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Education and Digital Learning

 Copyright © September 1, 2020 by Robert Wayne Atkins, P.E.
All Rights Reserved.

Education

Nations that have better educated people have a higher standard of living than nations that have a lot of uneducated or poorly educated people.

In order to continue their educational programs and minimize the problems of CV-19, a lot of schools are implementing digital learning programs to service their students.

Digital Learning

Children Using a Computer Some of the new digital programs are really good and they achieve the same goals as a traditional brick-and-mortar school.

However, some of the new digital programs are too simple and they are not achieving the level of knowledge transfer that is desirable. And some of the digital programs are too ambitious and they are over-loading the students with more work than the students are accustomed to doing during the average school day.

These problems are being encountered because many schools had to make an almost immediate transition into some type of digital learning program and they did not have the time to properly research the best way to create a digital learning program. Therefore some of these new programs were not based on a realistic appraisal of how a digital learning program should operate.

These new digital learning programs may or may not be successful in the long-run depending on how they are managed from this time forward.

Some of the problems with digital learning are:
  1. Some students cannot afford a laptop computer to attend digital classes.
  2. Free meals to qualifying students will need to be addressed in a way that ensures that the students actually get the meals intended for each student.
  3. A very limited number of students do not have the intellectual skills to do well in a normal educational program of any kind, including a digital learning program.
  4. Some parents have a full-time job and they cannot stay home to supervise their children.
  5. Most very young children do not have the self-discipline to do well in an unsupervised digital learning program.
  6. Young people need some daily social interaction with other children of their own age group. This is especially true for a single child in a home without brothers or sisters.
  7. Young people need to spend less time on their tablets, laptop computers, and mobile phones because these devices do not enhance a person's skills in being able to interact with other people in a traditional manner which is absolutely necessary to become a successful adult, spouse, and parent.
  8. The technology used by the new digital programs does not always work correctly due to a flaw in the software, or to a problem with an assignment not being correctly uploaded into the software, or to a problem with a student's computer not be able to access the software for some technical reason.
Some of the advantages of digital learning are:
  1. New schools do not have to be built to accommodate an increase in the population within a geographical area.
  2. Migration of students between different geographical areas does not cause changes in the employment of qualified teachers because qualified teachers can be acquired from any area within a state.
  3. School books do not have to be acquired if the material that is covered each day is freely available as a part of the digital learning program.
  4. Pencils and paper are minimized if students are allowed to complete their assignments using their laptop computer and if they submit their digital answers using an internet connection.
  5. Students can ask questions during their digital class session. If it becomes necessary students can also ask questions using email after class is over and the student will receive an answer at the beginning of the next school day.
  6. There is no travel time to and from the school and this reduces the amount of "unproductive" time each school day.
  7. There will be no issues with "bus misconduct" or "bus breakdowns" or "sick bus drivers" or late arrivals due to some type of bad weather or highway accidents that temporarily disrupt traffic.
  8. Exposure to offensive foul language will be significantly minimized. An educated person does not need to use filthy words to clearly express his or her thoughts.
  9. Bullying by other students becomes almost non-existent.
  10. Sexual problems, including sexual abuse, becomes almost non-existent.
  11. Drug problems become almost non-existent.
  12. Students remain healthier because they have a very limited exposure to the normal childhood illnesses (measles), or to the flu during the annual flu season, or to unique illnesses such as CV-19.
  13. Social status, such as expensive clothing and shoes, does not impact the way individual students are treated.
  14. Racial, religious, and other types of discrimination become almost non-existent because students do not interact with each other on a personal basis.
  15. A wider variety of "elective" courses can be offered to students. When students have the opportunity to select classes that are of special interest to them then their overall average scholastic performance normally improves.
Some suggestions that may help new digital learning programs become more successful are:
  1. If all students are evaluated each year when they are enrolled in a digital program then each student can be assigned to a class that approximately meets each student's educational abilities. This makes it easier for all students to succeed and for all students to be appropriately challenged based on their abilities.
  2. A mother who needs to stay home with her child for some reason (such as her child is in a digital learning program or a homeschool program) could open up her home and offer to supervise other children in her immediate neighborhood so each child can participate in each child's own daily digital learning program if the students bring their own laptop computers with them and if each student's laptop computer has the appropriate software already installed. The mother could charge a reasonable fee to supervise the children who stay in her home during the day. Each child could bring their own lunch with them and this would allow each child to eat something that appeals to the child. The parents of the children could continue their full-time jobs and pick up their children at the end of the workday. This would not be a daycare facility. It would simply be a way for several children to complete their daily digital learning assignments and it would also allow the children to have some social interaction with the other children in the home. Each child could be in a totally different digital learning program because each digital learning program is self-contained and independent of other digital learning programs.
  3. A digital learning program should have a physical education and safety class that meets at least two or three days per week. This will help to enhance a young person's health, stamina, coordination, and strength. There are a lot of different exercise options available and this would add variety to the class and make it more interesting and more enjoyable.
  4. A digital learning program should have a limited number of different software programs and platforms that the students are required to access. This would help prevent some of the technical problems that some students experience when they have to access a "unique" software program or platform.
  5. Digital learning programs should not try to fill up the entire school day of a student. Digital learning programs should allow an adequate amount of time during the school day for students to complete most of their assignments during normal school hours. Digital learning programs should not require students to do several hours of work outside of the normal hours for class. Brief homework assignments are okay but if every class has a 30 minute homework assignment then the student will have several hours of homework assignments to do before the next school day and this is not desirable for a digital learning program to be successful, and for the program to successfully accomplish the transfer of knowledge, and for the program to be well received by the students and by the parents of the students.

Conclusion

Digital learning will eventually replace brick-and-mortar schools just like handheld calculators replaced slide rules, and PowerPoint slides replaced overhead transparencies.

The transition to digital learning programs can occur with the minimum number of problems if schools will simply follow a few reasonable guidelines for their new digital programs.

Respectfully,
Grandpappy.

Grandpappy's e-mail address is: RobertWayneAtkins@hotmail.com

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