Now every little adolescent punk, both male and female, now think they are masters of the universe, whereas in Truth & Reality all they "know" is the "reality" created by TV in particular, and the electronic media in general.
Perhaps as this author argues we truly have reached evolutions end, and with culturally catastrophic results.

1. http://www.ratical.org/many_worlds/JCP98.html

No wonder education is in a mess! Schools - public and private alike - are full of decrepit old farts who started their teaching careers in the 1950s, 60s and 70s. Sad relics who are just incapable of adapting to the digital age.

Piffle. Pure piffle. Fabulous story, pity about the facts.

I'm with Paul on this drivel, having used slate and chalk like most kids in the fifties, the idea of using paper was revolutionary but the internet thats mind blowing.

A kid today can acess more information in one day on the internet than my generation could find in a lifetime. If school on the air can work for children in the bush why not for children in the city. Get the best teachers and to run the service and sack the rest.

Yet another way to prove the old adage "all generalizations are false".

"Administrators and assessors faced unmanageable problems as they tried to stick to the old [pre-internet] system"

How can the internet do anything BUT assist a student in learning a foreign language? Or help with their English, for that matter.

Or how it can possibly corrupt the teaching of mathematics? Or of chemistry - how many arguments can there be over the periodic table?

The author's near-hysteria is all over the shop. One moment it is discipline...

"Teachers struggled to maintain order. But the forces of disruption were too great."

The next moment it is the flood of new information sources...

"...teachers lost the control of the information that had been crucial to the ordered classroom. Lesson plans would not work: answers were questioned, and assignments and assessments were suddenly in doubt."

That is 80% nonsense.

Why would lesson plans no longer work? What on earth is wrong with "answers" being "questioned"? How exactly are assignments adversely impacted?

Assessments in a few subject areas, it has to be said, are vulnerable to the student's ability to cut and paste from online sources. But these are often detectable in the same way they are sourced in the first place. An unequivocal statement that such behaviour, when detected, will be treated in exactly the same way as cheating in the examination room, should be a sufficient deterrent for most.

>>This evidence of the education revolution is to be seen everywhere. It has created havoc in every institution and disrupted every aspect of learning and teaching. The system is reeling under all the pressures.<<

Oh, please.

If teachers find themselves unable to keep pace with their subject in the context of new information sources and new means of presentation, then they should be dismissed, and denied a pension. To simply cry "woe is me" because there are some new tools available is an act of cowardice.

But I doubt that many real teachers feel the same way as the author. In fact their intelligence is probably feeling grossly insulted.

Predictable nonsense! My children are happier, brighter, better-informed and more resilient than I ever was at school. They have never been injured by a bully, been humiliated by a sadistic PE teacher, been sexually interfered with by a priest, or had to travel 20 km by bus to find a library which could answer their homework questions. They don't snigger furtively about sex or indulge in prejudice against gays or children of other races. They have every chance to grow up into happy well-adjusted adults.

In fact their main complaint about school is the daft and pointless filters which cripple the school computers' access to the Internet and make them largely useless for research.

Great point Jon J,
The school I work at has filters that are so strong, children can not even access any pictures. To get something unblocked, I have to go through a lengthy and somewhat frustrating process. Fair enough, some web material needs to be filtered, but so often the filtering is so inaccurate that they block useful educational sites.

I have three computers for my class, that arrived at the school in 1997. They take up about a quarter of the room.

The pedagogical approach to computers at the school - is in a lab teaching basic computer skills. In reality, my kids have these skills and only enjoy computers when they have the freedom to create and explore.

It takes drive from the top to change the attitudes towards computers at school.

While I don't agree with everything in the article, the title certainly rings true in my own short professional experience.