Another school day of video games

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You also greatly overestimate the power teachers have over controlling this. We don't have the ability to block websites. We can send links to IT and they can eventually block them in like 7-10 days. By then, the kids have found 3 new sites they use and you're blocking a site they won't ever access anyway.

To make it worse, the kids at my middle school realized that they could put the links inside of google doc pages and they were almost undetectable because anytime you checked a browser history it came up as Google Docs. They also used them as live chat rooms that could be accessed by any student in the county.

As a co-teacher, I do my best when I am not leading class, I monitor lightspeed from time to time and I shut down and lock students screens whenever they are not staying on task. I can't do this 100% of the time though.

Is there a reason they have to have the computers open in the first place? Is it mandated by MCPS to use a curriculum that involves computer use? If not, can't the teacher just have them do assignments on paper?

As I mentioned before, as a 9th grade teacher, I would love to do more paper and pencil work but these kids have zero ability to neatly and legibly write. I have 15 year old kids who cannot write within lines or accurately space their writing to fit in the assigned spaces. Also, they will misspell probably 50% of the words at a minimum. When students do actually do paperwork, I have no shame in admitting the kids typically score 20-30% lower than if it were typed because If I can't read it, it's automatically wrong. No explanation. No questions. Just a zero for the question.

Then there is the fact that they are all too irresponsible to actually keep and maintain paper assignments. Half of them get lost and the other half are turned in folded, ripped, and crumpled up. I take off points for that too.

Doing the assignments on the computer removes all of the human errors and elements that these kids simply weren't taught prior to HS and I don't have the patience to teach to them now.

I have a 9th grade kid who has dysgraphia. He has a 504 so he can type and when I asked if the school could provide OT for handwriting all the way back in elementary pre pandemic, I was told no (he’d need an IEP for that and he was not eligible because his grades and scores were high). Neighbors told me middle school was all typed/on Chromebook. Then the pandemic hit and end of 3rd plus 4th/5th were also now typed on Chromebook. Now in 9th, teachers are going back to paper because of concerns about chatgpt. But I find it really upsetting that you, as a teacher, are so unsupportive of kids whose handwriting was never addressed through school and who may not have a parent like me who sought accommodations or knew of this disability. I encourage you to give kids the benefit of the doubt. If you can’t read something, ask them to tell you what they wrote. Or refer them to the interventions/counseling team if it is obviously a roadblock that is a potential disability getting in their way. The way you speak about your students is lacking in respect and rife with judgement. I hope my kids’ teachers have more patience than you (since you say you don’t have it) and help support and mitigate any known deficits discovered.

Sounds like you identified an issue for your child and completely ignored it on your end and instead are forcing teachers to pick up the slack for your poor parenting at home. Writing workbooks are very cheap and easy to find.

Do you not understand how disabilities work? Do you say the kids who need glasses should do eye exercises unless they have lazy parents? You can try to blame me, but I assure you I do far more parenting than you or anyone else does.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a teacher here in MCPS and I think Chromebooks shouldn’t be issued until like 10th grade at the earliest. I can’t issue pencil and paper work anymore in 9th grade because 80% of the kids are incapable of writing small and neat enough to fit more than 4 words into a space designed for like three sentences. Probably 50% cant write anything actually legible.

My college Freshman has classes where everything must be handwritten. All assignments, all essays, all exams. Hopefully this handwriting-to-defeat-AI is just a blip, but I wouldn’t bet my kids college success on it. Kids need to learn legible handwriting.

The constant games in ES has been goiing on for years and its harmful but saying Chromebooks shouldn't be issued till 10th is absurd too. Kids will always find a way to cheat, and they can just use AI and then hand write it. Teachers need to change their teaching methods for the new technologies.

What is really within the teacher’s control?

I’m curious to know what kids are doing on chromebooks in early elementary and why they are necessary.

There is some stuff that’s mandated but teachers also use chrome book time as a reward and to keep students quiet when they are not working or actively being taught. I understand there are a lot of challenges to having kids with wildly different abilities and behaviors in the same class but it’s frustrating to see screen time being used so heavily as a crutch. Some teachers are worse than others but it’s been nearly all of them. We did have one who was great about enforcing reading or other enrichment when you finished your work so I know it’s possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You also greatly overestimate the power teachers have over controlling this. We don't have the ability to block websites. We can send links to IT and they can eventually block them in like 7-10 days. By then, the kids have found 3 new sites they use and you're blocking a site they won't ever access anyway.

To make it worse, the kids at my middle school realized that they could put the links inside of google doc pages and they were almost undetectable because anytime you checked a browser history it came up as Google Docs. They also used them as live chat rooms that could be accessed by any student in the county.

As a co-teacher, I do my best when I am not leading class, I monitor lightspeed from time to time and I shut down and lock students screens whenever they are not staying on task. I can't do this 100% of the time though.

Is there a reason they have to have the computers open in the first place? Is it mandated by MCPS to use a curriculum that involves computer use? If not, can't the teacher just have them do assignments on paper?

