Computers as teachers: do they work?

Computers are in our schools now, and students are using them every day. Are they dehumanizing? Do they teach anything? Will teachers reject them? Charles Durang, science and computer editor for Reston Publishing, explores some old computer myths.

Can you remember, not too long ago, when no one thought computers would get into the education business within our lifetimes? We heard most of the following:

“We won’t use computers in our schools because they are too expensive.”

“Computer-aided instruction is dehumanizing — it’s mass production, lockstep, standardized education.”

“The computer can be a very useful tool, but the teachers and administrators are too conservative. They may also be afraid of being replaced by the machines. It will be a long time before computers are accepted in the schools.”

“It’s another form of programmed instruction, and look what a bust that was.”

Well, it’s time to take another look: each of those statements bears a little examination in the light of what’s been going on during the last year or two.

Prices of all computers have been dropping rapidly, and with the advent of the under-$100 Timex/Sinclair 1000 (nee Sinclair ZX81), there is no school district — and few families — too poor to jump on the computer bandwagon. One company is producing a package including computers, monitors, cassette storage units, software and perhaps printers — at a price for ten systems that compares to the price of one Apple-based system!

Today, the computer is proving, when employed for simple drilland-practice exercises, to be more individualized, more self-paced, more forgiving and less judgmental than any teacher and classroom environment can be. Computer-aided curricula are able to be more truly “competency-based” than anything that has gone before.

For inductive kinds of learning (although this kind of thing is clearly in its infancy as far as currently available software goes), a computer program can support and manipulate a large data base for student exploration and discovery of facts and relationships — at the student’s pace, at the student’s direction, using the student’s methods. We can learn how to learn even as we learn facts!

The misconception that lay beneath a lot of the anti-computer rhetoric was this: on the one hand you have a teacher, a living, feeling human being who will be sensitive to all the students in class and adjust the environment to help them; on the other hand is the machine, inflexibly programmed to proceed at its own pace.

The reality is that the teacher cannot address every student’s needs simultaneously — in fact, the classroom environment mandates lockstep methods — while behind the computer is another thinking, feeling human being who wrote the program the student is using. The student is not learning from the computer, but from the program — ultimately, from the teacher who created the program. By repeating tirelessly at the student’s option, moving ahead rapidly in response to student progress, and trying alternative approaches to the same concept when indicated, the computer provides the true self-paced and individualized environment. And the uncertain student will find his confidence growing in response to the program’s encouragement, rather than shrinking because of classmates’ derision or a teacher’s ill-concealed dismay.

Teachers are rapidly overcoming their legendary (and, it appears, largely fictitious) “computer anxiety” and recognizing the potential of this new medium. They are actively seeking to put the machines in the classroom; principals and superintendants are putting them in the budget.

A recent survey by Market Data Retrieval shows that 24,642 school districts in the U,S, now use computers for instructional purposes, including 10,499 of the nation’s 52,000 elementary schools (an increase, at the elementary level, of 80 per cent over last year).

There is the recognition, on the part of parents as well as teachers, that today’s students will have to understand and be able to deal with computers to survive in tomorrow’s world.

There is also — though it is a secondary consideration — the fact that the computer’s basic data processing capability for recordkeeping makes it easy to administer each student’s program in a way tailored to the individual.

Most important, of course, is the fact that educators realize the potential of all we said above, and that the microcomputer as “teacher’s aide” can provide both remedial and advanced self-study — at ever-declining cost — to supplement the teacher’s own efforts.

There is little doubt of the truth of that statement, and there certainly is a relationship between programmed and computer-programmed instruction. There is even the chance that computer-aided learning will indeed suffer the fate of its predecessor. But the differences are encouraging:

1. The climate today is more receptive to a new approach.
2. The computer is innately more powerful, and more interesting to the students, as a tool.
3. The potential economic rewards are such as to attract the best people (educators as well as programmers) to the software effort.

There is a lot of educational software out there already, but much more is needed. It is likely that, this time, the good will drive out the bad, rather than the other way around.

Perhaps the most exciting facet of the computer-assisted learning movement is the extent to which computers are being used at home for education of all sorts, and for every member of the family!

Parents are eagerly rushing to purchase personal computers to help their children learn at home — either because there are computers in the local schools, or because there are not! The resulting pressure from the home front is likely not only to speed the in¬ troduction of computers into schools, but also to improve the quality of education in general.

Such programs as Reston’s Self-Teaching Software for the ZX81/TS1000: Mathematics I-VI are likely to be found much more extensively in homes initially, and find their way into the schools somewhat more gradually.

Also, because learning is not just for kids, many adults without children are buying home computers specifically to learn new skills or topics. People who cannot afford the time or money to take courses, or who are embarrassed for one reason or another about being seen in a class, are embarking on their own programs of individualized learning.

You can certainly anticipate the first suggestion from this corner: go get a computer if you don’t have one! The Timex/Sinclair 1000 is a good starting place. While it is not a competitor to Atari for games, or to IBM for business applications, it is a superb learning tool — and a sophisticated machine that the programmer will not outgrow as he progresses from novice to expert. Second, be conscious of the computer as an educational aid at home. Look for appropriate software for learning, not only for the children but also for the adults in the family. Remember this: your home computer is not only good for learning about various topics . , . and not only for learning about computers because they will be all around us for the foreseeable future . . – but also for learning about thinking and problem solving.

Someone has said, and many have repeated it, that the computer will always do exactly what you tell it to do, which is not necessarily the same as what you want it to do. Learning to program a computer, even at a very rudimentary level, teaches clear thinking and problem-solving analysis in a way that the freshman Logic course always aspired to do.

Don’t worry if, when you bring home your computer, your children only want to “play games.” First, they will learn from the games. Second, they will next want to make up their own games — they will learn to program. And, perhaps later rather than sooner, but almost inevitably, they will put that pro¬ gramming knowledge to work in other areas.

Educators, students, parents, learners: you cannot go wrong by owning a computer today. You may not learn what you thought you were going to learn. But learn you will!