WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.899 Welcome in, everyone. I am just thrilled to have 00:00:02.899 --> 00:00:04.400 you joining us today. Yeah, it's great to be 00:00:04.400 --> 00:00:07.120 here. If you're the kind of person who constantly 00:00:07.120 --> 00:00:10.839 asks why things are the way they are, well, you've 00:00:10.839 --> 00:00:14.220 landed in the exact right place. Today, our mission 00:00:14.220 --> 00:00:17.519 on this deep dive is to explore a truly fascinating, 00:00:17.519 --> 00:00:21.309 um... a really unexpected slice of technology 00:00:21.309 --> 00:00:23.109 history. Absolutely. We're going to figure out 00:00:23.109 --> 00:00:26.309 exactly how, when, and I think most importantly, 00:00:26.750 --> 00:00:29.390 why computers first entered the classroom. It's 00:00:29.390 --> 00:00:31.350 a phenomenal topic, and it's one of the subjects 00:00:31.350 --> 00:00:34.409 where the actual history completely defies our 00:00:34.409 --> 00:00:36.810 modern assumptions. The source material we're 00:00:36.810 --> 00:00:39.649 using today is a really thought -provoking 2019 00:00:39.649 --> 00:00:43.009 article by Gary Ackerman. It's titled When Computers 00:00:43.009 --> 00:00:45.130 Started School, and it was published over on 00:00:45.130 --> 00:00:48.469 the blog hackscience .education. And I want to 00:00:48.469 --> 00:00:50.090 challenge your assumptions right out of the gate 00:00:50.090 --> 00:00:53.210 here. Because when I say early educational technology, 00:00:54.049 --> 00:00:55.609 what pops into your head? You probably picture 00:00:55.609 --> 00:00:57.770 a clunky desktop sitting in the school library 00:00:57.770 --> 00:01:00.149 somewhere. Yeah, totally. Maybe it has a glowing 00:01:00.149 --> 00:01:03.070 green screen, a really heavy mechanical keyboard, 00:01:03.189 --> 00:01:05.870 and it's running some rudimentary organ trail 00:01:05.870 --> 00:01:09.170 style game. Right, that classic 1980s or 90s 00:01:09.170 --> 00:01:12.239 visual. That is the era when computing became 00:01:12.239 --> 00:01:15.260 a hands -on, highly visible part of the student 00:01:15.260 --> 00:01:17.620 experience. But according to Ackerman's research, 00:01:18.200 --> 00:01:20.680 that image completely misses the true beginning 00:01:20.680 --> 00:01:23.900 of the story. The actual origins of school computing 00:01:23.900 --> 00:01:26.280 don't start with friendly desktop machines designed 00:01:26.280 --> 00:01:29.400 for kids. The story starts much earlier, and 00:01:29.400 --> 00:01:32.099 honestly much darker. It starts with World War 00:01:32.099 --> 00:01:34.819 II, the Manhattan Project, and machines the size 00:01:34.819 --> 00:01:38.230 of entire rooms. Okay, let's unpack this. To 00:01:38.230 --> 00:01:40.430 understand how computers got into schools, we 00:01:40.430 --> 00:01:41.849 really have to look at where they came from in 00:01:41.849 --> 00:01:45.310 the first place. Historians often trace the earliest 00:01:45.310 --> 00:01:47.569 conceptual beginnings back to the 19th century 00:01:47.569 --> 00:01:49.829 with Charles Babbage and his analytic machine. 