THE FLICKERING MIND: The False Promise of Technology in the Classroom and How Learning Can Be Saved

Are computers the "ultimate innovation" that will lead us into a 21st-century educational utopia? Or are they merely distractions, part of a long line of technological advances that are incompatible with proven traditions of learning? Oppenheimer's book, titled after a metaphor for the short attention spans of today's students, locates the waning educational computing craze in the historical context of an ed-tech trajectory that has brought visions of accelerated academic achievement followed by disappointment. Like B.F. Skinner's teaching machines of the 1950s, computer-based learning promises more than it can deliver, says journalist Oppenheimer. He visited elite public schools, under-resourced schools, high-tech schools and even a school for juvenile offenders, and has interviewed many experts. He draws compelling portraits of excellent schools in which computers play a peripheral role, arguing that the tried-and-true methods of progressive education—inquiry, exploration, hands-on learning and focused discussion—do more to develop students' intellectual capacities than technological gadgetry does. His well-researched and intelligible argument also takes aim at such current obsessions as standardized testing. Oppenheimer doesn't advocate removing computers from the classroom, but argues for a hard look at what can and can't be accomplished with the enormous investments they require ($90 billion just during the 1990s). Policy makers and teachers might be better off, he writes, remembering the basics: good teaching, small classes, critical thinking, meaningful work and the human touch. Agent, Rhoda Weyr. (On sale Oct. 14)