Technology in the classroom isn't always a good thing

[Shawn Knight]

Laptops are practically a necessity for college students, serving as invaluable teaching tools that assist with tasks like writing reports, taking notes in class and participating in online quizzes. They can also serve as a major distraction both for the user and those around them.

Susan Dynarski, a professor of education, public policy and economics at the University of Michigan, has banned laptops and other electronics in her classroom and at research seminars. Dynarski cites growing evidence suggesting college students learn less when using a laptop or tablet during a lecture. What’s more, tech users tend to earn worse grades.

Of course, proving that is somewhat problematic due to something called selection bias. You see, not all students use laptops the same way. A distracted student may turn to their computer when they are bored or otherwise disinterested in the lecture material while a dedicated student could lean more heavily on their laptop to take notes, look up related concepts on the fly and so on.

Students participating in a study at Princeton University and the University of California, Los Angeles, were randomly assigned either a laptop or pen and paper for note-taking purposes. Those who took notes on the laptop had a substantially worse understanding of lecture material compared to those that used pen and paper to jot down notes.

Researchers believe that, because students can type faster than they can write, the flow of information goes directly from the lecturer to the students’ typing fingers without really stopping to be processed by the brain. Those with pen and paper had to think about the material and condense it down in order to keep up. As a result, they had a better understanding of the material when it came time to take a standardized test.

Another study evaluated the impact of laptop use on students that weren’t using them (but were in the vicinity of someone that was). What they found is that the laptop could serve as a form of “visual pollution” by distracting nearby students and impacting their learning.

More studies are probably needed before drawing any firm conclusions but the information on the table thus far is fascinating and goes against the general notion that technology in the classroom is always a good thing.

Lead image via Brett Jordan, Flickr

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/72053-technology-classroom-isnt-always-good-thing.html

 

[Squid Surprise]

Wow.... I'm an elementary school teacher myself, and "technology" has been the buzzword for the past few years...

Wishing more people would stop and think about how to actually use the technology effectively.... also, many school districts (including mine) don't really understand how to budget for technology.... You can't just say, "we're going to spend $10,000 for 20 laptops.... they need to understand that they will then have to spend ANOTHER $10,000 in a few years once those laptops are obsolete.... It's not like buying a chair or table that last 20+ years...

 

[psycros]

Computers are only useful as actual *learning* tools (as opposed to tools for actually doing schoolwork) if the lessons are ON the computer. A few studies - and more importantly, grades - have proven this pretty conclusively. The ideal is actually self-paced PC learning enhanced by a readily available teacher who can answer questions and provide guidance for students. Of course the real world usually doesn't allow for this so gadgets are really only useful for recording lectures, taking pictures of presentation material and the like. However, those can be really important functions. For many people being able to digest a lesson at their own pace is the difference between pass and fail.

 

[amstech]

Using laptops in classrooms is usually counter-productive.
Also, I like the teacher that makes kids put their smartphones in a storage bag that hangs on the wall before class starts, the kids don't get credit for class unless the phone is there.

 

[senketsu]

Only reason for laptops in classroom is for electronic versions of textbooks. If you have a series of lectures back to back and cannot make it to your locker to rotate the textbook selection you carry, it can be ridiculous the amount of weight you pack around. I can understand that even tho I was a textbook kind of guy.
That said, my first thought was that the picture was fake, taken from some kind of Apple ad. How do they draw stuff or write non-standard characters? Plus the noise.
Good for Susan Dynarski, though I'm surprised some students haven't complained and she hasn't been summoned to some kind of kangaroo court at the admin office

 

[Capaill]

If the college students of tomorrow are anything like the kids of today, they will spend the whole lecture on Facebook or whatever other social media apps can be installed on a computer. Most kids have no idea how to control or limit their device time and many parents (not all) are content to let the tablets be day-long baby sitters. It will be interesting to see how the newer generations develop.
I'm all for removing technology from the classroom as much as possible - especially anything that is a distraction. Managing the distraction of technology is where I fear we are failing. Such as car crashes due to texting, pedestrians stepping onto the road while looking at their phones, people getting depressed because they don't get enough Facebook likes, Pokemon Go crashes and deaths, children not knowing how to write with a pen and kids not socialising as they are too busy with their tablets and games consoles. Let's make the college students think up solutions to all that!

