Ask HN: Is EdTech Just Hype?

Framing education as lessons presumes that lessons are how people learn<p>Project based learning pioneers, Maria Montessori, and other education innovators like Tom Wagner @ Harvard have discovered that learning is a human experience<p>Dr. Feynman has a wonderful illustration of this in his book “Surely you’re joking Mr. Feynman” on how he transformed Brazil’s physics education curriculum. Instead of drilling mathematical models of curves, they build ramps, invented their own questions, learned how to measure outputs, and derived their own formulas under Dr. Feynman’s guidance.<p>From birth, we are naturally curious and learn.<p>The fundamental problems to solve in education are:<p>1. Poverty - children without healthy, stable environments with proper nutrition &amp; sleep are significantly handicapped in their ability to learn<p>Psychological safety matters<p>2. Reframing learning as something a person does vs. a scaffolded theoretical learning journey they are supposed go on<p>3. Building lessons as experiences that the student then creates out of - using the creative arts like writing, film, products, etc. - similar to what you’ll see Olin College of Engineering do<p>There is no way to bring this approach to education into the education system as it is today, because the education system is not designed as an institution of learning but certification.<p>Instead, we must build new institutions. It takes about 60 to 100 years for new institutions to take root because their students &amp; families go on to be successful then donate back to the school in dollars, time, and political influence.<p>There are people who understand how to do all the things you describe, but that is not the decision tree for today’s education content producers. The work of Dr. Katherine von Duyke might be something you consider as you explore.<p>Instructional Design courses may be worth investigating. Just be highly skeptical that measuring performance is measuring learning. Retention is an easy indicator as to whether students have internalized a new concept or simply passed a test.

FWIW, this framing is the start of an essay I am writing about why the untold number of apps that purport to teach children to read fall far short and what can be done about it.