00:01:49.890 --> 00:01:52.409 Right, the mechanical era. Exactly, but the history 00:01:52.409 --> 00:01:55.189 of electronic digital computing, the direct lineage 00:01:55.189 --> 00:01:58.549 to the devices you and I use today, that is usually 00:01:58.549 --> 00:02:01.209 measured from the creation of the ENIC. And this 00:02:01.209 --> 00:02:03.689 is where the context gets heavy, because the 00:02:03.689 --> 00:02:06.219 ENIC wasn't built for learning. It wasn't built 00:02:06.219 --> 00:02:09.139 to store library catalogs. It was built for massive 00:02:09.139 --> 00:02:11.840 military computations during World War II. We're 00:02:11.840 --> 00:02:14.259 talking about the kind of complex, massive -scale 00:02:14.259 --> 00:02:17.099 mathematics required for global warfare. The 00:02:17.099 --> 00:02:19.680 text points out that this specifically included 00:02:19.680 --> 00:02:22.219 calculations for the Manhattan Project. Wow. 00:02:22.719 --> 00:02:25.099 It's truly staggering to think about. The very 00:02:25.099 --> 00:02:27.819 technology that now sits in the backpacks of 00:02:27.819 --> 00:02:30.960 millions of schoolchildren around the world has 00:02:30.960 --> 00:02:33.319 its roots in the creation of weapons of mass 00:02:33.319 --> 00:02:36.000 destruction. Yeah, it's a stark contrast. You 00:02:36.000 --> 00:02:39.340 contrast that reality of 1940s computing with 00:02:39.340 --> 00:02:42.069 the idea of a kindergarten classroom. You have 00:02:42.069 --> 00:02:44.750 a technology built to calculate blast radiuses 00:02:44.750 --> 00:02:47.050 and artillery trajectories, and we somehow bridge 00:02:47.050 --> 00:02:49.969 the gap from that to teaching fractions. It sets 00:02:49.969 --> 00:02:52.629 up a major logistical hurdle for the post -war 00:02:52.629 --> 00:02:55.270 era. Because when World War II ends, you have 00:02:55.270 --> 00:02:58.569 this incredibly powerful, staggeringly expensive 00:02:58.569 --> 00:03:01.430 new technology. But the immediate existential 00:03:01.430 --> 00:03:04.009 demand of a global war effort is suddenly gone. 00:03:04.090 --> 00:03:06.090 Right. The war is over. So the question becomes, 00:03:06.250 --> 00:03:08.569 what happens to these machines now? Well, they 00:03:08.569 --> 00:03:10.469 certainly didn't roll them into the local elementary 00:03:10.469 --> 00:03:12.770 school. No, not at all. After the war, computers 00:03:12.770 --> 00:03:15.469 were introduced very slowly into what the source 00:03:15.469 --> 00:03:18.430 material calls information -rich industries. 00:03:18.830 --> 00:03:20.710 information -rich industries. All right. Think 00:03:20.710 --> 00:03:23.650 about the sectors of the economy that are just 00:03:23.650 --> 00:03:26.949 drowning in data. We're looking at military production, 00:03:27.009 --> 00:03:29.310 which obviously continued post -war, but also 00:03:29.310 --> 00:03:31.610 insurance companies and airlines. That makes 00:03:31.610 --> 00:03:34.969 perfect sense. These were massive operations. 00:03:35.490 --> 00:03:38.129 I mean, insurance actuaries and airline logistics 00:03:38.129 --> 00:03:41.330 departments had the sheer volume of raw data 00:03:41.330 --> 00:03:45.050 to justify the machine. And more importantly, 00:03:45.349 --> 00:03:47.870 they had the massive budgets required to actually 00:03:47.870 --> 00:03:50.289 afford one. Because at this point in history, 00:03:50.590 --> 00:03:53.169 these mainframes were wildly expensive to build, 00:03:53.430 --> 00:03:56.330 buy, and maintain. Which brings us to a detail 00:03:56.330 --> 00:03:58.590 from the text that completely reframes the scale 00:03:58.590 --> 00:04:01.310 of this early industry. According to the article, 00:04:01.590 --> 00:04:03.509 in the years immediately following World War 00:04:03.509 --> 00:04:05.849 II, the annual sales of computers could be counted 00:04:05.849 --> 00:04:08.770 with single digits. Wait, single digits? Yeah. 00:04:08.870 --> 00:04:11.389 Are we talking literally under 10 computers sold 00:04:11.389 --> 00:04:14.020 globally in a whole year? Yes, between four and 00:04:14.020 --> 00:04:16.759 nine units sold an entire year across the entire 00:04:16.759 --> 00:04:18.879 industry. I