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Education Privacy

Smart Kindergarten 140

Posted by michael from the watch-johnny-pull-sally's-hair dept.
A UCLA professor is working on set of sensors and data-capture applications to record a school classroom in intimate detail. The project webpage has more information; see also an older story. The professor apparently envisions actually deploying these sensors in a classroom next spring, but doesn't mention what school is willing to participate.
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Smart Kindergarten More

Smart Kindergarten

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  • Coming soon to NBC (Score:5, Funny)

    by CptChipJew ( 301983 ) * <michaelmiller@noSPaM.gmail.com> on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:50PM (#6610893) Journal
    I'm a Kindergartner, Get Me Outta Here!
    Starring MC Hammer

  • Get the kids used to... (Score:3, Funny)

    by double-oh three ( 688874 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:51PM (#6610899)
    Get the kids used to Big Brother early!!! We'll all be living under his gaze soon, so might as well give the tods a headstart!
    • Teachers watch over kids.
      What does that make them?
    • Better Still....

      Wire up the ADHD kids with piezo transucers and you'll solve the energy crisis pretty quickly. Just make sure you toss 'em a few candy bars now and then.

      My kids have had cameras in their preschool classrooms for some time now, and the other parents are REALLY paranoid about others (non-parents) observing what goes on.

      Now they want to wire them up? geez...

      • Re:Get the kids used to... (Score:4, Insightful)

        by tsa ( 15680 ) on Tuesday August 05, 2003 @03:55AM (#6613406) Homepage
        What worries me is that this professor would probably never even consider using this technology in working areas like offices and such because of the privacy implications. However, many people seem to consider kids as as sort of sub-humans that do not need privacy. When I was in school I would sometimes go to the bathroom just to be out of class for a while. With this technology even that kind of privacy is taken away from the kids.

  • Great (Score:5, Funny)

    by ad0gg ( 594412 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:51PM (#6610900)
    Now will all know who's been stealing lunches. And who secretly eats the crayons and glue.

  • Great (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:52PM (#6610902)
    We'll have statistics on which color playdough is the most popular, as well as the optimal nap time.

  • Oh, great.. (Score:3, Funny)

    by TheDarkener ( 198348 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:53PM (#6610914) Homepage
    Now they're gonna analyze all the "doctor" sessions in great detail.

    Privacy for kindergardeners!!!

    • Re:Oh, great.. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jdray ( 645332 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:56PM (#6610936) Homepage Journal
      "So, Dear, what did you learn in Kindergarten today?"

      "I learned that someone named Big Brother is watching my every move, and that it's okay."

      • Re:Oh, great.. (Score:5, Funny)

        by Aadain2001 ( 684036 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:59PM (#6610958) Journal
        Big Brother == Federal Government

        Little Brother == State Government

        Kindergarten Monitor == Really bored prof with tenure :)
        • Allowing Little Brother to watch your every move - billions of dollars in taxes

          Allowing Big Brother to watch your every move - 100s of billions of dollars in taxes

          Knowing that any 3-letter agency can monitor your kids in the kindergarten for suspicion of "terrorism" - Priceless!!!

      • Re:Oh, great.. (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Thats the biggest problem with the whole thing -- if people don't care much about privacy issues at the momment, imagine what future generations could be like after going through this sort of training.

        • Re:Oh, great.. (Score:2, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward
          But they're only doing it for our safety, so what's the problem? If giving up 225 years of constitutionally protected rights stops just one terrorist, isn't it worth it?

      • Indeed. I am very strongly opposed to this.

        This is carrying out a huge invasion of privacy against people who are too young to realise their rights are being violated. Can you imagine any adults putting up with this level of monitoring?

        Get 'em used to being monitored whilst they are young - then they won't object to it when they are adults. We already have little privacy in modern society, in the name of "security" (For whom? Us or the government?), and this is training people from being small children th
      • I'm both very surprised and very unsurprised that UCLA has their hands in a project so personally intrusive (big-brother-ish). UCLA is probably the most politically liberal university in the nation and thus is generally against big brother type things and pro-privacy, but at the same time they are usually up to some off the wall project, which this seems to be, and, of course and like most, the ends justify the means even when it comes to idealized liberals at UCLA. Interesting altogether. I'd like to ha
    • Wow. I must not have gotten past "Kindergarten" if I spelled it wrong. =p

  • What parent would agree to this? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Rares Marian ( 83629 ) < ... dfgsdfgsdgsdhsh>> on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:53PM (#6610916) Homepage
    Wait this is America... it's for the children.

