‘No Critical Thinking’: Parents Sound Alarm As Tech Begins To ‘Replace The Teacher’
Parents are increasingly concerned about the prevalence of technology in classrooms and the negative side effects this change is fueling among the nation’s children.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic pushed schools to embrace remote learning, many have become increasingly reliant on technology, moving assignments digitally and providing each student with a computer or tablet to facilitate their classroom education. But after watching their children become angrier, less sociable and less educated, parents wonder where the teachers have gone.
“What do we do with an iPad all day, eight hours a day, in the hands of our children? Patricia McCoy, a mother of four in Wyoming, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Honestly, it’s worrying. They’re giving your kids worksheets on iPads. There’s no real critical thinking because they’re giving them apps to replace teachers.”
Even when parents ask for extra help for their struggling children, the solution in some schools still comes down to more technology.
“If your child is struggling with math, instead of tutoring them, they will recommend using this app on their iPad to teach them how to do that math,” McCoy continued. “But this app doesn’t teach them how to do the math. They approach the problem and it gives them the solution written and worked out, so no critical thinking is done. The answer is given to them. They have ChatGPT at their fingertips, and other things similar to ChatGPT, which, again, do the thinking for them. And all they have to do is show up, log into the iPad, get the answers from one app, put them into another app and to get the grade.”
This makes some parents wonder where the teachers have gone and if they are actually teaching their students.
“THEY DON’T WANT TO TEACH”
“Covid created a lot of that, and it made it a lot easier for some teachers to just put these kids in front of a screen,” Mike Maldonado, a father of five from California, told DCNF. “And that makes it easier for some of these teachers because they don’t want to teach. They’re just there for a job.”
“We can’t ignore the fact that all of this makes the teacher’s job easier, which actually, I think, produces a worse outcome,” said Frederick County School Board member Jaime Brennan, who spoke on her behalf, not her. “When a teacher can go online and write an assignment using AI, they haven’t thought about it anymore. Now they’re not using their intelligence, and it’s like a trickle-down effect. We’ve already introduced screens and technology to a level that, as humans, I don’t think we were designed for, and we haven’t adapted to it very well.”
Critically, Brennan said, the use of AI has prevented students from developing automaticity, the ability to memorize basic solutions, such as simple addition, to the point that one doesn’t even think about it, which is a fundamental skill that students maintain throughout their education and adult lives.
Third-grade teacher Nicole Brown sits at a laptop with one of her students during a lesson at Carter Traditional Elementary School on January 24, 2022 in Louisville, Kentucky. (Photo by Jon Cherry/Getty Images)
McCoy told DCNF that the digital learning environment has left his youngest son “two to three years behind” academically compared to his siblings, who have not kept up with this new screen-based school system.
“He’s considerably further behind academically,” McCoy said. “He’s doing what it takes to succeed, but intellectually and academically he’s years behind his two brothers and sister at that age, and it’s sad and heartbreaking as a mother to know that I probably failed my child because I accepted what the school said was going to help them.”
Even though he’s “years late,” McCoy’s son is on track to graduate on time.
“We’re graduating kids who have to go to community college and take remedial classes,” Brennan said. “Our kids are leaving grade 12 and going to grade 13. So we’re sending kids back who aren’t ready to function in the mainstream world.”
OWNED BY THE SCREEN
Not only is she worried about his education, but the concerned mother has noticed a noticeable change in her son’s mood, who is forced to spend more and more time in front of a screen.
“I tried to take my son’s phone once, and it was like a demon was looking at me. My son wasn’t looking at me,” McCoy recalled. “His eyes were completely black and cold. It was like he was a totally different person, like a drug addict, and you were taking their drugs. And he was 15 at the time.”
Without his phone, McCoy said her son was a new person.
