11 votes

Modern STEM toys don't do a good job of educating because they're just toys, not tools

10 comments

  1. DonQuixote
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    I've worked with thousands of children for decades, in essentially a self learning environment. I've observed thousands of parents interacting differently with their kids. It's no surprise that...
    • Exemplary

    But the toys don’t work. I’ve been very critical of modern STEM toys because they are just toys. The only things I’ve found remotely educational are Scratch, with its BASIC-like mental syntax, and Adafruit products that require actual soldering. Every other one, from the Nintendo Labo to the broken robot at the bottom of our basement stairs, is junk.

    I've worked with thousands of children for decades, in essentially a self learning environment. I've observed thousands of parents interacting differently with their kids. It's no surprise that kids especially those from 0-10 learn better, faster and more useful applications when their parents get involved. STEM toys are by definition toys. But that doesn't mean they're therefore junk. The idea of STEM is in vogue right now for a reason: there's a shortage of STEM oriented labor and the acronym, though overused, is a way for busy teachers and parents to get a handle on what used to be called tinkering. I want to add that it's a way to get girls involved in a field that was mostly dominated by boys in decades past.

    Childhood learning is not the same as adult or even adolescent learning. It involves play, fantasy, role playing and a great deal of feedback and approval seeking from parents. But I've seen even toddler minds turn on when they get the concept of inside and outside at a door with a large glass window, and endlessly experiment with it. A simple door. The Ipad has been the go-to fidget toy for many kids of busy parents since it hit the market, and now parents are looking for more hands on toys, realizing that screen time offers only a subset of the learning available to their children.

    Though the STEM movement is just a phase, and STEM toys only have a limited usefulness, they're a welcome step in getting children to acknowledge that Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics have a function beyond the abstract fields we attempted to learn from textbooks back when books were a thing.

    What we need to be concerned about are the multitude of children (and I see them every day, and teachers see many more every day) who don't have what we would consider capable parents in our privileged world of educated capable people. Many of those children are removed by three or more generations from the type of garage school learning the author relates. We need to be concerned about what our own children are going to really need to know when even many of the coding and engineering tasks are automated. What will the human mind be useful for? I don't have a crystal ball to see that future. I can guess that machines won't be concerned about parenting, changing climate, or human suffering and care for the aging population. Except maybe as batteries.

    6 votes
  2. [2]
    Akir
    Link
    I sort of agree with the author, but the biggest problem with his argument is that he is using examples that don't really fit the category of STEM toys. Nintendo Labo is just a toy; it doesn't...

    I sort of agree with the author, but the biggest problem with his argument is that he is using examples that don't really fit the category of STEM toys. Nintendo Labo is just a toy; it doesn't have any STEM interest beyond what you shoehorn into it. The same is true for just about any preassembled robots as well.

    I would sort of agree that Scratch is one of the best actual STEM tools designed for children, but it's not the only one out there. Parallax probably does the best job at making 'toys' that are actually educational, and they even have robots that are programmable in a Scratch-like enviroment called BlocklyProp.

    9 votes
    1. nic
      Link Parent
      I think that is a no true Scotsman fallacy. Most STEM products don't seem to encourage STEM.

      I think that is a no true Scotsman fallacy.

      Most STEM products don't seem to encourage STEM.

  3. [6]
    Deimos
    Link
    It's a pretty different perspective on it, but this article that I read yesterday also gave me similar feelings, but related much more to computers specifically: The Missing Computer Skills of...

    It's a pretty different perspective on it, but this article that I read yesterday also gave me similar feelings, but related much more to computers specifically: The Missing Computer Skills of High School Students

    We used to pick up a ton of knowledge as kids by tinkering around, often from necessity. It's honestly a bit baffling to me now that I, as a kid, used to do things like somehow figure out how to modify the AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS files in DOS to make games/programs work better, without access to the internet. Needing to do things like that taught me a ton about computers, and even though it felt far more like an inconvenience than an opportunity at the time, I think it was absolutely a valuable experience.

    5 votes
    1. [5]
      cfabbro
      (edited )
      Link Parent
      Who is this "we" you speak of? Because I know for a fact that I was an absolute minority of a minority back when I was growing up taking apart computers, putting them back together, learning to...

      We used to pick up a ton of knowledge as kids by tinkering around, often from necessity.