want you, the listener, to let that 00:04:18.879 --> 00:04:21.079 sink in for a second. We live in a world where 00:04:21.079 --> 00:04:23.399 tech companies move millions of devices in a 00:04:23.399 --> 00:04:26.100 single holiday weekend. And here we have an entire 00:04:26.100 --> 00:04:29.980 global industry in the years after the war, surviving 00:04:29.980 --> 00:04:33.579 on half a dozen sales. It's hard to imagine how 00:04:33.579 --> 00:04:36.279 an industry selling that few units survives, 00:04:36.839 --> 00:04:39.990 let alone grows enough to eventually target public 00:04:39.990 --> 00:04:42.069 school districts. What's fascinating here is 00:04:42.069 --> 00:04:44.290 the economic engine that those single -digit 00:04:44.290 --> 00:04:47.970 sales slowly started to build. Ackerman describes 00:04:47.970 --> 00:04:51.269 a cycle of industry push and market pull that 00:04:51.269 --> 00:04:54.430 began to drive sales and expand capacity. So 00:04:54.430 --> 00:04:56.790 even with those tiny sales numbers, the amount 00:04:56.790 --> 00:04:59.290 of money changing hands was massive because the 00:04:59.290 --> 00:05:01.790 machines were so prohibitively expensive. Exactly. 00:05:02.199 --> 00:05:04.360 As the early market slowly expanded, you know, 00:05:04.379 --> 00:05:06.699 as a few more insurance companies and airlines 00:05:06.699 --> 00:05:09.660 bought in, more capital became available to the 00:05:09.660 --> 00:05:12.480 computer manufacturers to fund their R &D departments. 00:05:12.500 --> 00:05:14.420 They're reinvesting it. Right. They poured that 00:05:14.420 --> 00:05:16.459 revenue back into making the machines faster, 00:05:16.519 --> 00:05:19.439 more reliable and crucially cheaper to produce. 00:05:19.779 --> 00:05:22.680 That R &D leads to technological advances, which 00:05:22.680 --> 00:05:24.759 expands computing capacity while simultaneously 00:05:24.759 --> 00:05:27.420 driving down the cost of production. If they're 00:05:27.420 --> 00:05:29.259 pouring all that airline and insurance money 00:05:29.259 --> 00:05:32.379 back into R &D for 15 straight years, the tech 00:05:32.379 --> 00:05:35.120 is bound to get cheaper. And that puts us right 00:05:35.120 --> 00:05:39.399 in the early 1960s. By the early 1960s, the price 00:05:39.399 --> 00:05:41.480 of mainframe computers had finally decreased 00:05:41.480 --> 00:05:44.160 to a tipping point. They were still massive and 00:05:44.160 --> 00:05:46.620 still incredibly expensive by our modern standards, 00:05:46.899 --> 00:05:49.220 but the cost had dropped just enough that a brand 00:05:49.220 --> 00:05:52.519 new market opened up. Schools. Yes. Selling to 00:05:52.519 --> 00:05:55.399 the educational market became a real mathematical 00:05:55.399 --> 00:05:57.560 possibility for these tech companies. And the 00:05:57.560 --> 00:05:59.699 source text points out that this convergence 00:05:59.699 --> 00:06:02.680 has led to a very cynical perspective among some 00:06:02.680 --> 00:06:05.259 historical observers. Oh, definitely. There are 00:06:05.259 --> 00:06:08.089 cynics out there who suggest that the so - educational 00:06:08.089 --> 00:06:11.410 applications of computing were entirely invented 00:06:11.410 --> 00:06:14.350 out of thin air for one specific reason. To sell 00:06:14.350 --> 00:06:16.930 more machines. Exactly. So that tech companies 00:06:16.930 --> 00:06:20.550 could secure sales in this massive untapped school 00:06:20.550 --> 00:06:23.389 market to keep their R &D cycle churning. It's 00:06:23.389 --> 00:06:26.509 a compelling argument. I mean, were early computer 00:06:26.509 --> 00:06:28.910 advocates genuinely trying to revolutionize