cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/38188482
Tech vendors promised personalized, frictionless learning. What American schools got instead was mind-numbing, data-hungry junk software that devalues teachers and shortchanges students. A growing movement, led by alarmed parents, is saying enough.
Technology’s allure is always future oriented: Personal computing was going to supercharge productivity; social media and smartphones would strengthen interpersonal connections; and now AI will streamline the world of work. And for three-quarters of a century, education technology vendors have promised to optimize student learning and eliminate the busywork of teaching. But as Charles Logan, T. Philip Nichols, and Antero Garcia recently argued in Kappan, “the future they’re selling has not arrived — and perhaps it never will. But de-skilling, surveillance, and extraction — all of that is happening now, in our classrooms, today.”
I know some avid Duolingo users. After multiple year-long streaks they have learned and retained quite a bit… also quite a bit less than they would have learned and retained after spending a season in an immersion setting where they used the language all day every day. Both routes to learning have their pros and cons… neither one suits everybody.