As concerns grow over the effects of screen-based learning, parents are questioning the rise of educational apps. The revolt against ‘edtech’ is gathering pace, writes Sophie Morris
Like many parents, I work hard to limit my child’s screen time. I have read enough about how screen time affects brain development to worry about it, and regularly suffer complaints, bad moods and even tantrums when my daughter cannot handle the fact that a screen session is ending.
I feel that boundaries on screens are vital, but increasingly hard to manage. We had a device-free holiday this summer, which led to our daughter reading twice as many books as usual and taking the dog for walks on her own.
I force myself to regularly leave my phone at home when we go out; I watch her - not my phone - when I’m at her swimming class.
So when Percy has come home with homework, I’ve so far tended to avoid it - because it generally means logging onto a poorly designed app. Working on a screen when it’s time to wind down for the evening never ends well - whatever your age. I figure we are better off reading a book, playing a game or talking.
But Percy, who attends a state primary school which she loves, has just started Year 5, and I don’t want her to fall behind. Already, I’m aware she didn’t progress in her times tables compared with some others in her class because we refused to use the app. Am I doing the right thing?
I’m not alone in this quandary. A growing swell of parents fed up with ubiquitous “edtech” - the umbrella term for the use of technology in education - are speaking out about their dissatisfaction with screenbased learning. Parents are anxious about the amount of screen time that children encounter in class and at home, and question the use of socalled educational apps whose efficacy goes unproven.
Their complaints, backed by the shadow Education Secretary, Laura Trott, and well-known figures such as the actress Sophie Winkleman, were debated in the House of Lords last month, and may well lead to significant changes in the way primaryage children are taught.
Parents describe how their children are being shown funny TikToks in assembly, YouTube for “movement breaks” in reception classes, and watching entire movies at school as rewards for good behaviour.
“Screens are as addictive as cigarettes,” said Trott. “Every day, there is new evidence of the irreversible harm that screens and smartphones are having on our children’s wellbeing and attainment. It doesn’t have to be this way. We can and must do more.”
Trott is calling for limits and alternatives to screen-based homework, and a rollback of the digitisation of GCSE assessments and the reception baseline assessment (RBA).
Before this school year, the RBA - a statutory requirement for all schools in England - was carried out with worksheets and physical objects, but since September, schools have been required to perform the test digitally, with four-year-olds answering on touch screens.
Baroness Barran, who brought the amendment, shared evidence that 50 per cent of children and young people said they used social media while doing online homework. Sixty per cent were texting. Pupils switched tasks every six minutes, and for every 15 minutes of homework, only 10 were spent studying.
“We have to ask who really wins when children’s time and attention is captured by screens,” says Daisy Greenwell, one of the co-founders of Smartphone-Free Childhood, a parents’ movement that has led to significant rollback on the use of smartphones in secondary schools.
“Tech companies profit enormously, yet there’s little evidence this improves learning.”
This is a key argument for antiedtech activists. For some, the ultimate aim is to return the majority of primary education to pen and paper.
Famously, tech bosses such as Steve Jobs did not let their children have phones and were strict about screen time. Now, there are reports of a high concentration of alternative schools and nurseries in Silicon Valley, such as Montessori and Waldorf Steiner institutions, which deliberately delay using technology and instead have teachers and children using chalkboards and pens.
“The irony is that the tech elite restrict screens for their own families, while other children are being locked into digital dependence,” says Greenwell. “And the evidence is clear: the first large, gold-standard trial of banning smartphones in schools shows it lifts attainment, especially for the most disadvantaged students. This is about giving every child the best chance to learn and thrive.”
Experts have warned about the “gamification” of learning - which can seem like an easy way to motivate children. Times Table Rock Stars, the name of a multiplication app that has achieved near saturation in British schools, is a prime example of this. What eight-year-old wants a boring printed chart of the times tables to learn by rote, when they could create an avatar of themselves as a rock star instead, and spend hours jabbing at an iPad to win points and cool rock star accessories?
Because gamification is ubiquitous, I had assumed it also worked, and that my dislike of it was oldfashioned and unwarranted. In fact, there appears to be little to no evidence showing that gamification promotes learning. What it does promote is exactly the same kind of addiction that has adults scrolling, gaming and gambling our lives away.
