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The Forum > Article Comments > Screen no match for the page in education > Comments

Screen no match for the page in education : Comments

By Mark Bauerlein, published 13/10/2008

Digital technology should meet more antagonists: let's frame a number of classrooms and courses as slow-reading and slow-writing spaces.

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Some years ago, my colleagues and I undertook quite a major review of the use and impact of ICT in schools around the OECD for a federal government agency. Without breaching the confidentiality of our final report, I can say that every country we looked at had invested huge amounts of money in hardware, software, development of online content and training for teachers. The result? There was, in fact, no measurable impact on students learning in any of the countries we examined.

Backward looking as it seems, the way to achieve higher standards of student learning is through reading books, (not texts, books), sustained study which focuses on both thinking and rote learning and high quality teaching which engages and challenges students minds. Happiness, well being, emotional intelligence and all the other fads and fantasies so beloved of modern Education Departments have little if any place.
Posted by Senior Victorian, Monday, 13 October 2008 1:12:27 PM
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Interesting reading, Mark. Very much confirms what I've long suspected.

.."let's frame a number of classrooms and courses as slow-reading (and slow-writing) spaces."

Didn't catch all of it, but heard something on RN the other day about a school that was going to have a class doing all their learning completely online for a year, and they were to monitor the results and compare them against those achieved in more traditional settings. It would be interesting to see a study done whereby the results achieved in this type of online/screen classroom could be compared to those achieved in a classroom set up in the slow-reading and slow-writing space that you describe.

Senior Victorian

"Backward looking as it seems, the way to achieve higher standards of student learning is through reading books, (not texts, books).."

I agree. Connecting children to good quality literature from an early age and fostering that love of reading and connection to good books throughout their formative years is the key to learning. We have some fantastic Australian writers and have built up a substantial body of children's and young adult literature over the years. School libraries should be availing themselves of this wonderful source and replenishing their shelves on a regular basis. Unfortunately though, bookshelves are left to languish, while funding is channelled into the never ending upgrading of computer equipment.
Posted by Bronwyn, Monday, 13 October 2008 10:50:05 PM
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How disappointing to read!

I'm 76 yrs and self taught, computer wise, have been on the net for some 10yrs, and have thought, if only I'd had access to this tech. while younger.
Is it perhaps the net promotion that has brought this about, assuming it's not a publisher's beat up.
While a a printer publisher of education material I lived through tough times. Rising costs of paper,labor and machines crippled me.
A paper book has only one advantage, that of portability, making train travel an opportunity to read, not a great space for study.
I can't help but feel that the opportunity to learn, thru computer use, has not been learned, either thru teacher incompetence, or children are programed into the trash on the internet before commencing school.
I know internet book publishing has been slow to score any points, just try buying a newly published book to read online! Only available after they are out of copyright. sometime up to fifty years of copyright, this is the system that needs change. The same exists for patent, some other system to reward authors and inventors needs be designed, patents and copyright claims are big business today, and hold society to ransom.

Paper manufacture is a destructive industry, I haven't bought a newspaper for 20 yrs. and they are going broke, Posts on chosen blogs are better informed for they are not held responsible to owners and editors bigotry.
What then is the solution? The advantage of individual choice and time
to learn individual pace of learning is surely enhanced with computers
capital cost is slowly becoming affordable to any aware of any and speed only encourages gaming, which is also a learning of sorts.
I use a mac, some 10 yrs old and it has a slow processor, it is certainly fast enough for text.
I hope there are people out there in support of computer learning and that they post here! someone with teacher experience?
fluff
Posted by fluff4, Tuesday, 14 October 2008 11:00:17 AM
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Yes, I saw this in The Australian. Interesting result about the F-scan. That confirms what sub-editors have known for many years. The eye flicks to the right top hand page and then scrolls down in a newspaper until it catches a headline that resonates.

That's why it's more expensive to buy advertising on a right hand (top right) page. The printed page seems to give context, although many news stories these days are not backgrounded. Once upon a time the last para or two was used to give the 'history' of a story.

That rarely happens on line.

RMIT did a study which never saw the light of day about reading on VDU's, short term comprehension and long term comprehension.

The students could remember isolated 'facts' from a story on a screen but had serious trouble remembering them five days later, even when prompted.

The students liked surfing the web but found the act of surfing the web was more interesting than writing the story.
Posted by Cheryl, Friday, 17 October 2008 11:36:07 AM
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This article hits close to home for me: I work for a senior secondary college, managing their Learning Management System (LMS) and producing digital content.

I agree with most of this article. Certainly, e-learning is an appalling medium for delivering liberal arts content. Jakob Nielsen has basically shown quantitatively what those of us who have worked with the web have always said: People just don't like to read on screen.

There is a case, though, for e-learning to be a part (but only one part) of delivering content for other types of learning. In my particular case, that's Vocational learning.

I've been building the LMS more-or-less from the ground up, and the big frustration I have faced is that curriculum developers just don't want to acknowledge the limitations that e-learning imposes. Too often they seem to think that they can just take their paper-based (and all too often, too wordy and education-theory-burdened) lessons, and cut-and-paste them from Word to a web-based LMS.

The result is lengthy, verbose and confusing, and the students hate it.

The key to successful e-learning - in those areas where e-learning is appropriate in the first place - is, in the succinct appraisal of a colleague at a tertiary institution, "videos and games".

It all comes back to what I used to constantly refer to in my days in web development: Appropriate technology.
Posted by Clownfish, Wednesday, 22 October 2008 1:24:54 PM
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