      Who is this "we" you speak of? Because I know for a fact that I was an absolute minority of a minority back when I was growing up taking apart computers, putting them back together, learning to write autoexec.bat/config.sys files and tinkering with routers, modems, IP addresses, networks, telnet, BBS', etc. Only "we" the nerds did that sort of stuff, and "we" were vastly outnumbered by everyone else our age who were generally interested in other things that were rarely as cerebral (although that was not always the case). And I suspect that the exact same minority proportion of kids with interests in tinkering and solving problems still exists today, but all the old nerds complaining about "kids these days" are wearing too darkly tinted a pair of rose-coloured glasses to see that. ;)

      Now that's not to say that tinkering and solving problems shouldn't be encouraged more or educational toys not improved, but IMO this whole "we lost our way and kids just aren't learning like they used to!" malarkey is just that... malarkey. Yes, disposable toys maybe aren't super great for learning... but I bet you a certain % of kids today (probably the same % as were tinkering with computers in the late 80s/early 90s) took that disposable toy apart instead of throwing it out when it broke in order to figure out how it worked, how to fix it and that has set them on a path very similar to ours, the nerds of ye olde times.

      1 vote
      1. [4]
        Whom
        Link Parent
        I am coming from a much younger perspective, but do you not see any difference between being forced to do in-depth things to complete your nerdy tasks and having those things be entirely optional...

        I am coming from a much younger perspective, but do you not see any difference between being forced to do in-depth things to complete your nerdy tasks and having those things be entirely optional unless you just think it's cool? The best way to learn is from authentic need for a skill, and there just aren't many of those that stem from many of the things nerds want to do. The nerds don't have to be nerds!

        3 votes
        1. [3]
          cfabbro
          (edited )
          Link Parent
          They were entirely optional for us too though... nobody forced me to do any of that, I wanted to because I found it compelling and rewarding to pursue, just as some kids today might even when they...

          They were entirely optional for us too though... nobody forced me to do any of that, I wanted to because I found it compelling and rewarding to pursue, just as some kids today might even when they aren't forced to. And if everything is soooo much worse for learning now, then why is the maker movement so insanely popular amongst high schoolers these days? We never had any organized movements promoting tinkering with electronics on that scale when I was growing up and yet here it is thriving in the age when "kids these days aren't learning like they used to"? I just don't buy it.

          1. [2]
            Whom
            Link Parent
            You never found yourself in situations where if you wanted to make a game work right or run a certain program, you had to tinker with things? I'm not talking about anything too serious, but...

            You never found yourself in situations where if you wanted to make a game work right or run a certain program, you had to tinker with things? I'm not talking about anything too serious, but messing with configs and stuff is something that continues to be less and less necessary, even on a much shorter timeline that I can speak to.

            Sure, in the situations I'm talking about it's "optional" in that you could just not do the things you want to do, but there's a learning opportunity in between yourself and a desirable outcome. Those outcomes that require you to learn anything to accomplish are becoming less and less common. If I'm a kid that likes games, I don't really run into anything like that unless I want to make them or something.

            Also, to be clear, I'd say if that's good or bad is a very different conversation. I think the tool of authentic tasks is becoming less and less present, but if you fill that in with direct instruction it could also mean a shortcut to other things, maybe.

            4 votes
            1. cfabbro
              (edited )
              Link Parent
              Have they really? Again I don't buy it. I suspect technical roadblocks needing to be solved by people before they can continue to use things are just as prevalent as they were before, and in fact...

              but messing with configs and stuff is something that continues to be less and less necessary, even on a much shorter timeline that I can speak to.
              ...
              Those outcomes that require you to learn anything to accomplish are becoming less and less common.

              Have they really? Again I don't buy it. I suspect technical roadblocks needing to be solved by people before they can continue to use things are just as prevalent as they were before, and in fact I suspect they may even happen more often overall now because of the sheer volume of electronics out there now that have become essential to our lives. And similar to in the past, once again it's all about proportion... the same amount of people that would have walked away before probably still do and the same amount that dig deeper to solve the problem probably still do as well.

              And maybe even more people are actually becoming problem solvers these days than in the past. E.g. If you had told me 10 years ago my sister would have learned how to use photoshop to create promotional material for her business on facebook, do simple modifications on her website on her own to do price updates, download movies/tv shows on to her media PC and run them through PLEX on her TV, know how to use google to troubleshoot other problems (e.g. printer not working), etc... I would have told you you were nuts. And yet here she is doing all that and more, and my nephew is doing similar incredible things for his age. He is already better than my parents at operating a TV, iPad and putting together legos at 4 years than they are at 60+. And IMO that sort of overall generational shift in technical competence is only accelerating, not diminishing.

              1 vote
  4. nic
    Link
    I've involved my kid in almost every repair project around the house. Because he is six, it increases the time by a factor of ten. But I am not fixing things. I am raising a man. In addition to...

    I've involved my kid in almost every repair project around the house.

    Because he is six, it increases the time by a factor of ten. But I am not fixing things. I am raising a man.

    In addition to helping out with repairs, I find Chess is excellent at developing logical thought.

    Simply reading books together, or cooking that meal he saw on a youtube video is excellent.

    STEM does not need to be only about programmable robots.

    As an aside, my favorite experiment so far involves boiling red cabbage, and then mixing the red water with vinegar/ baking soda/ other items to measure their acidic/base properties, then mixing everything together to see a foamy explosion.

    4 votes