[ale] Going OT: Cobb Laptop Deal

[Jeff Hubbs]

I grew to hate Accelerated Reader with a passion.  It basically wrung
all the desire out daughter had to read out of her when she was in a
Gwinnett County school.  The books were classified crazily, with widely
varying books put in the same classification, only a fraction of the
books the AR instance knew about were actually available in the library,
and, what really got our goat was that the competition between teachers
for AR points resulted in good readers getting their backs broken by
unethical teachers who were setting individual kids' goals.  

The school staff had nothing to say about any of this; in fact, they
told us that the only reason they had AR was because a long-gone
librarian refused to believe that some of the kids were actually reading
the books they said they were reading.  And, no telling how much this
all cost, but it had to be thousands.  

On Mon, 2005-08-15 at 20:33 -0400, Mark Wright wrote:
> 
> On Aug 15, 2005, at 6:17 PM, Geoffrey wrote:
> 
> > Mark Wright wrote:
> > 
> > > I am glad the deal fell apart even though I am a former
> > > Evangelist  
> > > member. ( Guy Kawasaki's old mailing list to promote mac info back
> > > a  
> > > few years)
> > > 
> > > 
> > > I think that computers in schools are just another impediment to a
> > > good 
> > > education.  I believe there is no teen in the metro area that
> > > cannot 
> > > operate a windows PC currently or passably given a day to  learn.
> > >  
> > > Putting PCs in schools unless, they are used just to teach  coding
> > > or 
> > > hardware design just takes away time from learning to read,  write
> > > and 
> > > do math.
> > > 
> > 
> > 
> > This is just patently false.  I was totally against the cobb
> > computer 
> > debacle, but the computers in schools these days are used for a lot
> > more 
> > then 'teach coding or hardware design.'  You don't even get the
> > option 
> > to take such classes until late in middle school.  So what do you
> > thing 
> > the students are doing with the computers in grades k-5?
> They remove some of the grading burden for teachers.  All Cobb and
> Cherokee grade schools use their computers mostly for a program called
> Accelerated Reader.  It was a "must have" at a private school I
> consulted for.  The teachers at this school went on and on about how
> it helped their students learn to read.  I was really excited to see
> this revolutionary teaching system that I was being paid to install.
> I was never so disappointed.  It is nothing but a database of
> questions for books the school has to buy for their library.  The kids
> read the books and then answer the questions on the computer.  The
> computer automates the grading and performance tracking for the
> teacher.  The computer does zero for the children.  
> 
> 
> Years later my second oldest nearly failed reading because she found
> it too tedious to go in her spare time to the library and take the
> easy tests even though she read the books.  I suppose more PC's in the
> school would have given her less of an excuse but so would a teacher
> to deliver the few questions.
> 
> 
> I have been closely involved with computers and schools and I don't
> see the need.  Knowledge gained from a library book usually lasts
> longer than google answers.  I have been to plenty of dog an pony
> shows for education software and I have also come in a year or two
> later to replace the dusty unused equipment with yet another  "latest
> answer" for lagging test scores.
> 
> > 
> > 
> > Further, you make an assumption that every teen in the metro area
> > has 
> > access to a computer outside of school, and that is also false.
> 
> 
> No I didn't.   I just believe with all the electronic toys even the
> poorest kids in Atlanta have, that adding Windows skills to what they
> already know is trivial.
> > 
> > 
> > Don't get me wrong, I don't think the computers in the schools are 
> > properly utilized, but they do a lot more with them then you've
> > stated.
> > 
> > 
> > I do realize there are all kinds of problems with computers in
> > schools. 
> >   Teachers get little or no training, there is little or no
> > support, 
> > poorly designed network infrastructure...
> > 
> > 
> > Computers can be used as a good educational tool just as books,
> > chalk 
> > boards, white boards, overhead projectors..... are.  In a lot of
> > cases 
> > they are.
> > 
> > 
> I think this is conventional wisdom.  Computers are expensive, I use
> one to be more productive therefore my child who needs to learn to
> read better and master algebra needs one.  Besides if our kids aren't
> getting the grades we want we gotta do something.  I think a computer
> makes a good carrot in a classroom but not a good tool.  That is a
> general tool such as a pencil or a black board or a book.  It makes a
> good specialized tool.  If you want to learn HTML it helps.  If you
> want to add some web resources to a lesson it helps but as a tool to
> teach math skills it falls way short of a teacher.  I have supervised
> a complete 4th grade curriculum delivered on a PC. It is just a book
> that can grade itself.  The some students did well with it most did
> not.  Most kids need more teacher time.  
> 
> 
> I mentioned the carrot above. The most effective use of computers I
> have seen was a teacher that let her class play educational games on
> them if they did there work fast enough.  It had to be correct.
> Mostly the boys in the class were working to get PC time though.  the
> girls needed other incentive.
> 
> > 
> > > The crazy thing is every time the government wants to spend more
> > > of  our 
> > > money to help students read, write and do math better, all you
> > > have to 
> > > do is move the curtain back a little and see that the  opposite is
> > > do a lot more then 
> > > ALWAYS the result.
> > > 
> > > 
> > > As you can see this is a sore point to me and I am restraining
> > > myself!  
> > > My daughters go to a respected public school up here in cobb  and
> > > I 
> > > don't think it would be much of an exaggeration to say they  there
> > > are 
> > > probably as many guns and containers of alcohol in that  school as
> > > there 
> > > are computers.  I am dead serious.
> > > 
> > 
> > 
> > And you blame the school system or the government for that?  The
> > problem 
> > with schools is that there is no parental involvement.  Schools are
> > not 
> > supposed or intended to parent these children, that's the parents'
> > job.
> > 
> > 
> > -- 
> > Until later, Geoffrey
> > _______________________________________________
> > Ale mailing list
> > Ale at ale.org
> > http://www.ale.org/mailman/listinfo/ale
> > 
> 
> 
> 
> Mark Wright
> 
> NASA Maintenance Specialist
> 
> Mark_Wright at NASAsupport.com
> 
> www.nasasupport.com
> 
> 
> 1.800.724.9692
> 
> 
> "Whatever It Takes"
> 
> 
> 
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