As I mentioned before, as a 9th grade teacher, I would love to do more paper and pencil work but these kids have zero ability to neatly and legibly write. I have 15 year old kids who cannot write within lines or accurately space their writing to fit in the assigned spaces. Also, they will misspell probably 50% of the words at a minimum. When students do actually do paperwork, I have no shame in admitting the kids typically score 20-30% lower than if it were typed because If I can't read it, it's automatically wrong. No explanation. No questions. Just a zero for the question.

Then there is the fact that they are all too irresponsible to actually keep and maintain paper assignments. Half of them get lost and the other half are turned in folded, ripped, and crumpled up. I take off points for that too.

Doing the assignments on the computer removes all of the human errors and elements that these kids simply weren't taught prior to HS and I don't have the patience to teach to them now.

I have a 9th grade kid who has dysgraphia. He has a 504 so he can type and when I asked if the school could provide OT for handwriting all the way back in elementary pre pandemic, I was told no (he’d need an IEP for that and he was not eligible because his grades and scores were high). Neighbors told me middle school was all typed/on Chromebook. Then the pandemic hit and end of 3rd plus 4th/5th were also now typed on Chromebook. Now in 9th, teachers are going back to paper because of concerns about chatgpt. But I find it really upsetting that you, as a teacher, are so unsupportive of kids whose handwriting was never addressed through school and who may not have a parent like me who sought accommodations or knew of this disability. I encourage you to give kids the benefit of the doubt. If you can’t read something, ask them to tell you what they wrote. Or refer them to the interventions/counseling team if it is obviously a roadblock that is a potential disability getting in their way. The way you speak about your students is lacking in respect and rife with judgement. I hope my kids’ teachers have more patience than you (since you say you don’t have it) and help support and mitigate any known deficits discovered.

Sounds like you identified an issue for your child and completely ignored it on your end and instead are forcing teachers to pick up the slack for your poor parenting at home. Writing workbooks are very cheap and easy to find.

Do you not understand how disabilities work? Do you say the kids who need glasses should do eye exercises unless they have lazy parents? You can try to blame me, but I assure you I do far more parenting than you or anyone else does.

+1 The ignorant PP clearly doesn't understand what dysgraphia is, and that buying a "cheap writing workbook" isn't going to resolve diagnosed learning disabilities that MCPS did not want to address at an earlier age due to the expense.

[Anonymous]

My first grader went to 175 sites on average per day last week. HOW?

He showed me and he has a program that asks him science questions. He just selects a multiple choice answer (the question was too hard and he just guessed) and then his game restarts. It's like 5% learning, 95% video game.

As a society can we please, please do something about this? I feel like school board admins are too stupid to realize they've been bamboozled by EdTech. This is not learning, this is fueling addiction. I am not a luddite. I do think kids should be writing essays in Word, making slide decks and be able to email teachers, but these stupid games are awful. My son is in dual language- where is the Duo Lingo??? Where are the quality educational tools? Why does Magma Math and Youtube have Ads? I couldn't believe my kids watch Ads all day at school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a teacher here in MCPS and I think Chromebooks shouldn’t be issued until like 10th grade at the earliest. I can’t issue pencil and paper work anymore in 9th grade because 80% of the kids are incapable of writing small and neat enough to fit more than 4 words into a space designed for like three sentences. Probably 50% cant write anything actually legible.

My college Freshman has classes where everything must be handwritten. All assignments, all essays, all exams. Hopefully this handwriting-to-defeat-AI is just a blip, but I wouldn’t bet my kids college success on it. Kids need to learn legible handwriting.

The constant games in ES has been goiing on for years and its harmful but saying Chromebooks shouldn't be issued till 10th is absurd too. Kids will always find a way to cheat, and they can just use AI and then hand write it. Teachers need to change their teaching methods for the new technologies.

What is really within the teacher’s control?

I’m curious to know what kids are doing on chromebooks in early elementary and why they are necessary.

There is some stuff that’s mandated but teachers also use chrome book time as a reward and to keep students quiet when they are not working or actively being taught. I understand there are a lot of challenges to having kids with wildly different abilities and behaviors in the same class but it’s frustrating to see screen time being used so heavily as a crutch. Some teachers are worse than others but it’s been nearly all of them. We did have one who was great about enforcing reading or other enrichment when you finished your work so I know it’s possible.

Screens are just as addictive for teachers as they are for kids and parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My first grader went to 175 sites on average per day last week. HOW?

He showed me and he has a program that asks him science questions. He just selects a multiple choice answer (the question was too hard and he just guessed) and then his game restarts. It's like 5% learning, 95% video game.

As a society can we please, please do something about this? I feel like school board admins are too stupid to realize they've been bamboozled by EdTech. This is not learning, this is fueling addiction. I am not a luddite. I do think kids should be writing essays in Word, making slide decks and be able to email teachers, but these stupid games are awful. My son is in dual language- where is the Duo Lingo??? Where are the quality educational tools? Why does Magma Math and Youtube have Ads? I couldn't believe my kids watch Ads all day at school.

(I am in a neighboring VA county, not MoCo. I didn't see the forum)

[Anonymous]

There should be no chromebooks or laptops period. For special assignments only. Or for disabilities I suppose.
Problem solved

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My first grader went to 175 sites on average per day last week. HOW?

