Photo by Elisabeth Podesta
Scott Dunlap gets into computer programming at the Hilton during College of Education's annual
summer conference.
Kids expand their minds
with help of computers
By Steve Hooks
Otth« Emerald
A kid's favorite program may no longer be on
Saturday morning television. It may be in his
classroom’s computer, if the annual College of
Education's summer conference is any in
dication.
This year's conference, held Wednesday
through Friday at the Eugene Hilton, focused
on kids, computers and the classroom. The
theme was computers as an extension of the
mind.
"The computer can be considered an ex
tension of the human mind roughly the same
way as reading, writing and arithmetic," said
University computer science Prof. David
Moursund, the conference's keynote speaker.
"Kids' brain cells won’t drop dead from
disuse" if allowed to use computers and cal
culators in class, Moursund said.
Moursund, president of the International
Council for Computers in Education, argued
that computers are as much classroom tools as
pencil and paper.
Moursund also edits and publishes "The
Computing Teacher," a journal concerned
with computers in elementary and secondary
education.
"In just a very few minutes, a student can
learn to use a computer well enough so that it
makes a significant difference in the student's
life," he said.
The conference featured many sessions
on the hows, whys and whens of classroom
computer use.
Educators noted for their research in
computers in elementary and secondary
schools covered topics such as home com
puter learning systems, computer use in the
early grades ard "Creative Programming for
Young Minds.”
Conference-goers did not ignore the pos
sible problems of using classroom computers.
As computers become "as familiar to
American homes as a television,” home units
could be used as learning tools, making public
schools less dominant in education, said
conference coordinator Philip Piele.
Public schools will be pressured to adapt
to the new technology or "become sig
nificantly changed as institutions,” said Piele,
who is director of the University's ERIC
(Educational Resources Information Center)
Clearinghouse on Educational Management.
Some negative consequences deal with
economics, Piele said.
As more middle- and upper-class parents
get home computers for home instruction, the
parents might be "less and less inclined to
support public schools through. taxation at
more than a basic level,” Piele said.
Moursund pointed out in his speech that
not every school system will be able to afford
classroom computers. The result would be
inequalities in education with “the haves ver
sus the have-nots,” he said.
“The problem of isolation” could also
harm children who rely too much on com
puters as a learning tool, Piele said.
"Look at video games,” he added.
Meanwhile, young conference-goers,
perhaps unaware of the computer's social
consequences, eagerly seized the chance to
switch roles and teach adult educators com
puter basics.
The computer language emphasized was
LOGO, designed with youngsters in mind.
LOGO uses graphics and even music as
teaching aids.
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