    People think if they let fear run their lives willingly it will work out better compared to when governments used to do that forcibly.

    Morons.

    • Re:What parent would agree to this? (Score:5, Funny)

      by Megaslow ( 694447 ) * on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:03PM (#6610977) Homepage
      Maybe parents can elect to get e-mail (pager, sms) alerts: WARNING: Suzy is picking her nose! ALERT: Johnny's fly is down! What if the microphones happen to record the children during sing-along time? Will the RIAA have to get involved?
      • It does not matter what reason is given. These reasons may sound good to the parents, but the entire point is to train children that being watched electronically is OK. When they are adults, they will have no problems having video cameras at traffic lights, or using cell phones that track their location and give the information to their boss. They will feel that this is the way it has always been and not question that maybe these are bad ideas.

        This is one more reason to consider home schooling. But eve

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • There are already kindergartens and daycares with webcams so that parents can checkup on their kids (and check that the teachers/daycare workers aren't beating their kids, etc.).

      I'm not saying this is a Good Thing but, for those parents that do, it isn't that much different. Probably better, in their minds.

      Sigh.
    • Rares Marian> Wait this is America... it's for the children. People
      think if they let fear run their lives willingly it will work out better
      compared to when governments used to do that forcibly.

      You didn't even read the article. I quote:

      The lessons this experiment may provide - including potential

      insight on teaching techniques, the speech of children, and the application of
      software and hardware in novel environments - have been deemed important
      enough for the National Science Foundation to provide $1.8

      • Cameras in classrooms that follow every thing in detail. Excuse me? How is that necessary for studying a child's behavior? Nevermind that we're talking about classrooms. Cameras on the kids every damn minute of the day.

        This isn't science. This an act of monumental stupidity.
        • Rares Marian> Cameras in classrooms that follow every thing in detail. Excuse me? How is that necessary for studying a child's behavior? Nevermind that we're talking about classrooms. Cameras on the kids every damn minute of the day.

          Ooh, now you're attempting to debate the study's ability to achieve its intended goal. That's better. But I still don't think you read the article, because they attempted to answer that question there. For example:

          "With the microphones we can tell, for instance, when the

          • Still no need for cameras. The switch will happen over needing a pencil, over telling a secret, over a closed clique insult about another kid, over an after school playtime event at the house of kids that the kid feels comfortable at. But having seen/heard of idiots who terrorize kids over left-handedness or the language they choose to speak, I think a study every so often would be fine.

            It's the teachers who need to be studied to find missing brain cells.

            Permanent sensors everywhere is not a study. I stil
    • I am witness to all the joys of children each day as a teacher at a private elementary school. Being that is is private and therefore "special" the parents are involved in every aspect of the school. Its their right since the pay for it. You have no idea what a pain that statement is. I can tell you for a fact that most parents would NOT allow their Kindergartener to participate in this, they wouldn't want other people watching their children like that. I manage the websites for each of our schools and
      • Well, my son was suspended from kindergaten when he was 4 (a little early for him but they made all sorts of noise about him being placed in kindergarten). Something about him lashing out at another child. The school never told my wife of any problems and decided on their own they would assign some psychologist to him. The principal said that my son would never amount to anything.

        The kid was 4, and the PRINCIPAL was passing judgment on him as to what he would turn out like in his future. Now think about th

  • Article Text (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04, 2003 @07:57PM (#6610944)
    Experiment to outfit classroom with sensors
    By Christian Mignot
    DAILY BRUIN SENIOR STAFF

    Electrical engineering Professor Mani Srivastava's seven-year-old daughter Megha provided the initial inspiration for a research project that may provide groundbreaking results in the fields of education and computer science.

    Srivastava's purchase of a wireless educational toy that allows parents to survey their child's interactions through a PC spurred him to imagine the larger implications.

    Along with his team of faculty assembled from the departments of electrical engineering and computer science and the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, Srivastava plans to outfit an entire first grade classroom - from inanimate objects like wooden building blocks and tabletops to the students themselves - with tiny electronic sensors.

