One of the nation's first large-scale studies examining the use of computers in schools has found that, when used selectively by trained teachers, computers improve the math performance of students. But when used ineffectively--as in repetitive "drill and kill" practice--computers actually inhibit students' math achievement.

The study, released Sept. 29, was conducted by a researcher at Educational Testing Service (ETS) in Princeton, N.J., and sponsored by the Milken Exchange on Education Technology and Education Week. It offers solid evidence of what works and what doesn't when computers are used in classrooms.

Students who spent the most time at a computer in school actually scored lower than their peers on a national math test, the study found. Students who used "drill and practice" software also scored lower. But students who used computers for simulations and real-life applications of math concepts scored higher, especially those students in middle school.

The study suggests that school districts should focus attention on professional development for teachers to make sure they know how to use computers with their students effectively.

"It's a step in the right direction," said education technology specialist William L. Rukeyser in an interview with the Washington Post. Rukeyser runs Learning in the Real World, an organization in Woodland, Calif., devoted to the study of educational technology. But "I wish," he added, that "we did not have to have tens of billions of dollars go down the drain to reach this point."

Survey results

ETS researcher Harold Wenglinsky, the study's author, used the test scores of 6,627 fourth-graders and 7,146 eighth-graders who took the math section of the 1996 National Assessment of Educational Progress, the most extensive study of student achievement in the country. For the first time, the test asked teachers how they used computers in their classes, allowing Wenglinsky to focus on how different uses affected test scores.

The study divided computer use into four categories: drill and practice, demonstration of new topics, mathematical games, and simulations and applications.

Eighth-graders whose teachers used computers for simulations and applications of concepts, such as showing the up and down movements of an elevator alongside a graph of its changing speed to demonstrate velocity, scored higher by two-fifths of a grade level than students who used computers in other ways.

Eighth-graders who used computers primarily for drill and practice, though, scored more than half a grade lower than students who used the computers in other ways.

MaryJo Watson, an instructional technology specialist for the Fairfax County, Va., Public Schools, said the study's results fit her observations. "When you take the same material that was on paper, there is not much more to it when you put it on the computer," she said. "It still does not engage the student."