Computer use might be hurting students’ reading skills

Overall, students who use computers moderately at school tend to have somewhat better learning outcomes than students who use computers rarely.

The report – Students, Computers and Learning: Making The Connection – says that even countries which have invested heavily in information and communication technologies (ICT) for education have seen no noticeable improvement in their performances in Programme for global Student Assessment (PISA) results for reading, mathematics or science.

Ten years ago, what did the OECD report suggest? About 96 percent of the 15-year-old respondents in the OECD study are using computers at home, while at least 72 percent are using one at school, cited Connect.

The report from OECD highlights concerns pointed out by the teachers and the unions that use of technology can have a very negative impact if not implemented in a proper way. Students in the United States also scored among the top for their abilities to “think, then click” when browsing the web for schoolwork.

No specific conclusions could be drawn about why computers haven’t fulfilled what many consider to be their promise in classrooms, but the bottom line for school systems, Schleicher said, is the “need to find more effective ways to integrate technology into teaching and learning”. For example, as far back as 2009, an Australian study showed that performance in “digital reading” was closely related to performance in “print reading”, suggesting that digital reading skill is not so much a marker of digital skills but of general literacy. Both those countries fared worse than Canada in math scores, the OECD report says. While the debate continues as to whether the use of computers can enhance learning generally, there is absolutely no doubt that all school-leavers should be digitally literate.

“It’s a huge benefit really because there’s so much available out there now in terms of information and knowledge and opportunities to communicate, so it’s not just one way”, she said. As well as being taught explicitly, all of these digital skills should be woven seamlessly into the teaching of everything from mathematics to science to business and, increasingly, to the humanities.

But the United Kingdom did complete some details in a questionnaire about how often students use technology at home and in the classroom.

As implausible as it may sound, the use of digital technology devices like computers does not necessarily make students smarter, a study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) revealed.

The study is relevant to any school board considering a significant investment in more technology, Owston said.

Our students would benefit from a judicious combination of traditional and computer-based activities in classrooms. Most notably, students who frequently used computers didn’t test well in reading.

Students in Hong Kong get better grades because they spent less time on school computers than students elsewhere in the world, research published on Tuesday by the the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has shown.