    "We want to use these devices in a classroom setting to see what we can infer from student's interactions and how they are associated with academic performance," Srivastava said.

    The sensors are part of a new generation of devices that create sensor networks to sample physical environments and collect data.

    The lessons this experiment may provide - including potential insight on teaching techniques, the speech of children, and the application of software and hardware in novel environments - have been deemed important enough for the National Science Foundation to provide $1.8 million in funding grants.

    Students will wear caps with sensors called "iBadges" pinned to them, Srivastava said. These badges will track the location of the child and the physical orientation of the child's head, as well as capture their speech with small microphones.

    Objects, such as puzzle pieces or board games, will be wired with sensors and used on task tables with magnetic systems under them to track location and usage. This will enable researchers to study the processes a student uses to complete tasks set by instructors.

    In addition, a series of microphones and cameras will be placed at various locations around the classroom to further monitor students' activities. Srivastava said sound clips gathered from the microphones would enable researchers to study the speech of children - particularly those who are bilingual.

    "With the microphones we can tell, for instance, when the students will switch from using English to Spanish or vice versa," he said.

    All data collected by sensors, cameras and microphones is routed through a central computer system utilizing software called Sylph, designed by computer science professor Richard Muntz.

    "This isn't the traditional kind of data - it is both multimedia and sensor data which is not very precise," Muntz said. "Capturing it and being able to process it is a complex problem."

    Muntz said the program is designed to collect queried data from sensors, store data and query archived data once it has been stored. Most importantly, he said the program includes data-mining capabilities, which implies distinguishing patterns among collected data.

    "Data mining has been a growing field in the last decade," he said. "Data collections are too overwhelming for humans to study so we are now using programs to help in the assessment."

    Researchers from the UCLA Center for the Study of Evaluation of the GSE&IS, which assess the quality of education and standardized testing in the United States, have also been working with Srivastava to determine how the classroom application of sensor technology will affect student learning.

    "It's like developing a new thermometer to measure kids interaction," said Gregory Chung, a senior researcher for the CSE.

    Chung added that sensors would allow teachers to pay attention to the problems of individual students through the assessment of their performance in small group interaction scenarios.

    "The problem for teachers is that they cannot usually pay attention to each student across all groups," he

    • I'll put this next to cloning a mammoth. Why the fuck a mammoth? Clone a dodo. You can have those as pets to fund the research. Researchers should be limited in the amount of time they can go w/o sex. They tend to accumulate a libido the size of mammoths.

      Privacy means I own moi. How can children learn self respect and independent thought when everything is looking at them?

      Researchers freak me out. I don't want to interact with a table. It's a fucking table. It's there to hold my plate... And other things.
    • ...not a call for wiring classrooms. There are plenty of psychology department's who'd like this data provided it's done ethically, and similar observational experiments go on via one-way glass and the like all the time, with informed consent.
      I don't really see this as any different - it's just done with better observational tools
      Now, if they'd wanted to install it without consent for long term monitoring, that would be different.

    • Students will wear caps with sensors called "iBadges" pinned to them


      Those caps wouldn't actually be tinfoil hats by any chance, would they?

    • IMHO this is really silly, nigh irrelevant. a gimmick designed to drum up funding. by far the most vital and formative moments of my early education involved interactions with students (fights) and teachers (being punished and yelled at). honestly, how do you record the horror of being assimilated into a community?
      • > how do you record the horror of being assimilated into a community?

        Mental scarring. That and the psychological disorders that eventually develop from it.

  • Who's being watched? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jdray ( 645332 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:01PM (#6610969) Homepage Journal
    I wonder if the teacher realizes that he/she is also being watched in this little experiment. I can just see large scale future deployments of these systems, and the resulting end-of-year reviews by faculty management:

    "We see, Mr. Smith, that your students are fairly unruly in class, and that they often speak to each other in languages that your resume doesn't indicate that you know. Also, for the 14.6 minutes per hour (average, of course) that your back is to the students, a full 26% of your class cheats on exams and other work. We don't feel that you have effective control of your classrooms, and therefore are choosing to terminate your contract."

    Thbbttttt....

    • You OBVIOUSLY have never worked in a school.

