Heidi MacDonald over at The Comics Beat offers some commentary on a recent NY Times article about technology and education:
Not that we have any idea what this means…the article goes on for six more pages with mostly head scratching over what any of it means. It’s possible that digital/interactive literacy isn’t measured on conventional test scores. Or maybe strong, dedicated teachers are really the key element and not laptops.
Every cartoonist knows that the Internet is both a very, very good thing (image research wonder-machine!) and a very, very bad thing (procrastination wonder-machine!). I think the same is true for students. Our school recently went one-to-one, meaning every student now has a laptop. I have seen the laptops both enhance and hinder of education. Much more important, in my opinion, are the parents, the teachers, and the choices that the students themselves make.
So should the students have laptops? I would say yes. Technology is a part of the fabric of our world now. But we can’t see technology as an educational magic bullet. Simply giving a laptop to a student isn’t going to make her any smarter than simply giving her a pencil.
