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When I was at school, there was a mass cull of blackboards. A playground rumour suggested it was because they were racist. Some suggested that the price of chalk had rocketed. Whatever the reason, up and down the country, these ancient tools of learning were removed and replaced with whiteboards and washable markers.
We became familiar with the sight of the teacher shaking those pens to get them to work. Countless duds would be tried and rejected until, eventually, the exasperated pedagogue would settle for a moribund blue. You had to squint to make out the pale script.
You would think lessons had been learned. In fact, the Labour government has since put whiteboards at the centre of its education policy. Only now the whiteboards are, magically, interactive.
As part of the same relentless drive for modernisation, £1.65 billion is spent each year to meet such pledges as one computer for every three secondary school pupils.
That this faith in IT might be misplaced was highlighted this week when the £24 million Brunel Academy in Bristol — one of the Government's flagship “wireless” schools — announced that it had reverted to pen and paper.
The headteacher, Armando Di-Finizio, described technology as a “white elephant” and complained he had yet to see a school where wireless worked. The most efficient way to keep tabs on children, he had found, was not a swipe card system but an old-fashioned register.
Tony Blair's big idea in education was never choice or access, and certainly not investment in teaching, but modernisation of precisely this sort. (This despite, or more likely because of, the fact that by all accounts he could barely switch on a PC.) We undoubtedly live in exciting times for gadgetry. But relentless neophilia distracts from the fact that new technology is expensive and fallible. Teachers constantly complain about losing control of classes as they wire up laptops, crash, click, reboot, abort …
Short of being some kind of Luddite, I was among the first generation of kids to grow up with computers. When the school patronised us with IT lessons, we had a better grasp of what they could do than the teachers did — and perhaps a more sober view of their limitations.
Certainly, I consider myself lucky to have been among the last academic years to use libraries and write out essays longhand, to learn patient reasoning and research. As we seek to replace lovely durable books with expensive, expendable iPads and teachers with robots, it's worth remembering the story of Nasa's space pens. The Americans spent millions developing a writing impliment that would work in zero gravity. The Russians had a far better solution. Their cosmonauts simply took up a pencil.
Salute to straight guy Sacha
Curious to see Sacha Baron Cohen at the Evening Standard Film Awards on Monday night. When he collected the Peter Sellers Award for Comedy for his performance in Brüno, he was dressed not in lederhosen or a mankini but in an ordinary suit. He did not sodomise a Filipino, brandish an African orphan or speak through his penis, but instead appeared to be a well-brought-up Jewish man from north London, a bit luvvie-ish, but essentially down-to-earth. And yet, for some reason, this performance was completely compelling.
Broken Britain is pure Chekhov
A Populus poll published in the Times yesterday offered some fascinating insights into “Broken Britain”. Some 70 per cent agreed that society is indeed “broken”. However, people were generally upbeat about the future: 55 per cent thought their children's lives would be better than theirs (37 per cent worse) and 60 per cent viewed the future with optimism (37 per cent with anxiety).
The most striking statistic was that 42 per cent said they would emigrate if they could. Forty-two per cent?! Would any other Western country have such a high figure?
In sum, it paints a strangely Chekhovian picture of the country. Like the Three Sisters we pine to leave our drab surroundings and make grand speeches about the future — and yet we are doomed to stay put. It's worth remembering that Chekhov insisted that his play was “a comedy”.
A prelate wasted on the church
Poor Rowan Williams. The Archbishop of Canterbury urged tolerance over the issue of women and gay bishops at General Synod yesterday. The more regressive elements find the prospect outrageous; liberal Anglicans criticise him for indecisiveness. He is bitch-slapped from both sides — and, of course, subject to the usual adolescent ridicule of the atheist movement.
And yet he remains the most sane and dignified person in high office in the country. He has spoken wisely against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, corporate greed, the sexualisation of children through consumerism and homophobia — and he does so with a subversive wit. Advising Tony Blair to read Dostoevsky after his Chilcot inquiry appearance was particularly treasurable.
No doubt his Christian critics will take the endorsement of a non-believer as proof of some failing or other. But I can't help thinking he is wasted on the church.