      First off, Teachers are hard enough to find as it is. They are very rarely fired due to underperformance.

      Second, the Board of Education for your district would never envision spending the bucks to install these things in classrooms (after all, they SOUND expensive), although would have no problem paying $60,000 for new furniture in the superintendent's office (This actually happened in my district. I kid you not). The fact is that the only chance of a school

  • A new method for assessing performance (Score:5, Insightful)

    by aligma ( 682744 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:03PM (#6610973)
    Well, there is one possible positive effect of this system.
    Currently when students do badly on exams or assignments, they might miss some of the opportunities other children may have, due to being placed in 'lower' classes. This could be one way of watching how a student works - if they are able to come up with good things in a low pressure environment, perhaps this will allow some of the students who have been previously overlooked to have an opportunity to show what they can too can perform, but only in a less pressure intense situation.

    Some of our most promising scientists could be becoming bricklayers because they can't focus properly when they're stressed out, and get bad marks...
    • It's illegal to group kids into classes based on test scores.. Although, that never stopped anyone.....

    • How's it "low pressure" when you're watched? (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      How can you consider it "low pressure" when the kids are continuously under surveillance/assessment?

      I couldn't think of a worse thing to do to a bunch of kids - and believe me, they'll know they're being watched.

      • If the children are under surveillance from an early age, they would most likely become accustomed to it. We're an adaptive species ;)
        • If the children are under surveillance from an early age, they would most likely become accustomed to it. We're an adaptive species ;)

          And then 24/7 monitoring when they are adults won't be such a bad thing.

          They're accustomed to it, right?
          • Well said- you are correct in that there could be disadvantages to this system. However, implementing one technology for one purpose does not automatically set a precedent for it to be used for all other purposes. For example, banks have CCTV systems. They are one system which aids in protecting banks, because theives know they are more likely to be caught if they rob the bank. This however, has not resulted in implementation of CCTV in all places at all times. I believe that us being watched 24/7 would be

            • Re:How's it "low pressure" when you're watched? (Score:4, Interesting)

              by YrWrstNtmr ( 564987 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @11:09PM (#6612265)
              If you were to ask people from many cultures around the world, you'd find a LOT do not want to be photographed at all.
              Now...think back about 75-100 years. Europe and the US. If you told your grandfather he would be on camera 20 or 30 times a day, he may well be outraged. "WTF do they need my picture for?!?"

              Jump forward 50 years from now.
              These kindergarteners have been 'on camera' almost constantly, wherever they go, since they can remember. Don't even think twice about it.
              And now, those 'kids' are in positions of power. They will find it very easy to enact 24/7 monitoring rules.

              The cost of the technology is a non issue. 25 years ago, who would have thought you could put a powerful computer on your desk for $200 retail? Or 4GB postage stamp?

              Currently, in any Western city, you *are* on camera quite a lot of the time. Go shopping, you're on. Drive through a lot of intersections, you're on. Walk *past* a gas station...you're on.

              Some cities (London) more than others. It's just that they are good at hiding the cameras.

    • Lower level classes != lower learning opportunity (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Although I won't argue that constant surveilence won't provide a means for detecting underperforming children, exactly how are they going to perform better when presented with less opportunity to show their stuff?

      Many schools classify children into their "above-average, gifted, etc" performers, the "below-average, challenged, etc" performers, and the rest of us. Funny thing is that over a span of nearly 10 years, these groups rarely see students transitioning from one to another.

      It's just too hard to rea
    • What is the point of this very expensive project when a researcher (or five) is cheaper, more resilient and can process the information better ?!

      How long do you think all these sensors will last with these little kids? How are you going to make sure they are wearing their caps instead of tossing them around, stomping on them, losing them, etc ?!

      All these microphones, sensors, cameras, etc are going to gather a ridiculously huge amount of data, which will be extremely difficult to process meaningfully.

      • > adding researchers to the classroom is not really changing the environment in a way that will affect children's behaviour.

        You mean the presence of five official-looking men in suits constantly watching you & taking notes during every school day would not affect how you work?
        • No ...because that's not what the researchers would do. They'd dress like teachers, and probably help out with activities occasionally ... this is grade 1 afterall. And little kids are much better at just getting on with things and not being self-conscious. They would get accustomed to having extra people in the classroom.

