Students can’t resist multitasking, and it’s impairing their memory

Living rooms, dens, kitchens, even bedrooms: Investigators followed students into the spaces where homework gets done. Pens poised over their “study observation forms,” the observers watched intently as the students—in middle school, high school, and college, 263 in all—opened their books and turned on their computers, Slate.com reports. For a quarter of an hour, the investigators from the lab of Larry Rosen, a psychology professor at California State University–Dominguez Hills, marked down once a minute what the students were doing as they studied. A checklist on the form included: reading a book, writing on paper, typing on the computer—and also using email, looking at Facebook, engaging in instant messaging, texting, talking on the phone, watching television, listening to music, surfing the web…

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A failing grade for broadband

The internet is becoming as critical to student success as textbooks and blackboards—in many parts of the country, even basic homework assignments require access to the web, Slate.com reports. This reflects not only a greater variety of educational resources available online to students, but also the rising importance of digital literacy as a fundamental skill. But even as companies create innovative new educational technologies—like cloud-based literacy programs, Skype-based tutors, and virtual math games—many policymakers and entrepreneurs are overlooking a critical factor that stands in the way of widespread adoption of these tools: adequate and universal broadband infrastructure…

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