Technology and Education

The Washington Post has an opinion piece here suggesting that the role of technology as a savior of education has been widely overrated.


Yes, technology is a tool.  Unfortunately, it’s a very expensive tool that is pushing out funds for more important things—like libraries, small classes, well trained, and paid, teachers, etc.

And, by the end of twelfth grade, the really advanced students—the ones who can go on to study almost any field they want—are the avid readers, not the tech geeks.  I taught high school English for thirty-seven years and watched it happen.  The skills that avid readers acquire—the ability to understand tone and different layers of meaning, the ability to follow multiple, complicated plots, the ability to understand character, the ability to read quickly and efficiently—are not skills kids learn on computers.