          If you've ever seen any documentaries done in classrooms with young children, you will see that they do not behave any differently or appear to even notice the camerapeople who are su

    • ugh, this is EXACTLY the kind of crap that I can't stand.

      disclaimer: I feel that EVERYONE should be given the best education that they can.

      What I am against is the fact that you believe that we should put these people in a "less pressure intenesive situation"... What happens when we baby this student all the way through school, he/she gets great marks and does well on their entrance exams (how that would be possible I will never know)... This student gets to college and may even pass there because of t
    • Doing this sort of "we don't really know what we're going to find but let's subject our children to more of that brick-in-the-wall feeling" IS the scientist's equivalent of being a brick layer. Frankly these scientists couldn't excel in any other field and now they're terrorizing our children.

  • Usenet (Score:5, Funny)

    by eclectic_echidna ( 586735 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:06PM (#6610995)
    It is bad enough that my 10 year old Usenet posts are available to my potential employers.

    Now they can download what I did in Kindergarten?

    --ee

  • Ethics? Where was the human studies committee? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dpbsmith ( 263124 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:07PM (#6611005) Homepage
    Uh, it doesn't say anywhere in the article that this got a signoff from any human studies committee. Shouldn't it have? It seems to me that this study presents an ethical issue or two

    Precisely why is it more valuable scientifically to track kids' classroom interactions than it would be to track the interactions of, say, executives working in a corporation?

    My cynical answer: it isn't. They're studying kids because no adult would ever be likely to give permission to be studied in that way.

    This is uncomfortably reminiscent of the "Fernald Science Club" of the fifties in which MIT scientists fed mentally retarded kids radioactive tracers in nutritional experiments. It wasn't supposed to harm the kids,and it probably didn't, but it was highly unethical anyway--even by the standards of the time.

    In That Hideous Strength, one of C. S. Lewis's characters remarks on the fact that performing experiments on children is considered wrong, yet it's perfectly all right to put the children in an "experimental school."

    • Re:Ethics? Where was the human studies committee? (Score:5, Informative)

      by MntlChaos ( 602380 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:17PM (#6611053)
      If you would RTFA you would notice that they are doing this to study learning patterns and advise teachers on what they are doing wrong. Advising CEO's on what they are doing wrong usually ends in somebody getting fired
    • I don't know about the US, but in BR we have a legal figure called patrio poder (parent's powers) and basically, children have limited privacy rights relating to their parents. For example, a child has no claim to client/attorney or client/doctor secret relating to its father, except of course if the mentioned parent is involved as the other part (sexual abuse or something like that)

  • Sure... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Hayzeus ( 596826 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:11PM (#6611026) Homepage
    A UCLA professor does it, and they call it science. My Uncle Murray does it, and all of a sudden it's a felony. The Man offers nought but injustice.

  • the results are in (Score:5, Funny)

    by meeotch ( 524339 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:18PM (#6611060) Homepage
    Students will wear caps with sensors called "iBadges" pinned to them, Srivastava said.

    5 years and 4.3 million dollars later, researchers report their findings: that you can't convince a first grader to wear a beeping, faintly warm hat for more than six minutes at a stretch.

  • Unexpected consequences (Score:5, Interesting)

    by YrWrstNtmr ( 564987 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:20PM (#6611077)
    And how will the little darlings day to day behavior be modified in response to all this monitoring?

    Students will wear caps with sensors called "iBadges" pinned to them,
    "Mom!! Do I hafta wear the stupid hat? All the other kids make fun of us!"

    as well as capture their speech with small microphones.
    (sotto voce)"Billy is a poopyhead. I'm gonna make him eat dirt at recess."
    And then the teacher may jump in..."Johnny...it's not nice to talk bad about Billy"
    [Johnny] "WTF? Get outta my head, Lady!"

    Objects, such as puzzle pieces or board games, will be wired with sensors
    So the child cannot take the puzzle piece across the room and show his friend?

    "The problem for teachers is that they cannot usually pay attention to each student across all groups," he said. "The feedback will allow teachers to better instruct their students."
    Obviously. You're not supposed to pay equal attention to each and every kid. SOme kids can get on with things themselves. Others need to be hald by the hand. That is why you hire competent teachers. And pay them a respectable wage.
    A competent teacher can recognize the attributes and students needing extra attention, by use of the best data mining tool yet discovered, the brain.

