
The Digital Gap Between Rich and Poor Kids Is Not What Was Expected - tysone
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/26/style/digital-divide-screens-schools.html
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jhallenworld
My kids get school supplied iPads. They get some real life experience from
this: how to deal with terrible school mandated applications. This mirrors my
experience working at IBM.

For example, in one app they have to enter answers to homework, but the app
does not allow you to edit the answers once entered. So, my kids have learned
to write their answers in a google docs, and then cut / paste when they are
really done.

Oh, they also learn that the school IT guy reads their email if they use
naughty words in it. Also there is a perennial question of whether the iPad
spys on our home network when they are home..

~~~
imjustsaying
I dont understand the iPad thing. Why not laptops? It's a huge burden to do
work on a toy instead of a proper machine. They're being conditioned to use
inferior tooling.

~~~
gowld
iPads are cheaper than laptops, and it has to be Apple because Apples are
pretty.

~~~
imjustsaying
Agreed, although I'm not sure iPads are cheaper than budget laptops even after
whatever subsidy Apple may give schools to do vendor lock-in.

This doesn't bode well for the "Are schools daycares or for skill
development?" debate.

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jfim
> Her older son, who has A.D.H.D., would get angry when the screen had to be
> turned off, she said, which worried her.

Completely anecdotal, but I was chatting with a teacher a couple of months
ago, and she said it's actually a common thing with young children that have
been raised on screens. They are addicted to their devices and have poor
socialization skills, so they tend to throw tantrums when asked to put the
devices away to focus on the class itself.

~~~
dzek69
It was just the same about 23 years ago. My cousin was raised by TV/PC screen,
drunk dad and overprotective mother that would do anything to keep him quiet
(screen worked the best).

He was kind of ADHD person, never confirmed by anyone, but he was jumping in
place everytime something exciting was on the screen, always wanted to move
around, hit other people. And most noticeable - he was furious when somebody
told him to turn off tv/pc.

I've seen many not behaving kids of course, this one had uncontrolled access
to technology even then.

And now we're alarmed? We had a lot of time to notice. Don't forget that TV
and computer isn't something new. People were addicted to mobile phones
(without internet of course, just SMS) even 10 years ago.

~~~
twtw
> It was just the same about 23 years ago

Did your cousin carry the TV around with him?

> TV and computer isn't something new. People were addicted to mobile phones
> even 10 years ago

It used to be rare to see teenagers with cell phones, let alone toddlers. The
iPhone is ~11 years old, and in that time it has become common for me to see
people of all ages, from toddler up, always on a smartphone or tablet.

I disagree strongly that the situation is just the same as TVs decades ago.

And I'm not interested in the picture of the people reading newspapers on the
subway. It's always been common to ignore strangers of public transit, I'm
more interested in a photograph of friends/family staring intently at their
own newspaper while at a dinner table or some other social event. This is the
norm with smartphones, and color me skeptical that it isn't new.

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forgotAgain
A child learns first from their parents. I feel sad for kids when I see
parents involved with phones while walking a baby carriage or attending a
soccer game. Parents show by their actions which is more important, people or
tech.

~~~
stephengillie
Would you feel better if the parent were deeply involved in a newspaper or
book? How about if the parent was constantly screaming obscenities at the
referee? Parents aren't honor or duty bound to pay rapt attention to every
second of their child's life. It's one human caring for another, and few
humans have identical interests.

~~~
wffurr
No, in either of those cases. Those are also awful things for a parent to do
at a child's soccer game.

The issue with screens is due to the addictive quality of experiences on
screens (tuned by highly paid experts to increase "engagement"!) causes more
people to turn to their screens than would otherwise be distracted by other
things, such as newspapers.

So instead of tolerating your child's soccer game because bringing and reading
a newspaper would be a hassle, seem antisocial, and not be that much more
interesting, one can just whip out their pocket computer and have some bright
colorful beep-boop gamified but ultimately meaningless experiences much more
engaging than the game.

~~~
stephengillie
The addictive screen argument is almost as tired as the argument that video
games are bad.

