What’s Next for Schools?

By Matt Miles and Joe Clement

The cavalry is coming. There is light at the end of the tunnel. This nightmare is coming to an end. Pick your expression of hope that things may soon be returning to “normal.” For schools, we worry about what that might mean.

Between us, we have forty years of classroom teaching experience. Most thinking adults and kids who have seen online school up close and personal, as students, teachers and/or parents, will tell you that school on a screen is not really school. Calling it virtual school is right on. We look at our kids staring at a screen all day long, and it’s unnerving. Not quite right. Better than nothing, perhaps – but that’s a pretty low bar for what we should expect from schools.

However, all of that is going away once “things return to normal” (whenever that is), right? Kids and teachers will be back in school, eventually without masks, and we can all get back to school as it was before Covid showed up. That’s a nice narrative, but that assumes school decision makers are going to make that happen, and educational technology firms are going to walk away from all of the cash – and the free data they’ve been mopping up for months. Neither is likely to happen, and we must be on guard – because while there is scant evidence that education through screen-based digital technologies is good for kids, there is a growing mountain of evidence that school this way is bad for kids. When we see school going on in this manner, our intuition tells us something’s not right. We need to listen to it.

It’s not that nothing good can come from using digital tools in the classroom. But because something can have benefits does not mean that it will. Because digital tools can be helpful in certain situations does not mean that kids need to have them all day in order to learn.

Here’s an analogy:

Suppose you are considering a home renovation. Your house is fine as it is, but it’s a little crowded and could use some updating. No change you are making is truly necessary, but it might be nice to have more room. It’s fun to think about the possibilities: a bigger kitchen; a guest room; another bathroom; a fireplace. Oooh, a fireplace. However, you likely won’t get everything you want because that is really expensive. You have to think about the costs. That is the only reasonable way to make any decision: to consider the costs as well as the benefits.

When it comes to educational technology, though, many decision makers often think only about the cool stuff and the possibilities. We are told about all of the great things kids can do if

only they had the tools. Too often, though, these same decision makers ignore costs. We do not do a good enough job looking at what kids actually do when they have these digital tools. The costs of screens in school go far beyond dollars and cents. No discussion of technology’s role in the lives of our children is complete without honestly and fully considering the enormous social, psychological, emotional, physical and intellectual costs alongside any potential benefit. The point of using digital technology in the classroom is the same as using any classroom tool, from chalk to paper to iPads: if a particular tool is the absolute best way to help a student learn content or a skill, then that is the tool that should be used. Sometimes, that tool is some sort of screen-based device. Most times, though, it is not. Well-intentioned technology initiatives (in which, for example, all students gets a device to keep with them at all times) miss the mark on this point. Why give a student a laptop 24 hours a day if that laptop is really only the best tool for three lessons in a week? There is a reason we do not require our Social Studies students to bring a protractor to class: they do not need one. Math teachers don’t require students to have screwdrivers, and physical education teachers don’t require students to carry calculators. The notion that a child needs a computer in order to learn every day is equally absurd. Laptops and tablets have © Can Stock Photo / Len44ik helped create an approximation of school over the last several months. Once some semblance of “normalcy” returns, the temptation will be great to continue our reliance on them. We need to guard against that so we can be sure we are doing what is best for our kids, and not just what we’ve gotten used to.

About the Authors

Matt Miles and Joe Clement are award-winning teachers and coaches in Northern Virginia for well over a decade. In 2017 they authored the book “Screen Schooled: Two Veteran Teachers Expose How Technology Overuse Is Making Our Kids Dumber.” Since then, they have spoken out about the problems created in screen-dependent children and issues around educational technology. Matt has authored articles published in Psychology Today, Education Week and the Washington Times. Joe has authored articles published in the Richmond Times Dispatch, Psychology Today, and numerous other publications.