He showed me and he has a program that asks him science questions. He just selects a multiple choice answer (the question was too hard and he just guessed) and then his game restarts. It's like 5% learning, 95% video game.

As a society can we please, please do something about this? I feel like school board admins are too stupid to realize they've been bamboozled by EdTech. This is not learning, this is fueling addiction. I am not a luddite. I do think kids should be writing essays in Word, making slide decks and be able to email teachers, but these stupid games are awful. My son is in dual language- where is the Duo Lingo??? Where are the quality educational tools? Why does Magma Math and Youtube have Ads? I couldn't believe my kids watch Ads all day at school.

It's pretty incredible. My kid got in trouble at school for playing video games one day (along with some other kids, they say they were done with an assignment) and after that I pursued it with my kid's guidance counselor--including asking about putting more controls on the computer (similar to what we have on our home computers, where only the websites we proactively allow are included). I was told it was not possible and that we could submit the names of URLs of the gaming sites to the school IT guy to block and ask him for advice.

The MCPS IT guy never responded. We sent quite a few URLs to him...I got the sense that this is a known issue for MCPS, but that it's easier for most schools to ignore the issue rather than doing what Pyle MS is doing and keeping the laptops out of the classrooms (which involves teachers doing more work to actually print out copies of reading assignments, having paper based assignments rather than classroom blookets etc.)

[Anonymous]

Check your kid's Chromebook History. Tons of game time dressed as research or education. It all happens during instructional time - 10AM-12PM. Principal is cautious and always defers to Central Office.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Check your kid's Chromebook History. Tons of game time dressed as research or education. It all happens during instructional time - 10AM-12PM. Principal is cautious and always defers to Central Office.

So what can we do as parents? I know this is an issue for my son. He’s just very addicted to all the games. At home we control it with a lot of sports, activities and he has to read physical books. We just don’t give him enough free time to get on his laptop. We have zero control at school and teachers keep saying he’s off task. Why are teachers complaining to me when I can’t do a single thing to help it. I’ve told him he needs to pay attention to his teacher but he says his school work is done (and it is done. He gets excellent grades). Schools is giving him crack and then complaining to parents that the kids are addicted. Except we don’t have these problems at home because we redirect and don’t just set them on laptops all day.

And I’m not anti teacher. I think the admin and school board have done this to our kids. My kids had never had screen time before K other than a few plane rides and some family movie nights.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check your kid's Chromebook History. Tons of game time dressed as research or education. It all happens during instructional time - 10AM-12PM. Principal is cautious and always defers to Central Office.

So what can we do as parents? I know this is an issue for my son. He’s just very addicted to all the games. At home we control it with a lot of sports, activities and he has to read physical books. We just don’t give him enough free time to get on his laptop. We have zero control at school and teachers keep saying he’s off task. Why are teachers complaining to me when I can’t do a single thing to help it. I’ve told him he needs to pay attention to his teacher but he says his school work is done (and it is done. He gets excellent grades). Schools is giving him crack and then complaining to parents that the kids are addicted. Except we don’t have these problems at home because we redirect and don’t just set them on laptops all day.

And I’m not anti teacher. I think the admin and school board have done this to our kids. My kids had never had screen time before K other than a few plane rides and some family movie nights.

Check your kid’s browsing history. Even innocuous looking links are sometimes gaming sites. Write down the ones that aren’t academic in nature. Write your principal, cc guidance counselor, and ask how you and the school can help your kid not access such sites during the school day.

This is a widespread issue that MCPS is ignoring.

[Anonymous]

Incredible how teachers were able to teach for decades without these Chromebooks and now it’s suddenly this massive problem that apparently can’t be fixed.

[Anonymous]

This is not something for parents to fightnalone. MCPS should either ban chromebooks or disconnect from the intermet. At least for elementary or middle school. Or put better filters. Kids at ES cannot be watching Mr Beast because YouTube Kids is not banned by the sys admin. They can also have offline research tool if kids need to do research. Pebble Go but offline. In the end it is a regulator issue not parenting. You have to require seatbelts, they cannot be optional. There is a Chromebook survey by some PTAs going around. Fill it in. My biggest fear is that most parents dont see chromebooks and screens as the existential problem it is. Screens are proven to have zero benefit for learning. There was interesting senate hearing last week with tons of finding by the best education scientist. Reality is scary and schools are clueless. Not even touching the topic of AI. Why MCPS needs to spend money for these things when we are being asked by teachers for donations of pencils and crayons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Name the school or it did not happen.

LOL. This happens at every school. Elementary school and Middle school. I want to know the names of schools where the kids DON'T get to play games on their Chromebooks. That seems super unlikely.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Name the school or it did not happen.

LOL. This happens at every school. Elementary school and Middle school. I want to know the names of schools where the kids DON'T get to play games on their Chromebooks. That seems super unlikely.

Private schools. My 3rd grader has no Chromebook.

And before anyone says it: I pay property taxes into MCPS, so I have a vested interest in it. I also wish I didn’t have to pay $45,000/year for private school, but MCPS is so awful that we have no choice.