Copyright ©1997-2008 Glenn Fleishman except as noted otherwise. All rights reserved. For permission to reprint, contact Glenn Fleishman at glenn at glennf.com. Photo © 2008 Laurence Chen; used with permission.
Copyright ©1997-2008 Glenn Fleishman except as noted otherwise. All rights reserved. For permission to reprint, contact Glenn Fleishman at glenn at glennf.com. Photo © 2008 Laurence Chen; used with permission.
Turning technology from mumbo-jumbo into rich tasty gumbo
� HD Radio Redux: Still Months Away | Main | August Wilson Dies �The folks who defend the program to spend tens of millions of dollars in a largely rural state to provide loaner laptops (not ones they eventually own or keep year to year) to middle-school students are still squishy. I've written about this in years past, with my disappointment that there is no quantitative improvement, no objective measure that the program provides to show that laptops help in any regard.
The person they hired to evaluate the program bemoans that he has no measures by which to show the program has shown improvement for students because their tests show only memorization results. Sure, but if there's no item in the budget to create tests that show other kinds of analytical improvement you are left with $37 million spent and no proof whether it was spent well.
Most good programs are designed with feedback built in to understand whether a given change produces any result, positive or negative. It's terrible to see reports over and over that Maine did not plan to have any method to measure success. Throw a laptop at the kid, integrate it into the curriculum, and throw up your hands.
How about more teachers, better textbooks, better pre- and post-school programs? You know, things that there are decades upon decades of studies that they show have a measurable effect on kids' lives as kids and adults? Naw, not sexy enough.
Posted by Glennf at September 30, 2005 3:15 PM
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Hi,
I've read a few of your articles on the Maine laptop program and am I wondering how you feel about it now? Are you for or against laptops?
We're a group of parents trying to stop our children's school from wasting tons of money on a laptop program. (We have much better and cheaper alternatives but they won't listen)
We are all professionals with computer and educational backgrounds. We are looking for more information about laptop programs for middle schools.
The school's computer department and many of the enlighten staff all know we are right and back up, but they won't speak up for fear of offending the administration which in intent on forcing an ill-thought out program on the students and staff.
Richard
[Editor's note: Still opposed to the "laptops are a panacea" mentality. I read every article on the topic that I spot, and I can't find any significant research that explains how the money is well spent. That is, no rigorous looks at absenteeism, graduation rates, classroom disruption, performance on tests, overall happiness, or anything objective or subjective that's the result of well-designed studies, which were planned from before computers were delivered and funded for a few years.
I do believe that computers have a useful place in education, but using PowerPoint isn't one of them unless you're just giving up on the notion of teaching kids how to think and simply preparing them for the workplace.--gf]
Posted by: Richard at May 21, 2006 5:07 PM
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