The Screen That Ate Your Child’s Education

[Anonymous]

As an early elementary teacher and mom of current high schoolers, I agree that screens are overused is some classrooms. This seems to be worse the older the kids get.
However, are we also going to discuss kid’s access to screens at home? Over the years I see young children far less prepared to interact with peers in a classroom setting. When I ask them what they did over the weekend I hear a lot more about what they did on the phones (they are 4 and 5) than what they did with human beings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Naw. Screens are an integral part of our lives. They belong in schools.

Not going back to slate and chalk. Nope.

Boy are you going to be surprised.

At what?

My kids grew up with screens in the classroom, one just graduated UVA Summa Cum Laude and has a professional services job in Manhattan where she is thriving (and working with screens, match). The other is a junior at Virginia Tech and also thriving. She is working toward a career in public health.

The kids will be ok.

If your kids are grown, then they are not the same as the kids that are learning to read on laptops by playing a game where you have to rapidly jump a rabbit to get to the right phonetic sound - or fight another penguin to get to do a math problem. But you definitely will want to do something about it before your grandchildren get to school because they will also not learn if this continues.

+1. Kids who are in or recently out of college right now did not go through elementary or even middle school when most students had access to a smartphone or tablet or even when all students were 1:1 with Chromebooks starting in kindergarten.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Naw. Screens are an integral part of our lives. They belong in schools.

Not going back to slate and chalk. Nope.

You will when you see the absolute morons that the next generation is turning out to be. They can't focus on anything at all.

It’s not about school chromebooks. It’s about lazy parenting, young kids who “need” smartphones and iPads every day at home. Sorry. Parents don’t like hearing it and want to deflect blame elsewhere, but it’s the truth.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Naw. Screens are an integral part of our lives. They belong in schools.

Not going back to slate and chalk. Nope.

Boy are you going to be surprised.

Aww, you’re cute. Wrong, but cute. DP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Naw. Screens are an integral part of our lives. They belong in schools.

Not going back to slate and chalk. Nope.

You will when you see the absolute morons that the next generation is turning out to be. They can't focus on anything at all.

It’s not about school chromebooks. It’s about lazy parenting, young kids who “need” smartphones and iPads every day at home. Sorry. Parents don’t like hearing it and want to deflect blame elsewhere, but it’s the truth.

Both things are bad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Naw. Screens are an integral part of our lives. They belong in schools.

Not going back to slate and chalk. Nope.

You will when you see the absolute morons that the next generation is turning out to be. They can't focus on anything at all.

It’s not about school chromebooks. It’s about lazy parenting, young kids who “need” smartphones and iPads every day at home. Sorry. Parents don’t like hearing it and want to deflect blame elsewhere, but it’s the truth.

My child was first introduced to screens at school. She came home wanting to play the penguin math game.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Naw. Screens are an integral part of our lives. They belong in schools.

Not going back to slate and chalk. Nope.

This.

There were a number of phases btwn slate/chalk and screens. I’d personally like to go back to pen/paper, text books, and physically present teachers who actually teach.

Textbooks are heavy, outdated and dumb. No need for them when we have the internet. Agility is a plus in education.

What’s the point of pen and paper in a digital age?

4/10 attempts so far for all your posts.

[Anonymous]

Plus, like the article says, I can't police them all the time. My daughter says she is doing work on her school device - what am I to do? Sit over her shoulder all afternoon? I also have work. The problem is the device not the parenting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My elementary and middle school-aged children all have entirely screen-free educations. They don't have phones or ipads either. It's...amazing.

Is this a public school?

[Anonymous]

Paper leads to better comprehension. Students scored significantly higher on comprehension tests when reading on paper than on a screen. (this is not so surprising).

Screen reading is more shallow. The eye-tracking data showed that students tended to skim more and reread less efficiently when reading on a screen. (also not so surprising)

Students don’t realize the difference. Despite the apparent differences in how they processed the texts, students didn’t seem aware that their reading behaviour changed based on the medium. (depressing)

[Anonymous]

Yes lazy parenting is bad for education but what do schools have more control of: what parents are doing at home or what’s going on at school? You can really only control one through policy so it makes sense to focus efforts there.

Unfortunately we see schools telling parents to cut screen time with the assumption that screens are necessary to educate kids. They totally aren’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Naw. Screens are an integral part of our lives. They belong in schools.

Not going back to slate and chalk. Nope.

This.

There were a number of phases btwn slate/chalk and screens. I’d personally like to go back to pen/paper, text books, and physically present teachers who actually teach.

And actually homework that is sent home- and corrected tests and quizzes that get returned to students. All this Dropbox nonsense and electronic submission for everything makes it hard for parents to know what their child is doing and their performance

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My elementary and middle school-aged children all have entirely screen-free educations. They don't have phones or ipads either. It's...amazing.

Where is this and how do I get there?

Probably a Christian private school

[Anonymous]

Computers are good for some things - posting assignments, due dates of papers, quizzes, etc, uploading work from the day in case a student was absent. What is very bad is having the kids do the work on the computer. It should be used as a vehicle to deliver assignments. Not to do the assignments. Kids need to do math on paper with a pencil.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My elementary and middle school-aged children all have entirely screen-free educations. They don't have phones or ipads either. It's...amazing.

And how much do you pay for that privilege?