It's like the argument about students starting out the window, or at a
ceiling, during a lesson. The answer is not to remove the windows, nor is
"scolding the ape" a good solution. The real answer is to compete on
engagement, and make the lesson more interesting than what's outside the
window.

Likewise, the way to have more people engaged in a sporting event is to make
the game more engaging. But then more people yell obscenities at the referee.

In the end, all of this "screen time" nonsense is just a dumb way for some
people to feel better than other people.

~~~
wffurr
Windows aren't designed by teams of highly paid experts to drive engagement
metrics. There is no way ordinary life can compete with that.

------
gumby
A few years ago my son's (private) high school introduced ipads. The class
that had spent a year piloting them was mostly unhappy with them. He led a
movement against their introduction. Finally the principal took him aside and
told him, "Regardless, if we don't have them parents will think we're behind
the times and the reputation and parent satisfaction will fall."

Which reminded me of my time on a school board -- the parents wanted all sorts
of things that the actual teachers/educational experts thought wouldn't help.
Each time I looked into these suggestions the obvious excuses of teacher
laziness/dogmatism didn't appear to be the case; it was mostly parents who'd
talked to someone or seen some article or simply "just knew".

~~~
LeftTurnSignal
>> "Regardless, if we don't have them parents will think we're behind the
times and the reputation and parent satisfaction will fall."

In a previous life, I worked at quite a few schools (public and private) as a
consultant. How the parents would react and what they thought was always
priority number 1. The second priority was how the students would react,
because if they reacted negatively, then the parents would inevitably get
involved. I've seen this from K-12 from all over the US.

I also have had a lot of teachers and administration say that their biggest
issue was making sure the parents were happy with everything. A few even said
that it didn't matter what the kids thought, as long as their parents thought
one way or the other.

/not every school is like this so ymmv, but a depressingly large amount was.
This was 5 years ago, but I really doubt anything has changed.

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mynegation
It is a food story all over again. Few hundred years ago additional body
weight was a sign of riches, as they could afford excess food. These days with
the prevalence of sugary and processed food tables have turned.

Same with screen time - staring at cute animal videos and other junk is not
the same as using the screen for a quality education. Quality education
(still) needs a lot of human guidance which is getting increasingly more
expensive (at least relative to an abundant screen time)

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alphabettsy
I find this to be true when observing how friends with children raise their
kids. People with more education seem to have severe limits on screens and
lower education folks seem to let screens entertain their kids all day
everyday.

~~~
thrower123
This strikes me as some weird virtue signaling, as part of the package of
well-to-do enlightened whiteness. Watching tv or playing with computers is not
intrinsically good or bad; you have to think about what content you're
delivering. I spent most days watching old-school History Channel while
playing with Legos or army men. Likewise, almost all of my knowledge of
geography and a significant chunk of history comes from playing strategy games
on the PC. If I was watching the Disney Channel and playing Fortnite, then
that would be less productively used time, I suppose.

~~~
eropple
I grew up similarly to you (though less army men, more Legos), but I do think
we are looking at a difference of kind today with video games. You're right in
that Fortnite would be different--but that's because Fortnite (or, worse,
mobile games) are a dopamine flood. Intuitively it feels like the loot
treadmill of an old MMO (I lost a lot of friends to WoW addiction back in The
Day) but with a tighter loop that more easily can ensnare people, particularly
kids. I absolutely can't prove it, and wouldn't judge somebody for letting a
kid play them...but I would be a little uneasy if I had kids.

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icebraining
How is Fortnite different from any other FPS we had twenty years ago, like
Tribes?

~~~
eropple
Loot boxes, mostly. Gacha games and the like pioneered it and now it's in
everything. The slot-machine pull does something to people, and I'm more
worried about what it does to brains that haven't completely set yet.

~~~
lozaning
Fortnite doesn't have loot boxes. There's skins and dances, but you buy them
all directly, there's no RNG. At least that I've found in my ~30 hours of
playing the game.