 

[MannerMauler]

Interesting story, but just how many mac books are in that picture? Seems like it's 99%.....

 

[Stingy McDuck]

What did Shawn write about? I wasn't paying attention because I was playing Minecraft.

 

[dbk55]

I'm a little late to this party, but two thoughts:
1. My father had an executive secretary way back when. He marvelled at how she could type documents at full speed while talking on the phone. This demonstrates one of the points in the article about verbal information flowing through the brain to the fingers without being processed for content.
2. I took a physics course in college where the professor handed out very high-quality lecture notes. As a result, no one needed to take substantial notes — at most, you might add a few supplemental notes. This enabled students to focus on the lecture, rather than note-taking. I focused on the lecture but also related it to the handed-out notes to correlate the two and check for any material missing from the notes.

 

[DelJo63]

Researchers believe that, because students can type faster than they can write, the flow of information goes directly from the lecturer to the students’ typing fingers without really stopping to be processed by the brain. Those with pen and paper had to think about the material and condense it down in order to keep up. As a result, they had a better understanding of the material when it came time to take a standardized test.

YES! It has also been shown that the value of student notes is not the opportunity to review the material-- OMG!

The value occurs in processing the aural information, distilling it in the mind and then translating that into a written form which requires a new thought, eye-hand co-ordination and the ability to form a coherent sentence. The "notes" need never to be reviewed as the value has already occurred, real-time in the class by creating the note itself.
@Squid Surprise

 

[DelJo63]

2. I took a physics course in college where the professor handed out very high-quality lecture notes. As a result, no one needed to take substantial notes — at most, you might add a few supplemental notes. This enabled students to focus on the lecture, rather than note-taking.

The value of taking notes is not in the opportunity to re-reading them, but surprisingly in the actual act of creating them! Several sensory faculties go into play as well as (omg) the thought to create the wording and sentence fragments. So handing out preprinted notes removes this opportunity and once again,

the notes of the teacher become the notes of the student without going through the mind of either.

 

[chrissand112]

As for me it's fifty-fifty for laptops in classrooms. It's true that a lot of students may turn to their computer when they are bored or otherwise disinterested in the lecture material but without any device they won't learn something, if they don't want to. It isn't a right solution to ban laptops. Other students can properly learn some iformation with the help of it. They even can work and earn money on their breaks in the internet, as I was. I worked on some site and payed for my education myself.

 

[captaincranky]

IMHO, the data derived from this study, should be directly compared to a group of stenographers.

I'd speculate that the individual preoccupied with trying to record all the testimony in a courtroom proceeding to paper, learns very little about what went on that day, but certainly could recite it back from their notes.

However, with the current pool of knowledge available on the web, the computer is, when used strictly as a research tool, is second to none at the task.

Even if you don't believe a word Wikipedia contains, as a secondary source of information due to the citations, reference sources, and cross linking to other topics, it's hard to come up with a better resource

For whatever else a person might think of Google, their search engine is top notch. It's capable of giving good results, when you flub keywords, concepts, and use unorthodox syntax.

So, as to laptops in the classroom, or not being able to learn with such a powerful tool at your disposal, you must be, (as Steve Jobs so famously said), "holding it wrong".

As for smartphones in the classroom, all I have to say about that is, "Candy Crush.........PLAY NOW"!

 

[DelJo63]

Other students can properly learn some iformation with the help of it. They even can work and earn money on their breaks in the internet, as I was. I worked on some site and payed for my education myself.

You are/were "a self-starter" and makes a whole world of difference (y)