Recently, I was on two short consulting calls about AI in education with school leaders in the United States.
In both, the talk started about AI implementation …
… but then it went broader to the screen time debate.
Everyone in education — especially in edtech circles — is talking about it right now. Books like The Anxious Generation and The Digital Delusion are calling us to have critical conversations about the place of tech in our schools.
Honestly? I think we need to have those conversations. I’m all about focusing on what makes teaching and learning truly great.
But in many cases, we see parents, politicians, fellow educators, and others in our communities with agendas. Rather than having discussions, they show up with cherry-picked stats and talking points that don’t always reflect the realities inside the walls of schools.
Lots of the loudest voices are on the far ends of the spectrum — “technology is the devil” or “technology is the savior.”
And then here we are … folks who work every day in classrooms with students. We’re in what I call the reasonable middle, saying … “I use tech when it helps. I don’t when it doesn’t help. It’s a tool. Why are we getting so bent out of shape?”
How did this go sideways so quickly?
After the big ISTE Conference in Orlando — and after having lots of conversations with a variety of educators (including my wife, who’s a high school social studies teacher), here are some things we need to fix in education in our relationship with devices and screens.
What would you add to this? Do you agree/disagree with these? Share your thoughts in our DTT online community here.
5 things we need to fix about screens in schools
1. We need to fix the illusion that it’s a “balance.”
I find myself slipping into language like this all the time: “You have to find the right balance between tech and no tech.”
Then I catch myself. Because it’s not a balance. It never was intended to be a balance. I think that’s part of the problem. We casually use language to describe the place of technology that is rather inaccurate.
In my own classroom, my students will have their Chromebooks out all of class on some days — because the apps they’re using contribute to the activities and experience I want them to have. But sometimes, they’ll stay closed and under their desks for days on end. In the end, it’s never a 50/50 split.
We use the tools that help us accomplish our goals. And it’s never balanced.
2. We need to fix the assumption that technology is inherently innovative and effective.
I accept some of the blame here. Over the years, as devices have become more and more prevalent in schools, there’s been this belief that technology makes us innovative, creative teachers — and that technology helps make learning more effective. That’s just not the case.
Here’s what’s interesting about this. I rarely hear anyone say this. I can’t ever remember saying it directly myself. But with incessant tech PD days and trainings over the years, it has silently sent that message to teachers. We didn’t have to say it out loud, but where you allocate your minutes says a lot about your priorities.
Tech can be a tool that helps create the conditions for innovative, creative, effective learning … but it doesn’t do it by itself.
3. We need default to “tech off” rather than “tech on.”
Years ago, the default in my classroom was “tech on.” Every day, students grabbed Chromebooks out of the classroom cart, turned them on, and logged in without question.
Now, I teach at a school where students bring Chromebooks to class every day. Before class, they’ll work on homework or watch videos or do any number of things on them. And sometimes, if I’m not careful, I won’t tell them to put them away.
What happens then? It’s easy for them to sneak away to digital distractions.
Defaulting to “tech off” doesn’t mean you aren’t going to use it. It doesn’t mean you don’t believe in its place in education. It’s just a simple condition that helps students avoid the addictive pull of technology. (Read more When to put the devices away (and what to do when they're gone)
4. We need to center professional development on learning, not on tools and features.
I talked earlier about all the minutes and hours of PD we’ve spent on tech tools and features.
Where’s the professional development about pedagogy … about instruction … about cognitive science? These are the categories of understanding that drive the success of teaching and learning in our classrooms — and the effective integration of technology into instruction. But in too many schools and districts, we stop learning about them after our college teacher prep programs.
If we really believe in improving instruction for our students’ sake, it should be rooted in what actually helps students learn.
5. We need to spread the word.
When people want to attack the place of technology in the classroom, they’re usually armed with the worst examples. Why? Because they’re probably listening to someone who has an agenda — and it’s easiest for them to make their case with bad examples of tech use.
The parents and the folks in our community need to know the whole story.
If they’re going to form a fair, balanced opinion, they should know the whole story …
- They should see the creative things students can only do with the technology.
- They should know about the power of instant feedback — and how well it scales across a large classroom.
- They should see how it lowers and eliminates barriers to learning through accessibility tools and features.
- They should know how well-crafted AI chatbots can provide students adaptive, personalized explanations and questions right on their level.
And they should know how it fits in a classroom and in a school — not as the ONLY way to teach, but as a powerful tool to use when it makes sense … as determined by a highly qualified, experienced teacher.
We should knock it off with all-or-nothing thinking
This is the trap I see far too many people fall into.
Ban tech/AI … OR … embrace tech/AI.
“It’s terrible and ruining education!”
OR …
“It’s not going anywhere so we should get with the program!”
The best place to be, I’ve found, is in the reasonable middle … where so many caring, experience, practicing educators in classrooms are.
Everyone seems to see this as a technology issue. In reality, I think it’s an implementation issue — and a perception issue.
If we can work on that, maybe we can work toward a model of education that prepares students for a tech-saturated future — but also the skills they’ll need to think and be human in that future, too.
