Carrie Derr

October 5, 2003

SLM 521

Journal Critique #2

Oppenheimer, Todd. (July 1997). The Computer Delusion. The Atlantic Monthly, 280, 1. P. 45-62.

In this article, the author challenges the assumption that computer use in the classroom significantly improves teaching and learning. Todd Oppenheimer reviews accounts of past historical figures claiming that the next generation of technology will enhance learning to the extent that textbooks and even teachers are not necessary any longer. However, the author has pointed out in his article that although technological advances have supplemented education, none of them has replaced teaching and learning techniques to the extent they were predicted. Computers have been the latest technological advance predicted to improve learning, but the majority of the studies are inconclusive so far as that they lack the validity needed to convince all peoples of their performance. Many studies do not account for differences in teaching styles and methods. Nor do they use scientific controls or situations which may be reproduced. In spite of this, in 1996 “teachers have ranked computer skills and media technology as more essential than the study of European history, biology, etc…” (1997, 2). Schools have begun discontinuing programs in art and music to pay for more computers in the classroom. Childhood specialists contend that children must learn first about the physical world through “hands-on” activities and interactions that engage their minds and then they may learn about technology. If too much emphasis is placed on computer use and being “computer saavy,” children lose the ability to think creatively, to question what it is they’re learning and to use their imaginations.

I agree with Mr. Oppenheimer that there hasn’t been enough research done to thoroughly prove that computer use improves learning. However, research has not yet disproven it entirely, either. The classrooms I have participated in have had computers, but the students were not absorbed with them. The computers were to be used for a class activity or when other work was completed to supplement a particular lesson. However, I can understand why childhood specialists fear that extended computer use will diminish a student’s ability to think creatively and manipulate objects in their physical world because computers are 2-dimensional and do not promote 3-dimensional thinking. The less and less a person uses their cognitive abilities to problem solve and think, the more they loose those abilities. Basically, hands-on learning and teaching have no substitutes. Children must interact with peers and teachers to gain the support and insight they need.