[WalterBright]

That would be correct! And all the technology added since has resulted in no discernible improvement in educational results.

In college, the classes were a lecture with a professor, 9 blackboards and colored chalk. Not even handouts (well, there was one on time dilation).

Calculators utterly wiped out slide rules when I was in college, though nobody learned any math from a calculator. Calculators just made for quicker work to more significant figures.

[lazyasciiart]

So you’re saying that educational technology has no noticeable negative impact on educational results. Since we know it has some practical benefits, such as accessibility, that would be a strong argument for using it.

[WalterBright]

You are correct that it does help with disabled students. The overwhelming majority of students, however, are not disabled and are not helped by technology.

[KPGv2]

"back in my day, kids listened to their elders"

> all the technology added since has resulted in no discernible improvement in educational results.

I would say it's because it's used stupidly (also I'd take a Millenial's education over a Boomer's any day). One of the best things about technology is that my kids can carry one lightweight tablet instead of 50lbs of back-breaking books. They can look up reference materials immediately instead of spending an hour looking at World Books that end up having little to know information (insert essay about being assigned a report about the golden lion tamarin in elementary school and all libraries in my town put together had one paragraph.)

Yesterday while driving my kids from camp to a celebration lunch, they asked a question about science and I was able to talk to my car's AI (apparently this is a thing in new cars!) and model how one goes about getting an overview of a topic through curious inquiry.

But plopping a kid in front of a computer isn't a panacea. I just think it's the pedagogist's fault, not the tech's.

[WalterBright]

> instead of 50lbs of back-breaking books

Are you joking? I carried one or two books from the locker to class, if that.

> instead of spending an hour looking at World Books

I had a set of World Books. Looking things up in it usually meant encountering a number of other interesting entries in it. I never ever spent an hour looking up something. It is alphabetized, after all.