An Education Select Committee report last year on screen time in education found that of the 500,000 available apps claiming to be educational, there are no quality standards.
“Many schools encourage the use of educational apps to support learning and engage pupils with subjects such as mathematics, but there is currently a poor evidence base regarding which are most effective,” it said.
Worryingly, it found that only 7 per cent of edtech providers had conducted randomised controlled trials on their products, and that the evidence to suggest that any of these apps are effective is poor.
Ben Parker, 49, is a child and adolescent consultant psychiatrist in south-west England with 16-year-old twin boys and a daughter aged nine.
After seeing how his sons grew up using tech, including doing their homework on smartphones, he gave some thought to alternative education for his daughter, such as a Steiner school. Ultimately, he has decided to stick with their local state school, but only because he has been reassured by the rising number of parents resisting buying a smartphone for their children.
He warns that the way young people use screens interferes with brain development in a number of ways, from ruining concentration to affecting their ability to interact with others.
“If you don’t use these parts of the brain during adolescence, a critical period for brain development, they don’t fully develop the skills that they need for life,” he explains. He believes radical change is possible, and has been successful before.
“I honestly think we will look back in future generations, a bit like we look at photos of people smoking indoors, and think, ‘Oh, my God,
I can’t believe we let kids have all that screen time’.”
However, despite the startling claims in the select committee report, the Government’s embracing of edtech shows no signs of abating.
In June, the Department for Education announced a nine-month pilot asking schools to act as “testbeds” to find new tech solutions to cut teacher workload. Meanwhile, it announced £1m for AI firms to fund the development of classroom tools.
During September’s debate, Lord Holmes of Richmond praised the potential of edtech, saying that if done right, it “enables personalised education - for every young person to have a classroom assistant alongside them in technology form”.
With schools battling a funding crisis, teacher recruitment crisis and high levels of need and behavioural issues, technology is proving an irresistible, cheap solution.
A teaching assistant in Scotland, who is extremely concerned about the rollout of devices in primary schools, told me: “There is a culture of using tech to engage or, more worryingly, occupy children displaying behavioural issues during class.
“I have seen instances of children who are unwilling to access the school curriculum being able to help themselves to tech [iPads or laptops] and access, for example, completely inappropriate games.
“I am absolutely not against all tech use in schools but feel, emphatically, that it should be used for specific tasks and then put away.”
Sarah, 42, a mother with two children in primary school in south London, says: “My son is now six and when I pick him up at the end of the day the children are always sitting on the carpet engrossed in some kind of animation on a big screen.
“I expect it’s possibly an educational film, and I know it’s a way of keeping them quiet while they wait for their parents, but it is a super depressing sight.
“My son also told me that they watched K-Pop Demon Hunters recently at school as a reward for something or another. They are only six - it would be so easy to reward them with a sticker, extra playtime, a marble or something. I feel teachers right now are pretty overwhelmed, with support being cut like never before, and they rely on screens more and more - when parents are trying desperately to keep a limit on them.”
For now, I’m trying my best to find a balance for my daughter, so that she learns what she needs to but from a mix of screen-based and old school pen-and-paper homework.
Last week, we did two 15-minute homework sessions together. The first was hellish. We logged onto Mathletics. The interface had changed since last year, but at least it didn’t freeze every few minutes. Yet the questions, even to me, were not clear. Instead of progressing through the set tasks, we ended in a puddle of screaming just before bedtime.
I know exactly how she feels. As adults, when we don’t get the results we hope for from technology, especially in the evening, we are liable to feel drained, anxious, and perhaps angry. For the other homework session, we did spelling.
In previous years, the school prescribed a spelling app called Sir Linkalot. Spelling Shed is also widely used. But this year, it has decided to return to good old pen and paper - a promising sign that our school is starting to listen to the data, and parents. The school has also banned screens in the wraparound care it provides - so where she used to stare at Minecraft for hours, she now plays outside and talks to her friends.
Remarkably, when we did the pen and paper spelling game, we both enjoyed it and laughed a lot together.
This has never happened before, and who knows if it will again, but it felt like a strong step forward.
Still, as my daughter regularly points out, if I want to improve her behaviour around screen time, I should really sort out my own first.
FAST FACTS CHILDREN AND SCREEN TIME