It's just like golden eye, but now you've got to pay to play as odjob.

~~~
eropple
Sorry, you're right, I shouldn't have used the example of Fortnite when I
personally play PUBG. And Overwatch. Both of which do. ;) My reach exceeded my
grasp.

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r_klancer
This is actually why I want to get my 6yo a real, old-fashioned boot-to-BASIC
computer.

We've minimized her screen time (she gets ~1hr TV per week and _no_
phone/tablet/computer time outside school) and the result is she knows how to
entertain herself with drawing, writing, reading, or just _playing_.

My kid is still entertained by _typing_ words and sentences onto my computer
(the one computer activity I've occasionally let her do). It feels like the
window for her to be entertained by typing in commands and seeing them do
something is still open ... but maybe not for long.

Unfortunately, many of the "hackable computer for kids" products like Kano
assume a full UI, Internet access, etc. Which seem like a counterproductive
distraction.

Relevant HN discussion about boot-to-BASIC:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18228740](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18228740)

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holdenc
Screens are fine. But wasting time is not. My middle schooler is allowed
unlimited screen time for ebooks, video editing, photoshop, and writing (other
than messaging). youtube and social media is rationed.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
Same question here - how do you ration this? I am looking to swap to ubiquity
network router just to get some control back.

Being able to create such fine grained control on ios seems ... unlikely

~~~
holdenc
My solution is pretty low tech. I have a second desk in my office for my
daughter's constructive computer time. So, I can look over her shoulder. All
time spent on mobile devices is assumed to be youtube and social media.
Limiting this sometimes means taking the device.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
Thank you

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wccrawford
>Her older son, who has A.D.H.D., would get angry when the screen had to be
turned off, she said, which worried her.

And the solution was to take away the thing he liked most? Did this actually
help anything for him, or do they just not have to deal with him having a fit
now?

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brootstrap
Just had a baby girl and my wife and I are planning on how to manage this...
When we go out we see families where every kid is loaded up on an iphone,
including the adult kids. Lets go out to eat and every go on the phone, very
nice. I'm speaking from an odd spot, i grew up playing a shit load of
computer/video games. However I also enjoyed running around outside with my
neighborhood friends doing whatever , playing sports and all of that good
stuff. Curious to find what the future holds and I think my own screen time
will be limited as the baby gets older. OR i'll say your only screen time is
dark souls, better get started young

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mmagin
I think the real way to see this is as "who is being taught how to think and
who is being taught how to do mindless busywork in minimum-wage jobs?"

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Tsubasachan
Digital piracy bridges the divide. Movies, software, music, books: available
to all regardless of financial status or what country you live in.

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casper345
Technology in schools always takes a lot of adjustment to enhance learning
than make another distraction. Technology should be seen as just the medium,
not the ends to education

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thowthisaway
How are you suppose to curve the kids off screen when adults aren't able to to
that themselves? Monkey see, monkey do

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programminggeek
Screens are designed to distract, not educate. A screen is a great place to
learn if you are not in a classroom or if you are trying to avoid class. It's
a terrible way to be "in class".

I learned this in college back when laptops were expensive and relatively
rare.

~~~
y4mi
So, you learned it before moocs were invented? The internet was a very
different place 15 yrs ago.

I admit that it's easy to just use screen time for distractions. But not
everyone does and there is an increasing quantity of learning material
available nowadays.

It's actually become hard to find quality material because of the quantity
available.

Also: taking notes with a pen takes ages. typing is quicker and needs less
attention

~~~
greggyb
> Also: taking notes with a pen takes ages. typing is quicker and needs less
> attention

Unsure if this is in praise of writing or of typing, or if it is a neutral
statement.

I much prefer paper note-taking, except for its inconvenience. I notice better
retention when I use pen and paper. When I take notes on a computer, I'm
taking dictation, rather than processing what I hear.

~~~
y4mi
i notice better retention when i add content to an Anki[0] deck as cloze type
question and actually repeat the content a few times.

just writing it down was pretty much useless for me. but everyone has their
own way of remembering, i'm sure just writing it down with a pen works for
you.

[0] [https://apps.ankiweb.net/index.html](https://apps.ankiweb.net/index.html)

