Here's another school question:

With as much technology that is available today, some are asking if students learn better from a computer than from a teacher. Do you believe this to be true? Keep in mind that many people take college courses online, instead of going to an actual classroom and taking notes from an instructor. For me, I disagree. I think teachers are needed to humanize the whole process. What do you think?

I would say I'm just a hair in favor of computers. In my own personal experience, I've had a boatload of shitty teachers where even a computer could've done their job better. I think good teachers do humanize the whole thing, but on the other hand I don't think just any ol' lump of a flesh should be put up in front of 20 children and pronounced "good enough."

Not everyone has a computer, or a good one. What happens when their PC or internet goes down? I don't think teachers can be so easily replaced by machines.

Chris wrote:

Not everyone has a computer, or a good one. What happens when their PC or internet goes down? I don't think teachers can be so easily replaced by machines.

What happens when the snow drifts keep the humans from getting to school?

My grandson did homeschooling, mostly thru internet connection. My daughter got her BA from a computer school and is now working on her Masters. I think it is just the way of the future in the present.

I have just been compiling my 300+ published opinion letters to donate to the county library and realized when I started in 1981, it was written by hand. Then I got a manual typewriter for years. Eventually, wanting to do desk top publishing I got my first computer around 1995 (IBM Aptiva 4 MB of RAM) Now I have a dell with gigabytes and able to communicate with ppl all over the world. Including a college prof if I so desire.

I don't write letters to the editor any more. I may comment on a newspaper online webpage - and the debate is on as to how long news printed on paper will be around.

THIS is how we do it now. Why go back to an archaic tradition?

What about in public schools though? I've been reading through some cartoon joke books from the 60s and 70s, several of them have the children threatening the teachers 'you know, you can be replaced with a machine', so clearly the idea is nothing new, but would it be effective? In a classroom, there are going to be things a human teacher can catch onto that a machine just can't.

It depends on the student. I was home schooled and hated it, and failed at online college, but got a 4.0 at "in person" college so I think some people need the human interaction in order to learn.

thepossiblepolice wrote:

It depends on the student. I was home schooled and hated it, and failed at online college, but got a 4.0 at "in person" college so I think some people need the human interaction in order to learn.

I never took an online course, but I know some people who did....and they say it's more strenuous than classroom assignments, because of the leisure of it. I took an A/V course last semester and only barely passed it because the majority of it was on computer (lab work) with the teacher being a little too hands off. I thrive best with the structured environment of a hands on teacher.

I think computers are useful tools for education but I'm old school (literally) and think there needs to be human interaction between a student and teacher. That doesn't mean I think they have to be in the same room. Is that what you meant Shale?

alan smithee wrote:

I think computers are useful tools for education but I'm old school (literally) and think there needs to be human interaction between a student and teacher. That doesn't mean I think they have to be in the same room. Is that what you meant Shale?

Yeah, sort of a virtual classroom, maybe with prof and students connected in chat or C2C. I remember years ago seeing this as some sort of model for the future of schools.

I think it would be really hard to replace a teacher. I think a combo of both is the best way to learn. Problem with computers, though, is that they can't comfort kids. One of the little kindergarten kids tripped coming in from lunch today and fell quit hard - bumped his head. I helped him up, asked if he wanted a hug, and he practically launched himself into my arms and wouldn't let go. He was scared more than anything, as he'd tripped over a couple of older girls, though we don't know exactly what happened, as he wasn't sure, either. I think with older children, computers can take a more prominent role than they do in many situations, but elementary kids still need the human touch far more than a computer.

When I first read this question, I had the idea that students would learn ONLY from a computer and wasn't thinking about online courses, as with most online courses, there is still an instructor on the other end. I interpreted the question to mean no human on the other end in any form other than the person/people who developed the computer program. It's not truly a computer replacing a teacher if you fire off an e-mail or paper to a person who answers or marks it and then sends it back. I had an image of a "robot" type teacher, with students communicating and learning only from the computer and no humans involved at all. Was that what you were thinking, cateyes?