More Sloppy Reports from Maine's Laptop Program

It's not quite my bete noire, but I have taken issue over the last couple of years with reports of the program which provided Mac iBook laptops to all 7th graders in the state of Maine, and later all 8th graders as well. Although objective studies aren't perfect and I don't believe that standardized tests tell the whole story, this Associated Press account says that because teachers think students are learning better, that students are learning better.Yes, teachers do know whether their students are performing better and whether they can spend more one-on-one time. But there should also be some quantification over two years. Are kids who spent two years on a laptop outperforming kids who didn't? That should be a very easily answerable question which, combined with this survey of opinion, would produce a result worth discussing.