Reader views (8)
The space pen/pencil thing is an urban myth. Ask Stephen Fry 
It's not true they used pencils MP - pens work, ordinary, bic pens.
I don't understand why everyone had to make it black or white. IT AND pencils and pens I say. Calligraphy is a marvellous theing, so is penmanship. Writing longhand is wonderful in some circumstances, but I wouldn't want to to churn out the thousands of words I do at work everyday.
- Qi Fan, London, 09/04/2010 09:21
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You seem to be confusing different issues in your article about IT in schools. While you are entitled to be skeptical of interactive whiteboards, I think you are slightly misleading readers when you mention the problems at the £24 million Brunel Academy, where they have reverted to pen and paper - for marking registers - because the wireless swipe card system doesn't work.
Swipe card registers and interactive whiteboards are two completely separate issues - as a teacher myself, I tend to agree that swipe card registers are a bit of a white elephant. However, interactive whiteboards can be a very useful tool in the classroom.
A final note - the classrooms where I teach have both traditional whiteboards and the 'magically' interactive ones, so the teacher can still choose to use the moribund blue pens if they so wish. However, I know which type of board most students and teachers would prefer.
- Tom, Kilburn, 19/02/2010 19:30
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Don't you watch QI? Dispelled the pencil myth forever ago...
- Grace, London, 12/02/2010 01:48
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Richard, you pride yourself on being a member of one of the 'last academic years to use libraries and to learn patient reasoning and research', yet fail to do your research on NASA's space pen with the necessary rigour required of such a self-elevating position.
That the Russians 'merely used a pencil' is an urban myth. NASA did use pencils and found that small flakes of graphite posed both a health hazard to astronauts and a danger to sensitive electronic equipment in a zero-gee environment.
Flawed research not withstanding, your summary of teachers' experiences with technology are not completely inaccurate. Through the course of my own career I have been witness to many poor, and occasionally dangerous, uses of technology within schools. Teachers do indeed waste considerable time wrestling with recalcitrant equipment.
Yet rather than re-enforce the media's disparaging attitude towards technology, you would be better served to focus your 'patient reasoning' on the root cause; namely a lack of training, a lack of standardisation and a lack support for the technology once it is in place.
Frequently teachers are given the role of 'IT Co-ordinator' with nothing more than a basic knowledge of IT. School budgets do not stretch to having a competent computer professional running their IT; rather they rely on part-time 'have a go Dad' local outfits which cause as many problems as they solve.
Technology is not the problem. Poor planning and execution is.
- Drew Wagar, Ashford, Kent, 10/02/2010 21:47
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Bah humbug, Mp from London. Enjoyed the urban (cosmo?) myth much more.
Can appreciate that IT has helped in schools but too often young people go into the workplace with few basic skills these days. I'm probably older but than you and was among the first generation of pupils to use computers at school. I am not sure what I learned about them in school when we were patronised with IT lessons. The only thing that has stayed with me is GiGo - garbage in, garbage out!
- Mel, Surrey, Surrey, UK, 10/02/2010 21:26
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Oh, how I identified and agreed with that image of the teacher confused and frustrated by the technology in the classroom! Just in the last two days I've struggled trying to find the right frame on a DVD, show the carefully planned clip from youtube and even just find the volume control! Meanwhile the class becomes restless and you grow more and more embarrassed and the whole 'enriching' experience is ruined and time is lost. Books, paper and pens, at least are manageable and reliable.
- Annie, Bristol, 10/02/2010 17:09
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I read your last few columns with great interest, and continue to enjoy your writing(good turn of phrase). But I cannot agree with you on this one. Computers have revolutionised my lessons (I am a Primary school teacher). I see your point about getting them to actually work (that can be hell) but I don't think you can ignore the digital age as soon as the kids step into the classroom. School has to reflect what is going on in the wider world. Anyway, rant over. Hopefully you'll return to form next week, or at least say something I can agree with!
- Jamie, Kilburn, 10/02/2010 13:56
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The story about the Americans spending milions on developing a pen to use in space is untrue. They used pencils like the Russians. The Space Pen was developed by a private business, and then sold to both the Americans and Russians.
- Mp, London, 10/02/2010 11:06
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