In 2002, Maine became the first state to implement a statewide laptop program to some grade levels. Then-governor Angus King saw the program as a way to put the internet at the fingertips of more children, who would be able to immerse themselves in information.
By that fall, the Maine Learning Technology Initiative had distributed 17,000 Apple laptops to seventh graders across 243 middle schools. By 2016, those numbers had multiplied to 66,000 laptops and tablets distributed to Maine students.
King’s initial efforts have been mirrored across the country. In 2024, the U.S. spent more than $30 billion putting laptops and tablets in schools. But more than a quarter-century and numerous evolving models of technology later, psychologists and learning experts see a different outcome than the one King intended. Rather than empowering the generation with access to more knowledge, the technology had the opposite effect.
They say things like this about every generation. Boomer kids had their brains rotted by TV and rock’n’roll. GenX couldn’t do long division because of calculators. Millennials lost the ability to communicate in complete sentences because of mobile phone texting. In the bronze age, writing totally destroyed the youth’s ability to memorise epic poetry. And so on.
Standardised testing results plummeting for the first time ever is quite a bit different to the anecdotal generational gripes you’re describing.
Really highlights the problems with standardised testing.
The Pineapple And The Hare: Can You Answer Two Bizarre State Exam Questions?
Consider what would happen if every single student in the testing pool gained superintelligence overnight and they all aced the tests uniformly. What would testing companies do next? They can’t just hand out perfect scores to everyone all the time. There’s no value in that as a metric.
In the same vein, imagine if everyone was hit in the head with a hammer before test day and they all failed. Testing companies would be lambasted for flunking an entire graduating class, as the default assumption would be that the tests were the problem, not the students.
Standardized testing must be a rigged game which seeks to produce a particular set of outcomes to satisfy the state education boards, not to accurately measure the cognitive capacity of test-takers. Exam difficulty can change radically year to year simply because students are doing too well (or too poorly) for the purposes of sorting the “smart” students from the “dumb” ones.
That’s before you get into the economic incentives of privatized exam-prep courses and supplemental material sales. Or the incentives offered by schools looking to goose scores by a certain degree per year in exchange for some kind of bonus.
Scientists: This is the first time this has actually happened based on measurable data.
You: Old people have been saying the same thing forever.
Yeah… But there’s actually quite a bit of research to back it in this case. Standardized testing and literacy rates have been falling sharply since 2017, but accelerated even faster after COVID.
I don’t think laptops in schools really have anything to do with it, it’s likely a reflection of systemic failures in education and the economy. However, we do know that too much screen time for children is harmful for their cognitive development, and there are more and more kids being raised by tablets every day.
I work in healthcare in a pediatric hospital, in the last couple years we’ve had to put in strict rules for our clinic about the use of phones and tablets during the appointments. We often have to tell both the patient and their parents to put their phones away, just so they will somewhat pay attention during the appointment. Often both the parents and their children will throw tantrums when we do this.
Technology isn’t inherently dangerous, but the social media we collectively engage with is designed to keep people engaged with it. It’s almost like we all have little casino slots machines in our pockets, and there’s plenty of research about the harm it’s doing.
Are you saying that letting an anti public education grifter take over the Dept of Education was a mistake?!?
I mean that definitely doesn’t help, but COVID in general was just a large disruption for most family’s routines and children thrive with stability in their lives.
Writing Skills
gregg
You sent me down a super fun shorthand rabbit hole. Thanks!
As a multilingual, I use Gregg precisely because it coverages the languages I most use phonetically.
But as to what I prefer, phonographics be damned.
What are we testing them on? Some “basic skills” become irrelevant over time and the testing should reflect that.
We dont test kids on how to use a slide rule any more.
The advent of the calculator has likely made us all dumber at mental math, but that doesnt mean we havent gained skills elsewhere.