Professors Say Ban The Laptops
from the pipe-down,-I've-got-a-good-hand-here dept
As people deal with the impact of technology on their lives, occasionally there's some pushback, like from law professors banning laptops in their classrooms. The profs say the machines inhibit debate and turn their students into "stenographers", and they're tired of catching people surfing the web or playing online poker during lectures. While that's probably annoying, what's the point in banning laptops because some students can't handle them? If a law student can't be bothered to stop playing poker while they're in class, it's unlikely that taking away the machine is going to turn them into a good, attentive student. There's an inherent risk in adopting new technologies for education, that some people will abuse them. But is it really any different than somebody doodling or daydreaming? Laptop computers aren't making people bad students, they're just doing a better job than pen and paper of keeping bad students entertained.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Agree with ban
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Offer something better
He could for example offer lecture notes that students could just annototate with personal comments or he could get the class to agree on a few designated note takers who would circulate their notes to everyone else.
So far as distractions go laptops are pretty tame. I remember a particularly dreadful math professor I had where I used to read a newspaper in the front row during his classes. I got an A but I don't think he liked me very much.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
I would disagree
[ link to this | view in thread ]
First - make your class interesting. I have attended college classes that are FAR more interesting than Web Surfing and Playing Online Poker.
Second - there's not a whole lot of debate in college anymore - the only debating they seem to do is how bad is America really? They don't debate issues on intellectual integrity, but on how it makes them feel politically.
So in the end, the classes are getting so damn boring, the students find online poker more interesting...
Sounds like a problem with the 'professors' not the laptops. But whatever...
Heck, while we're at it - let's ban notebook paper too - afterall, I used to sit and doodle during boring classes.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Money down the drain
It's their money (or their parents). Let them learn one of life's lessons.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Offer something better
The difference between doodling and the laptop, doodling is much less distractive to those around you. Law classes are generally in ampitheatre seating, so it hard to ignore the flashing and blinking going on in front of you because it is so visible. I can easily read people's IM conversations in class.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Of course, I'm considering bringing a laptop to classes next semester if I can figure out a good note-taking app/technique, so I don't necessarily think they have to be banned, but I certainly think it's the instructor's prerogative to do so if he finds them disruptive.
And I agree with krached that they're a different kind of distraction than doodling. If someone's only entertainment option is some paper and pen, they're more likely to just skip class and be less distracting to instructors (many of whom can just tell if someone's not paying attention).
[ link to this | view in thread ]
They are just distracting, trust me, I've lived it for the past four years.
At the very least, WiFi needs to be under the Professor's control so they can force the students to stop yakking on IM.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
distraction
[ link to this | view in thread ]
WiFi
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Partial agreement
But my comment is to the part about emailing during meetings. I know that the people with whom I work are in a meeting when I get immediate responses to my emails! It cracks me up! Also makes me glad I am neither the leader of the meetings or the professor that gets to lecture to large numbers of scalps (tops of heads)
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Same issue in the corporate world
Of course, that assumes that the meeting is actually useful, but hey, some actually are.
Eric
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Laptops are a tool that increases efficiency. If you ban them, your students will suffer greatly. In the end, the colleges that ban them, maybe not in the short run, but in the long run will suffer from a decrease in college applications.
I have several classes where I may browse the internet/check my email on occasion, but only when I'm not in the middle of something else. For the most part, the students without laptops are at a GREAT DISADVANTAGE. In my Operations Management class, information is thrown at you so fast, that it's all you can do to try and keep up. You can't bother taking notes and trying to figure it out later, you have to build your spreadsheets while the professor is giving the lecture and explaining them.
And as others have said, if a student pays, and doesn't destract others, it's their own future they are playing with. What should be done is having students with laptops sit towards the back of the class so students behind them aren't distracted. In many of the classrooms at WWU, there are only power outlets at the desks towards the back of the room. Most of the time I sit at the back specifically so that I don't disrupt others, and I have yet to have a professor complain.
Fact is, laptops help big time. As teachers bring up subjects and no student understands the subject or someone wants a better explaination, sites like Wikipedia and Google can give a student enough information to spur a conversation on when previously the professor was sitting with silent students.