    "This will be an example of how humans will use computers to create smart environments," he said. "The use of sensors in this manner will allow people to talk and interact with the physical world."

    umm....haven't we been talking and interacting with the physical world for a few million years?


    When and who is supposed to do this data mining? The person who is in constant contact with these kids every day? When is s/he supposed to have time to do that?
    Or does she just get a report at the end of the week?
    "Johnny doesn't like Billy"
    "Jose' needs a little more help in English"
    "Mary is a little behind the curve in motor skills development"

    I can see a competent teacher saying "No shit, Sherlock! I see these kids every day, all day, and I know this."

    Whereas in the hands of an incompetent teacher....Johnny, Mary, and Jose' will be concentrated on even more, to the exclusion of the other kids.

    Kids are not data to be mined. Interaction, play, instruction are what grows respectable adults from these little darlings.

    How much could an extra $1.8M do for one classroom for a year?

  • IN SOVIET RUSSIA (Score:5, Funny)

    by laigle ( 614390 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:24PM (#6611102)
    Kindergarten learns about kids!
  • Big Brother is watching you.

  • just like on the simpsons (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Savatte ( 111615 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:33PM (#6611160) Homepage Journal
    while singing Bingo: "inserted extra clap. clearly not college material"
  • Sounds to me like they're trying to find Ender Wiggins.
  • My dyslexia had me reading this as an ACLU guy setting up a bunch of students with monitors and sensors, and part of my brain knew that just wasn't right.
  • "1984 - At kindergarden", some would love this.

    +3 paranoia.

  • Shades of Ender's Game... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Tar-Palantir ( 590548 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:39PM (#6611208)
    Remember the monitor Ender had to wear? A little more advanced, but similar idea.

  • Good Tie Into DARPA's LifeLog (Score:3, Interesting)

    by schalliol ( 676467 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:40PM (#6611216)
    I'm part of a group that put a proposal in for LifeLog. This project seems like a good tie-in. More info on LifeLog: DARPA page: http://www.darpa.mil/baa/baa03-30.htm Please see the following articles if you are interested in reading what others have to say about it: * CBS News: "A Diary That Never Sleeps" http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/06/03/tech/mai n556654.shtml * Geek.com: "DARPA looking to record lives of interested parties" http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2003Jun/gee20030 603020240.htm * The Oregonian: "Step into one man's world, as recorded by the Pentagon's planned LifeLog" http://www.oregonlive.com/living/oregonian/index.s sf?/base/exclude/1055937392327010.xml * Timesunion: "Your diary's got nothing on LifeLog" http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?sto ryID=140316

  • An aside. (Score:4, Informative)

    by Mr_Icon ( 124425 ) * on Monday August 04, 2003 @08:45PM (#6611239) Homepage
    A traveling salesman selling farming equipment once came across a large, rather unkempt field located near a shabby-looking farmhouse with a few lopsided barns strewn around it. He turned his truck around and drove along the narrow dirt road until he was near the front porch of the house, where he stopped. An aging, dishevelled-looking farmer, prostrated in his unpainted gray rocking chair, was eyeing him lazily as he got out of his vehicle and offered his greetings.

    "Sir," said the salesman. "I have with me the literature and the know-how of many qualified farming experts, that can teach you how in just a few short years and with almost no initial investment you can turn your farm around and start harvesting the crops that would make you rich beyond your wildest dreams. Would you like to learn how you can improve your business and start making a profit?"

    The farmer looked at him with no change of expression, then raised his hand and took the makeshift wooden toothpick that he was chewing out of his mouth.

    "Son," he said, "Don't you think I already know how I can improve my business?" ...

    You can throw all kinds of technology at both kids and teachers, but unless the former are motivated to teach, and the latter are motivated to learn, it will fail just like all other educational programs have failed -- be it hands-on science, montessori, three-Rs, and whatever else the smart people with EdD degrees care to come up with.

    Education starts at home and at the very core of the society. If the society discourages doing well at school, berates dedicated learners, and offers subtle indoctrination that one doesn't have to be smart or even hard-working to do well in life... well, then whatever insight is obtained in the course of this experiment will be lost on the generation Afternoon Disney Channel.

