I recently read Dr. Jane M. Healy’s book Failure to Connect: How Computers Affect Our Children’s Minds — and What We Can Do About It. If you’re interested in reading the results of our society’s (somewhat failed) attempt at using technology in education, I would highly recommend Dr. Healy’s book. Her background makes her well qualified to write on this topic with more than 35 years as an educational psychologist and professional educator as a classroom teacher, college professor, reading and learning specialist, and elementary school administrator.

Dr. Healy provides great insight into how the educational system in the United States has thrust technology into the classroom, not always with positive results. She describes her visits to a variety of schools throughout the US with varying social and economic backgrounds. She describes the success, or unfortunate failures, she observes regarding technology in the classroom at these schools. For example, she talks about a private school that spent well over $300,000 on technology. In one class she monitored at this school, most students did nothing more than surf the web for topics unrelated to their studies.

One of her points in the book really hit home for me personally. Dr. Healy writes about how many school systems dump buckets of money into computer hardware and software, but neglect to train teachers. Not long ago, I chaired the technology committee at my children’s school. Our task was bringing computers into the school. The committee went around in circles discussing what type of computer hardware we should buy, while I was trying to focus discussions on the more important issues: What educational goals were we trying to accomplish with the new technology and how the teachers would be trained.

Dr. Healy offers her professional advice regarding the introduction of technology into the lives of children. She gives age specific advice on how much time, and what kind of technology, is appropriate for the proper development of children.