Why prepare students in a classroom without the resources and tools that they will be using for the rest of their lives? Teach the students how to effectively use the tools and you will be doing a better job.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Games & Web browsing in lecture
Having said all that, the reason why people play games and browse the web is because their attention isn't being held by the class. I think for a lot of students this is because the lessons are pitched at the bottom end of the ability ranged meaning everyone who even approaching average ability has heard most things before and is desperate for something better to do with their time when lecture attendance is enforced with threats.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Overreaction
If the prof is boring and regurgitates the textbook such that any student can easily do well, why should any student pay attention?
Conversely, if they do need to pay attention and don't, then that $50 they made in Party Poker during class is a small consolation to the poor grades on their transcript.
Same with work. If someone is playing on their laptop in a meeting, they clearly didn't need to be there and their time is being wasted. If they did need to pay attention and didn't, someone will notice.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
What some tend to forget...
It's ridiculous to think that a college student has a right to their laptop or wireless Internet access during the course of a class. Companies have policies limiting use of cell phones with cameras, personal laptops, thumb drives, and a host of other devices that could be used to hijack information. The kids better start learning to cut the tether to their IM client, myspace, WOW, and whatever else they're running and get back to the basics of learning and thinking.
Bring a pen and a piece of paper, your book, sit down, shut the hell up with your whining, and learn something.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
People not Method
If someone wants too goof off and not pay attention then they should fail the class at the end of the semester. How does the means of their goofing make any difference to this.
If a student is taking notes on a laptop then there is a good chance they don't need to debate whatever you are debating. Learning is learning, we don't all do it the same.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Anonymous Coward
Second (and technical): once the student walks in a classroom, he/she can only access the professor's website and the lecture material. They simply won't be able to access anyother websites during that period AT ALL.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
First
Having said that, I do agree that laptops should be banned from the classroom, as they ARE disruptive. Hearing the rapid clicking of someone just brainlessly transcribing the course notes is just annoying. If someone is playing solitaire or browsing the web in front of you, it is hard to concentrate when there is obvious distractions. Also, I do believe that the purpose of a lecture it to engage the professor in debate or ask questions, and for the most part, Absorb the information flowing in the room rather then just getting it down on paper.
When I was in university, by my sophomore year, I stopped taking notes in class, period. I found that by paying attention to what the professor was saying, and understanding the information he was presenting, I learned more and did better in the courses then madly taking down notes that are largely available in your course text.
Laptops are great educational tools, but leave them out of the classroom.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Maybe business classes are about efficiency, but science and engineering classes are about learning. Technology has a great potential to come between a student and learning. Almost anyone can graph an equation with a graphing calculator, but to really understand what's going on with it you need to sit down and work it out by hand. Once you understand it there's no reason to do everything by hand, but if you CAN'T do it by hand you haven't learned it.
I graduated last year. Whenever I saw someone using a laptop in class, without exception, they were just using it to IM or web surf. Why bother going to class? Go to a computer lab to do that. That's what I did if I wasn't going to pay attention in class. If you're not paying attention you shouldn't be there disturbing others with your typing. You're not fooling the professor hiding behind your laptop.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
lawyers & technology
At the time the majority of lawyers did not want to use PCs because "we pay our girls to do the typing around here".
The lawyers that wanted to use PCs were little better. They could not understand why you had to pay for software when they could buy floppy disks by the dozen for next to nothing. Some wanted to buy 1 copy of a program and install it on all of their computers.
The kicker was when I selected and installed a time/billing system for a law office. It was the best one I could find. One of the lawyers threatened to sue me for incompetence because the software wouldn't allow him to bill for more than 24 hours in a day.
My experience with lawyers has made me change my consultancy practice to less hazardous clients like Feds, mobsters and bloodthirsty tyrannical dictators.
JS
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Laptops, doodling, its for a reason.
