All sorts of silliness in this New York Times article which attempts (once again) to paint the technology in education discussion as either/or rather than right time/right place. We considered Waldorf schools for our own kids at one point, and there was much to like in terms of their focus on the environment, social justice and more. But we knew from the outset that their no-tech approach probably would not win the day for us. (There is much to learn and do with the environment and social justice with technology, you know.)
But to have well-heeled Silicon Valley executives tell it, these kids can just pick up technology and work it’s wonders any time. They don’t need it in school.
“The idea that an app on an iPad can better teach my kids to read or do arithmetic, that’s ridiculous.”
“Technology is a distraction when we need literacy, numeracy and critical thinking.”
“At Google and all these places, we make technology as brain-dead easy to use as possible. There’s no reason why kids can’t figure it out when they get older.”
And so on.
I love Diana Laufenberg’s response to the either/or nonsense, captured in a couple of Tweets:
Yep.