# School Technology and Parental Opt-out **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 17, 2026, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763 "2026-02-17T20:40:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2026, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763/21 "2026-02-18T00:30:20Z")
> [@raspberry\_hunter](#): > > You can be be brilliant, but if you can’t communicate that brilliance to anyone, it won’t do you any good. Yeah. My kid still has pragmatic language issues, which means he can’t describe a lot of the things he understands. This is most notable for vocabulary which is low average on tests. What he can understand and what he can articulate are vastly different. We’re working on it. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2026, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763/22 "2026-02-18T00:56:59Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > they still need to know how to use them and be comfortable navigating them. Screens aren’t going away any time soon. > [@Beckdawrek](#): > > We use screens as tools. Shouldn’t our kids learn to as well? What is it about using screens that has to be explicitly taught or else kids won’t know how to do it? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2026, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763/23 "2026-02-18T01:20:07Z")
> [@raspberry\_hunter](#): > > I was under the impression that work needed to be shown for full credit on the AP Calculus exam (I can ask kiddo when I get home; @Chronos should know). There’s a multiple choice section and a free response section. Work is irrelevant on the multiple choice; just bubbling in the right answer. On the free response section, the bulk of the points are for showing your work. You don’t need to show all of your work, but there’s no way of knowing in advance which work will and won’t be worth points, so best to show all of it. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2026, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763/24 "2026-02-18T01:24:45Z")
Thanks for the clarification. This is going to be sooner rather than later for my kid. At the rate he’s going I’ll be surprised if he _isn’t_ doing calculus by 7th grade. Whereas I never got that far in high school. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2026, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763/25 "2026-02-18T01:52:30Z")
I said “learn”. (I’ll look back, I might’ve said taught, too) But, the kid needs access to said device to learn it. Lots and lots of kids don’t have access anywhere but school. I say you put a kid in a chair with a device and they’ll know more than you in a couple hours, how to physically work it. Not necessarily safely without some adult intervention. I can see where a child with some disability could get great use of knowing how to use it and navigating the big wide world. With my speech impediment, I could’ve used a good texting device in school. Alas, none available at the time. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2026, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763/26 "2026-02-18T02:45:45Z")
How much of the teaching material now really requires a computer to backend it? Textbooks are fine, but by now I would have thought there would be high quality replacements that are fully interactive. I have zero idea of what school level teaching looks like nowadays. But I would have imagined that for a lot of the core common subjects there would be significant competition to provide high quality end to end book replacements. At university level it seems (at least during my recent dipping back) that textbooks are still a thing but paper versions are very rare. Most students use a reader or laptop. I’m not convinced this is a net positive. Setting open book exams becomes impossible, for one. I like open book exams. Makes it really hard for students that just coast or memorise stuff. Which _is_ a net positive. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2026, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763/27 "2026-02-18T23:17:52Z")
> [@Francis\_Vaughan](#): > > I’m not convinced this is a net positive. Setting open book exams becomes impossible, for one. So you lock down the computers so that the textbook is all the students can access. Granted, clever students might figure out some way to still cheat, but students have always been figuring out ways to cheat. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2026, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763/28 "2026-02-20T03:03:27Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > There’s research showing that information collected online is not processed in the same way as it is through paper literature Anecdote time. Growing up, we copied notes off a chalkboard, which eventually became an overhead projector. But we still had to copy all our notes by hand. When I got into college, things started to transform. Professors found out easier to photocopy all the notes and hand them out so everyone had their own copy. Saves time waiting for everyone to keep up writing. That’s when I came to the personal revelation that I was remembering less. I eventually surmised that the act of copying the notes while also listening to the teacher have my brain parallel learning methods, which comings complemented each other. When I just listened and read along with maybe an emphasis or two, it wasn’t sticking as well. At least thats my guess. It’s likely the difficulty and quantity of content to learn played a role as well. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/school-technology-and-parental-opt-out/1027763.md?page=1)