Sadly I have no link to anything to prove this, but I'm guessing its the same thing that allows me to retain more info when I'm listening to beethoven and reading my books over neural nets.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
An alternative strategy
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ever think
[ link to this | view in thread ]
But... I need to get back to my studying.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: Offer something better
[ link to this | view in thread ]
But What About
He apparently doesn't pay much attention in class, but his grades are perfectly fine. He suggests laptops to everyone.
On the ability of cheating alone.. you're not learning anything. Therefore your test scores don't reflect a laptop hindering you. --Your scores are artifically inflated.
Just get rid of the laptops--or rather, disable the internet. There's most of the problem gone. Solitaire, minesweeper, and other games are the only things left. And Microsoft Word, of course.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Old School Technophobes
your laptops for this discussion, I want everyone to
focus on what is being said. Pretty simple.
Its the old school teachers that are just inheriently
threatened by technology in general. Especially in a
law class where a student can look somthing up and
challenge the instructor with intelligent arguements.
The instructors ego says "Im supossed to be the all
mighty powerful knowledge holder."
But really, if the instructor is good, he should
either be able to embrace the technology or control
his class to not use it when it isnt appropriate.
thats what i think.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Consider the bandwidth
[ link to this | view in thread ]
I'm not a law professor, but...
I started deleting all games from the computers whenever I set up for a class, and I noticed two things: 1) it was easier to keep the attention of everyone in the class, and 2) I got significantly better reviews from the students. I mentioned this to other instructors, and before long, the practice spread, and with similar results.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Computers in the Classroom
[ link to this | view in thread ]
After that, we tried actually listening and taking notes on the laptops. That didn't work out too well. Most of the information that came out from other students asking questions didn't translate too well into the straight line, carriage return, line feed of word processors and notepad. Just try drawing a bracket around 5 lines, drawing an arrow to another bit earlier in the notes, and annotating "This will be on the test". Did better, but still not great on the next test.
Once we gave up on notebooks, printed out the slides and made our scribbled notes on them our grades improved significantly. We also started asking questions when we didn't understand and having the printed slides with our notes also helped jog our memory and provide context to the subject.
Thats my experience. It might not be the same for everyone.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: lawyers & technology
Which brings to mind the story of the 42 year old lawyer who dies and finds himself at the Pearly Gates. The lawyer complains to St. Peter that there has been a mistake and that he's died too young. St Peter says: "There's no mistake. We checked your time dockets and you're at least 83 years old."
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: I would disagree
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Read the Article
Second: Anonymous Coward get's it right - read the article.
Third: Professors should be able to run their classrooms as they see fit - especially if it enhances debate (good skill for a lawyer, no?), increases attention and avoids distractions. All of which enhance learning - which is the whole point.
Next people will be griping over their right for a 3rd grader to have Coke served with their lunch.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Achronyms
If this is your idea of communicating, perhaps you don't understand how communication existed before the internet. This is the sort of communication that professors are accustomed to, and the sort that is used in professional settings around the world.
We may work with laptops and the internet, but these are tools to augment our processes of communication, not subvert them.
College is about more than taking notes, memorizing data to be tested on, or spending your or your parent's money and potential. It's abbout forming habits and skills that will make you more productive, effective, and therefore hirable, than the kids that didn't go to college. This is obviously not helping any of those causes.
I went to college, and I lost focus in many classes. Kids can be amazed at their earning potential with online poker to the point of questioning the value of higher education. The fact remains, though, that this practice is just wasting everyone's time.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Ban! (If the professor asks)
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Laptop is the modern equivalent of using pen and p
Now first, to qualify my statements; I am a current university student as well as a teacher and my spouse is a university professor.
Guess what ... I use a laptop while in class.
And while I have seen many students play games, e-mail and/or IM is that any different from the modern workplace? If a students grades slip because you're not paying attention in class then there is a built in consequence. The blame could just as easily be placed on the higher education faculty or facility. There are many "professors" who either can't teach or should not be teaching in higher ed. today. There is also the issue of many universities/colleges teaching to the "lower half of the class" and not having the ability to be flexible with more advanced students. Requiring all students to take useless or entry levels classes just to fulfill degree requirements wouldn't it be a better option to challenge a student than to ban their laptops? But that may take too much of the professors time where their actual job is to publish rather than teach students.