    I know this, for I am a teacher.
    • Montessori failed? How so? It appeared to have worked perfectly well with my neice - she was thrown out of her pre-school group for kicking and biting, was sent to a Montessori nursery and now has no problems with violence, and is a confident, competent 4 year old who does a heck of a lot of things for herself.
      • You misunderstood my point. All programs, including montessori, hands-on science, etc, are very good programs, but they are not the be-all, end-all that will "help us turn the education system around." The education system is doing just fine with the programs that already exist, it's the society in general that can use some turning around.

        When I say they "failed" I mean they failed in the eyes of people that thought these programs were some kind of a panacea that would somehow alleviate all woes the world

  • Takes smarts. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by tomstdenis ( 446163 )
    In a society where education runs on a bare-bones budget to come up with a brilliant idea to spend more money spying on children in classrooms. I mean what sort of complete fucking moron comes up with this idea?

    Next they will probably promote racial segregation [again... oddly enough] as a means towards a more unified society or something.

  • Why? (Score:1)

    by bih ( 674728 )
    Americans are so afraid of everything. Afraid that we don't listen to the right music(MTV), afraid we don't have the right clothes(malls), afraid that our kids are eating paste(this article). Who cares? We should all lighten up a little.

  • I'd like to see actual CAMERAS, please. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by JessLeah ( 625838 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @09:08PM (#6611412)
    And before you start screaming "INVASION OF PRIVACY!", please consider what it is that many geeks (i.e. many of the readers of this very story) go through in school. I was one of the two 'most picked on' kids in my school throughout my entire childhood (the fat girl was the other one). Teachers will almost never care when a student complains about another student harassing them. It's considered a "normal" (and, by implication, healthy!?) part of growing up. I once got beaten up by an older girl in the hallway, and no one did anything about it. Peppering Elementary and Middle schools with cameras, and enforcing strict penalties against the students who perpetrate violence against other students (and their parents, for raising such despicable brats in the first place), would do a lot more good than sensors and other "non-invasive" measures.
    • Everytime I got in a new class (we moved a lot when I was a kid) I did the same they teach you to do in prision: the first kid (it was normally a boy one foot taller then me, 'cause I was always the youngest in the class) that messed with me got a kick in the balls. In the only ocasion it was a girl (also taller than me), a slap in the face did it. I was sent everytime to the principal's office, my mom was called to the school, bla bla bla, and one year of bliss... no other kid in school wanted to try the b
      • This is how the system works at present. The kids who get picked on have no recourse. Those who DARE fight back get sent to the Principal's office. The instigators of conflicts, however, hardly EVER get in any sort of trouble whatsoever. And we wonder why the RIAA gets away with the crap they do?
        • Am I the only one left on SlashDot who doesn't even run Windows for gaming?
          You are not alone. I don't run Windows.
        • Or, they just don't care (the troublemakers)...

          The one thing that I wish I knew then that I know now is that the "permanent record" and getting in trouble really didn't matter, in the whole scheme of things.

          But then again, maybe I'm a better person for conforming... ugh.
    • I went to a school with a "zero tolerance" policy. Anyone involved in a fight, regardless who starts it was suspended. I once saw a guy take the beating of his life, and he never raised a hand to defend himself, hell he couldn't. He still got suspended 3 days same as the other guy no questions asked.

      Needless to say if anyone even pushed me I beat the ever living hell out of them... by then it was too late cause I was already going to get suspended.

      I asked teachers on several occasions in Junior High to
    • Yes. 24/7 monitoring of everywhere we go, and everything we do, so we can feel "safe".

      No thanks.
      • Hey, up yours, buddy. This is PRECISELY what I wanted as a kid. So if you don't give a poop about the nerdy little kids getting the snot beat out of them just because they're nerdy... well, I guess that's your problem.
        • Hey, up yours, buddy. This is PRECISELY what I wanted as a kid.

          This is PRECISELY why we don't let children vote.

          So if you don't give a poop about the nerdy little kids getting the snot beat out of them just because they're nerdy... well, I guess that's your problem.

          If you'd rather give up some basic privacy for some pseudo-freedom, well..I guess that's your problem.
          Don't presume to force your non-solution on the rest of us.Do you live at the school? Do you never go outside for fear of being beat up?

