As one example, offering speech-to-text and typing options can be helpful to children with fine motor challenges and language-based learning disabilities that affect spelling. Schools also rely heavily on audiobook programs like Learning Ally to help children with dyslexia and reading comprehension challenges access grade-level curriculum. There’s also the issue of differentiation. Teachers are expected to provide engaging, accessible lessons to the entire class. Even in private schools where I have taught, ability ranges in classrooms are broad with some children placing below the 10th percentile on standardized tests, while others place at the 99th percentile. As long ago as 2010, I had an administrator tell me “Just put kids on Khan Academy” when I asked him/her how to best accommodate middle school children whose math skills were so weak they didn’t know their addition or multiplication facts. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to use effective direct instruction and help my students. I did have a real time management issue, however, as I tried to prepare kids for pre-algebra and remediate third-grade skills inside of a 45-minute class period with no support from aids or learning specialists.

We’ve had decades of parent complaints about students inattentive students who refuse to use plan books not knowing the homework and parents not having access to grades. Schools have turned to off-the-shelf software, like Google Classroom and Schoology, to solve these issues. For equity schools then issue devices so that families have access to the online information.

No parent complaint about ed tech is going to do away with the factors that influence teacher and administrator reliance on that technology. Nor are individual public schools in charge of contract negotiations and purchasing decisions. If you have an example of a specific harm from technology, raise it with your school board or private school head. If they hear enough feedback, they may take steps to mitigate the more harmful aspects. But if you think you can complain to the point where your school won’t use laptops or Web-based software any longer, that’s an unreasonable expectation.

....and this resigned attitude is how we'll end up with AI schools as the public school experience

+1

[Anonymous]

We had public school for decades without edtech. We know it can be done, we know it is what is best for kids, so figure it out or families will flee public schools