Parent Powered Technology
Education experts gathered at the New America Foundation this morning to offer remarks and panel discussion on the subject “Anytime, Anywhere Summer Learning: Connecting Young Children and Their Families to Early Literacy Opportunities.”
Special Assistant to the President for Education Policy Roberto Rodriguez, National Summer Learning Association CEO Sarah Pitcock, and NYU Professor of Early Childhood and Literacy Education Susan Neuman, among others, shared insights into the opportunities and obstacles of applying technology to combat the effects of summer learning loss.
The “summer slide,” as it’s called, marks both the reversal of academic gains made during the year and a further wedge between the educational outcomes of students from high and low socioeconomic backgrounds. As the panelists observed, students of middle and upper income families often continue to engage in learning opportunities outside the classroom–reading books at home, taking trips to museums, joining storytelling groups at libraries, etc.– while those from lower income families lose access to such academic stimulation over the summer and regress 2-3 months in core proficiencies.
Michael Levine, Founding Director of the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop, observed that there is “no new dose of some magical concoction” to undo and prevent the slide, and Ms. Pitcock added that even “an 8-week comprehensive summer program is not the best fit for every child and family.” Rather, the need is for “a variety of solutions.”
In discussing these solutions, the panelists delved into the question “What role does and should technology play?”
Terri Clark of Read on Arizona (fittingly using technology to join the event via Skype) outlined a recent initiative to establish a “digital library” accessible to all students of the Grand Canyon State, and multiple panelists spoke enthusiastically of the potential benefits of rolling out reading apps, expanding technology resources at libraries in high need areas, etc.
Yet for all the enthusiasm to invest in new technologies and educational innovations, one point loomed above all else: parental engagement. As Mr. Levine stressed, the efforts to harness technology require reaching and mobilizing parents, encouraging them to promote at home reading and a culture of family literacy.
Prof. Neuman cautioned against becoming “so enamored of technology and apps that [we] forget the human connection,” and Yolie Flores, Senior Fellow at the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading, added, “[It] must not be about replacing adults”, but rather “equipping them…[It’s] first and foremost about relationships, and [remembering] that technology is a tool.”
As if straight out of CER herself, Ms. Gutierrez summed it up as follows: “Keep parents and parent power at the center of this work.”
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I completely agree that technology should assist and complement other types of learning, and relationships.
And let’s not forget the power of a book, whether its a bound paperback or on an e-reader. Getting my first
library card, at the little branch near my grandmother’s house, was one of the highlights of my early childhood.
In ways the library was a more important part of my education than school.
The two greatest gifts my mother gave to me, and probably part of the reason I became a writer are:
1. She read to me every night, even when I had every line of my favorite books memorized.
2. When I was an infant, she would settle me somewhere near her and she would just talk normally
to me as she did her housework. No baby talk. She just talked to me as she would any person. After
I started talking, it wasn’t long before I put full sentences together on my own.
Parents don’t need specialized training as educators, or complicated technology. They just need to make language;
conversation and books in any form, a normal, pleasant part of the child’s every day life.