How Every Kid in Montclair Can Have a Private Tutor

Yesterday, a piece in the NYT explained how technology could ultimately be used in schools (and already is in some) to provide students with the kind of one-on-one tutoring valued in classical education.  The article delineates how, for instance, online learning (e.g. a lesson or course taught via the Internet) can teach important concepts:

Online education used to be mostly correspondence courses put on the Web. But no more, as interactive simulations for trial-and-error experiments become routine. An example, Ms. Means said, might be Web-based software to teach elementary school students the concept of density by testing if virtual objects float or sink in water. Size and weight alone, she noted, determines whether an object floats — and students can test their predictions against online simulations.

“Students are not repeating something they learned by rote, but making if-then judgments,” said Ms. Means, an educational psychologist at SRI International. “The more of that you can do, the more real learning goes on.”

This is something I've thought a lot about in the past.  In fact, not so long ago, when I was exploring my kids' educational options, but realized homeschooling would never work for our family, I considered hiring a tutor who could work with my kids, providing enriched but traditional tutoring on an individualized basis for about four hours a day.

I figured "socialization" could happen in extra-curricular settings, as they participated in sports and other activities.  

Quick calculations led me to believe we could do this for somewhat less than sending both kids to private schools, but with the high taxes in Montclair, it wouldn't make sense.  (And thus the voucher system appeals to me on many levels. Much to the consternation of my liberal loved ones!) 

For this, and other reasons, I let the brainstorm fizzle.   Always, I hear the voice in my head that argues, They need to learn all this stuff--how to stand up for themselves in a big crowd, how to deal with the sarcastic, mean, or disorganized teacher, how to deal with boredom.

But I am on the fence.  I'm not so sure  young children should have to deal with boredom, unresponsive teachers, or conforming to the crowd.   (And if this is a requirement of our society (e.g. the typical workplace or the political system), let's question that, instead.)

So technology holds a promise here.  But not just for kids and families who have a certain idea of education, like tutoring or homeschooling.  It can also work, obviously, for the schools themselves, perhaps making fantasies like mine unnecessary, even obsolete.

In fact, it seems a little weird to me that technology is not used MORE in our classrooms, and that it's still being debated at all.  There's so much talk in our district about differentiated instruction.  With technology, you've got one very very good way to make that actually happen.

I teach at Montclair State, and we are constantly being exhorted by the higher authorities there to remember whom we are dealing with--digital natives, born into (and sometimes, on) the Internet, texting, blogging, and You Tubing the way my generation phoned, watched TV, and appropriated Pink Floyd lyrics to communicate our ideas and explore issues.  Yes, I can have my college students write essays and listen as I lecture.  But if I really want to know what they're thinking about the material?  I'd better read their Tweets about the class, too.

Kindergartners must be taught to use the Internet, first and second graders to blog, third graders to create videos demonstrating their understanding of colonial America, and so forth.  

And not next year or within ten years.  But now.