Here’s an interesting (to me, scary) article in Scientific American.  Now that ‘everyone’ has a smart phone–and calculators are allowed in many classrooms–EEK!– kids (and everyone else) don’t need to memorize stuff.  They just need to click and get it.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=smartphones-mean-no-longer-memorize-facts&WT.mc_id=SA_sharetool_Twitter

I remember how glad I was when my kids’ school did not allow calculators–that was back in the ’90’s. Times have changed. No one needs to know who the first President was– or how much 3 apples will cost, if each is 19 cents. Just look it up in a flash. Wow, that was easy!

Yet, I find this unsettling. What happens when the battery dies?  Or the smart phone is lost?  What will anyone know or be able to do?

I still believe the best calculator and ‘smart’ gadget is our brain–and it needs to be nourished, challenged, and educated.

About Miriam

Miriam Kurtzig Freedman, JD, MA—an expert in public education, focused on special education law— is a lawyer, author, speaker, consultant, and reformer. For more than 35 years, Miriam worked with educators, parents, policy makers, and citizens to translate complex legalese into plain English and focus on good practices for children. Now, she focuses her passion on reforming special education, with her new book, Special Education 2.0—Breaking Taboos to Build a NEW Education Law. Presentations include those at the AASA Conference, Orange County (CA), Boston College (MA), CADRE (OR), and the Fordham Institute (DC). Her writings have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Education Week, Education Next, Hoover Digest, The University of Chicago Law Review on line, DianeRavitch.net, and The Atlantic Monthly on line.

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