And to a prior comment there are programs to help take notes in class, now while I am not a huge Microsoft supporter, OneNote works well and is specifically geared towards students. You can read their documentation here: http://www.microsoft.com/office/onenote/prodinfo/occupation/education/default.mspx
[ link to this | view in thread ]
I was a law student . . .
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
NO BAN
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: NO BAN
[ link to this | view in thread ]
My experience
However, I had a horrible experience with paper note-taking before I got my laptop. I cannot write nearly as fast as I can type--not nearly fast enough to write down all that I need to. In fact, I end up in a frenzy of trying to get things written down and as a result am not nearly as engaged with the professor and with the rest of the class. Despite this frenzy, I still don't get things written down and end up having to ask my classmates a lot of questions that they shouldn't have to answer for me. With typing I can go at 80 words a minute with no problem, thus preserving everything I will later forget
Also, when I'm writing on paper I have to look at what I'm doing. I can take typed notes without ever looking at my computer (this includes even opening the note-taking application, with the aid of tools such as Quicksilver).
That said, I often see students with their laptops out in class, and I will admit that they are rarely showing good judgment in their use of them. However, it seems rather foolish that their poor judgment should result in me not being able to take advantage of a very helpful technology (there are numerous other benefits in addition to the ones I mentioned, but I don't want to ramble on for too long).
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Employees and school fees
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Learning & Note taking
As a business owner and perpetual student (and part-time lecturer) who has experienced the good and bad of the classroom, I have discovered one thing: My attitude determines my attention level and interest. Boring professors are the excuse of a poor attitude or indifference. Are there boring professors? Without a doubt. Am I saying that I bound into every class with excitement? Far from it! But I have noticed that if I decide to enjoy the class, then I enjoy the class - I also ask more questions during the class. If I make no decision before the class, then my indifference usually moves me toward daydreaming or doodling. Hopefully I catch myself during class and reorient myself - afterall I am paying for this.
Notetaking -
I've noticed more than a few comments on note taking, the 21st century etc.
Note taking is a skill that allows you to retain more information. Notice I did not say stenography. If you're going to write (type) down everything the professor says, then get a tape recorder (er, digital recorder for Rob) and go over the lecture at a later time. Note taking is more than copying down every word - sketches, arrows, lines, etc. all help the note taker to recall the classroom material. (I guess the tablet PCs would allow you to do this, but then you're writing and not typing.) Review your notes that evening and your retention rate doubles. Good notetaking is a skill that can be learned but like all things it takes practice. Taking smart notes will let you put less effort into the process with a huge return for that effort.
In the working world, it's not always possible (or practical) to have a laptop, tablet or PDA available. Get used to pen and paper - it's not going anywhere.
Finally, the deciding factor on this is the professor. If this professor wants to facilitate discussion & reduce distractions then that's how it goes. Paying for a class does not mean you get to dictate how & when you get to learn. You may pay for the class, but you do not get to tell the professor what to teach, how to teach, what room to hold the class, when the class is held, etc. I'd like to know what "rights" students have? Poor note taking isn't a right, it's a decision and a bad one at that. Being a distraction isn't a "right" either. While we're on the subject of rights, what about my "right" not to be distracted by someone typing on a laptop? What about the responsibility of a student to participate in the class.? After all, you can play poker out in the hall. Anything else is a choice - not a right.
If I'm paying for the class, then it's my responsibility to get the most out of my money. I sit up front, pay attention, ask questions and take good notes.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
The flip side is that I've attended more classes than I care to think about where I really didn't even need to show up -- all I had to do was the reading, homework (if any) and tests, and I'd get an A; but since attendance was 10%, I'd wind up attending...snoooooze...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
You have a very interesting site... Please visit m
[ link to this | view in thread ]
You have a very interesting site... Please visit m
[ link to this | view in thread ]
You have a very interesting site... Please visit m
[ link to this | view in thread ]
You have a very interesting site... Please visit m
[ link to this | view in thread ]
You have a very interesting site... Please visit m
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]