The PaperandPencil Computer Guy PaP CG

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Humans have one thing, only one thing, we can control- each choice we make. Nothing but our choices matter.

Background: I owned a computer store for almost 25 years. During that time I tried to convince anyone that would listen to spend money on technology they needed, technology that would help them achieve a goal. I discouraged people to just spend money on new stuff. I saved people thousands of dollars, and companies tens of thousands, leading them to what they needed not what they thought they needed.
I had several opportunities to make that impact on government institutions. It just never happened. They were always happy to spend extra to achieve less. This page is dedicated to one niche of that spending: public education. They have gone beyond overspending and crossed into actually working against their defined mission-educating our kids. I'm also a father. What I have seen in our local schools, which mirrors national trends, is the reason we all need to get involved and do something. We are paying for our children to be made more ignorant and become more dependent on technology. Their brains are being underdeveloped. They aren't learning multiplication tables because they "will always have a calculator". They are being taught dependence, not how to rely on their own brain. This is insane!
Technology (we can have the AI discussion separately since it is relatively new) is a wonderful "memory" device. It stores the knowledge we have discovered and accumulated. Using my example, a calculator has the multiplication tables stored and spits out the answers so we didn't have to remember them ourselves. Technology does not think, it's just memory storage. It cannot replace the human brain in relation to creation, discovery and thinking.
Unless we believe we have discovered all the knowledge in the world and stored it in the archives of technology for reference then we still need to teach children how to think. You might argue there are even more reasons our kids need to think, but take that as the bare minimum.
I love tech. I enjoy tech. It is a tool that we are lucky to have. But we must use it for our betterment. We cannot teach our kids to become dependent on it. We cannot accept that our schools might teach them to be dependent on it.
-Thoughts from the Paper and Pencil Computer Guy

Learning how to take notes was my key to surviving college. The skill of identifying key phrases and information the professor would have on a test was something that served me through my professional career.
The trend today is to transcribe notes on a laptop. This captures more words, but would not teach me anything. I would have to read the transcript and make notes to absorb the material. That would take at least twice as long.

Good book about the overuse of tech in education: The Digital Delusion by Dr Jared Horvath.

Technology is a reasonable substitute for memory. It stores knowledge and enables is to use it. Technology is not a substitute for thought.
American education is teaching students how to use technology instead of teaching them the buildings blocks to understand the concepts in use first. There are kids that can't multiple without a calculator (or a phone or computer that has one). They can't spell without autocorrect. They aren't using tech for assistance or efficiency, they are becoming dependant on it.

Technology in American schools is making our students stupid. Teachers have known it for a long time. Finally research is coming out to prove it