    • Peppering Elementary and Middle schools with cameras, and enforcing strict penalties against the students who perpetrate violence against other students (and their parents, for raising such despicable brats in the first place), would do a lot more good than sensors and other "non-invasive" measures.

      You are right, but I'm thinking forests and trees. Why do we send our kids to government holding pens for eight hours a day anyway?

      I think public schools made sense for about 20 years in frontier towns. I d

  • Well, overall we observed a strong 'ignorance' theme - these kids were pretty clueless. Some less clueless than others, but even the brightest were pretty fking stupid. Their movement was pretty erratic - but we have some Phd's tweaking the data mining. I should note though that Dr. Dulanee's early analysis has found a strong correlation between the children's head orientation and the position of a TV presenting cartoons... Interesting... Their learning seemed to be based of repetition - the more th
  • The Smart Dust [berkeley.edu] Project at UC Berkeley, which seeks to create a wireless network of sensors each of which is one cunic milimeter in size. These "micro motes" create an ad-hock network to communicate between each other and relay information back to a central computer. The motes are cheap and self powered so they can be placed a variety of places.

    Here's a good article [computerworld.com] on the motes and what they are all about.

    Along with "Smart Buildings", the "Smart Kindergarten" would seem like the perfect non-military app
  • As cool as this may seem, I have to be the voice of dissent. Providing "data collection" for administrators is really undermining the trust that parents and administrators have with the teachers. There's a reason that parents and teachers meet - because the teacher has the most intimate interaction with the child and the teacher's responsibility is to help those children in the way the teacher best sees fit. I don't think that knowing that little Johnny picks his nose when he's taking a test will help t

  • Been there... (Score:3, Informative)

    by LauraW ( 662560 ) on Monday August 04, 2003 @11:00PM (#6612222)
    The idea of collecting data in classrooms isn't exactly new, though this application of it certainly is. I've been involved in a project where we made videotapes and collected lots of other data in science classes.

    About 10 years ago I worked in a research lab at an education grad school. We were using simulation software to study the way that middle-school kids learned physics. The idea was to try to get kids to build a "mental model" of how basic mechanics works by doing lots of simulations (and some real-world experiments too).

    To study how this worked, we'd basically videotape everything: the kids interacting with the software and with each other, the teachers interacting with the class, and so on. Then the slaves^H^H^H^H^H^H grad students would transcribe the tapes and see if they could find instances of kids working out models for the physics. There were also tests at the beginning and end of the semester, in both the classes using software and some "control" classes. I don't think any of the kids or parents objected to the data collection, though I wasn't too involved in that part of the project. There were some privacy guarantees on the release form that the kids' parents had to sign. This was all pretty standard stuff for education researchers who wanted to collect hard data instead of just theorizing.

    As an aside, the outcome of the project was a bit unclear, at least to me. The students in the classrooms that had the software definitely learned more physics. However, I always wondered whether that had as much to do with the extra attention they got as with the software. But then, I'm not an education researcher or teacher.

  • ...can't make the kids smart, so let's make their environment smart.
  • Some where a market research guy is salivating...

  • Violates UCLA's own rules (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Tuesday August 05, 2003 @01:43AM (#6613009) Homepage
    This doesn't sound like it complies with UCLA's rules on the protection of human subjects. [ucla.edu] There's supposed to be "informed consent".

    Interestingly, it's clear why they're picking on kindergardeners. At age 7 and above, the rules require the informed consent of the subject. If the kid says no and the parents say yes, that's a no. And there can't be any penalty for saying no. But below age 7, the parents alone can "consent".

    If they tried this on, say, teenagers, they'd probably be blown off, unless they paid out some serious money.

  • - Objects, such as puzzle pieces or board games, will be wired
    - with sensors and used on task tables with magnetic systems
    - under them to track location and usage.

    "No Bill, you can't use those to build a tower, they are puzzle pieces and they only work on that table."

    "...and little Susan swalowed the letter 'Q' and it is now entering her lower intestine. Don't worry, we track stuff like this every day."

    "Luckilly the network crashed during nap, so there was hardly any work to re-enter positiona
  • When I read the headline I thought it'd be a story about Slashdot-forums. :-)

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