“That week, he was a totally different person. He wasn’t too tired or sleepy all day. He was actually interacting with the family and spending time with us. Instead of being cooped up in his room, he was playing with our dogs more,” McCoy said. (EXCLUSIVE: Group of parents sounds alarm over ‘companion’ apps leading children to suicide and harming development)
Maldonado believes these behavior problems stem in part from the lack of human interaction children experience in increasingly screen-dependent classrooms.
“Part of the problem is they lost a lot of the interaction,” Maldonado said. “That’s why I think some of these kids are acting out, because they don’t want to listen to the teacher. There needs to be that communication between two people, two humans, and not a screen where they can’t really interact and get the tone, the voice inflection of a response.”
“It’s a major problem,” Maldonado continued. “Without social skills, how do you function in society? And we see that all the time. Social skills are learned, it’s a trait that you learn from interacting with people when you’re young. And that’s the most important thing, people don’t realize that if there’s no interaction, that person is going to be removed, not only from the classroom, but from the home and from society.”
The problem is particularly apparent among children who were younger during the Covid year, Maldonado said. So-called “Covid babies” are usually “the ones you can see having the majority of behavioral problems.”
“It’s hard to get some of these kids to look you in the eye and make eye contact. They don’t know human interaction,” Brennan acknowledged, adding that today’s students don’t even go out as much as they used to. “I’m really worried about where this is going to go and what our children will be like. We’re already seeing the negative impacts of this disintegration, people are waiting until later to get married. They’re not getting married.”
THE PRICE PAID BY AMERICA
Meanwhile, as the use of artificial intelligence (AI) among young people increases, more data and stories are being published revealing that the tool often exposes children to inappropriate content, harms the development of critical thinking, and sometimes drives children to suicide by explicitly coaching them to do so. Brain scans from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) found that brain engagement was significantly decreased in participants using AI compared to those using a traditional search engine, and that memory after tasks completed with AI was reduced.
Interestingly, schools that are struggling with budgets and often fail to see promised district-wide staff increases somehow find funds to purchase new devices for every student, even when they already had slightly older, but still functional, devices.
” Most [the money goes] on administration and fees and other things that have nothing to do with educating our children, or they spend this money on these expensive iPads and technology that shouldn’t even be in the classrooms, and then they go to the state and say, “You’re not giving us enough money.” We need more money,” McCoy told DCNF. “Well, we keep throwing money at the problem, but the problem is not getting better or going away. The situation gets worse every year. So it’s clear that money doesn’t solve the problem of our children’s inability to read, write, and do math.
“Stop spending money on iPads and instead reinvest that money into classrooms,” McCoy continued. “Give it to the teachers.”
While Tina Descovich, co-founder and CEO of the parent advocacy group Moms for Liberty, shares the concerns of many parents, she also told DCNF that there could be a place for technology in classrooms.
“I think they need to be used very responsibly,” Descovich said. “There are so many wonderful teachers who would love to use AI to improve their skills and teach their children better.”
Moms for Liberty signed a pledge with the White House in September to help foster innovation and interest in AI among America’s youth.
Brennan remains concerned that technology in the classroom prevents children from thinking independently and could harm the development of future skills rather than facilitating an interest or expertise in technology.
“Are you trying to keep up with kids who are learning how to use technology, or are you trying to create kids who are going to develop technology? Because those are two different things,” Brennan said. “So if we’re just teaching our kids to be technology consumers, then of course the easy way out is to make it all about technology. If you’re trying to continue to teach kids to be technology developers, they need to learn how to think and process outside of technology. They need to have other skills that aren’t technology-based.”
PARENTS ALWAYS HAVE THE POWER
For parents concerned about technological takeover of their children’s classrooms and who feel like their schools aren’t listening to them, Descovich said that in addition to helping their children at home when possible, parents should “rally with like-minded parents.”
“Start educating your community,” Descovich said. “I think when parents really understand what’s going on and what their concerns are and what the risks are, they’ll want to take action. And when enough parents show up at school board meetings and talk about a problem that we have, as we know, you can definitely make an impact, and they will listen to you.”
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