human 00:06:28.910 --> 00:06:30.449 learning or were they just trying to open up 00:06:30.449 --> 00:06:32.069 a new revenue stream? We aren't here to take 00:06:32.069 --> 00:06:34.329 sides on that debate, of course. We're simply 00:06:34.329 --> 00:06:36.850 reporting on the perspectives outlined in the 00:06:36.850 --> 00:06:39.829 source material. But it is a vital piece of context 00:06:39.829 --> 00:06:41.629 to understand the motivation behind the push. 00:06:42.110 --> 00:06:44.689 Absolutely. Regardless of whether you view it 00:06:44.689 --> 00:06:48.389 as a corporate cash grab or a genuine pedagogical 00:06:48.389 --> 00:06:51.730 movement, the historical fact remains the same. 00:06:51.930 --> 00:06:55.449 The result was incredibly swift. Yeah, we went 00:06:55.449 --> 00:06:58.810 from calculating nuclear explosions in the 1940s 00:06:58.810 --> 00:07:02.490 to pitching educational systems to schools by 00:07:02.490 --> 00:07:05.839 the 1960s. It's a whiplash inducing pivot. Here's 00:07:05.839 --> 00:07:07.680 where it gets really interesting. We need to 00:07:07.680 --> 00:07:09.800 talk about Don Bushnell. Yes. Don Bushnell is 00:07:09.800 --> 00:07:12.660 a central figure in this narrative. In 1963, 00:07:12.939 --> 00:07:15.180 he wrote a monograph for the Department of Audiovisual 00:07:15.180 --> 00:07:17.639 Instruction, which was part of the National Education 00:07:17.639 --> 00:07:20.519 Association. In this document, he lays out a 00:07:20.519 --> 00:07:23.660 very bold, very specific blueprint for the future 00:07:23.660 --> 00:07:26.300 of computers in schools. Bushnell predicted, 00:07:26.420 --> 00:07:28.540 and I'll quote from the text here, that the digital 00:07:28.540 --> 00:07:30.879 computer and its peripheral equipment will support 00:07:30.879 --> 00:07:33.699 most of the subsystems in the total school complex. 00:07:33.980 --> 00:07:36.439 That phrasing alone is so revealing, subsystems 00:07:36.439 --> 00:07:38.379 in the total school complex. Yeah. It sounds 00:07:38.379 --> 00:07:41.240 like he's describing a nuclear submarine or a 00:07:41.240 --> 00:07:43.800 Boeing assembly plant, not a place where children 00:07:43.800 --> 00:07:46.279 go to learn. It strips a lot of the humanity 00:07:46.279 --> 00:07:48.250 out of the environment, doesn't it? Bushnell 00:07:48.250 --> 00:07:50.610 envisioned a highly standardized educational 00:07:50.610 --> 00:07:54.170 environment. In his mind, a computer rich classroom 00:07:54.170 --> 00:07:57.629 was a place where a uniform curriculum would 00:07:57.629 --> 00:08:00.490 be delivered to all students via computer terminals. 00:08:00.870 --> 00:08:02.730 And how was learning actually measured in this 00:08:02.730 --> 00:08:04.730 system? I mean, it wasn't through essays or a 00:08:04.730 --> 00:08:06.589 creative project. No, not at all. It was entirely 00:08:06.589 --> 00:08:09.290 binary. Students learning would be measured solely 00:08:09.290 --> 00:08:12.350 based on their ability to provide correct answers 00:08:12.350 --> 00:08:15.829 to questions posed by the computer. And the correctness 00:08:15.829 --> 00:08:18.389 of those answers would be judged strictly according 00:08:18.389 --> 00:08:21.230 to the answers already stored inside the computer's 00:08:21.230 --> 00:08:24.170 memory. It's a completely closed loop. The computer 00:08:24.170 --> 00:08:26.790 holds the ultimate truth. It asks the student 00:08:26.790 --> 00:08:29.149 for the truth. And if the student matches the 00:08:29.149 --> 00:08:31.589 computer's stored data, learning has supposedly 00:08:31.589 --> 00:08:34.789 occurred. Wow. It's rote memorization and recall 00:08:34.789 --> 00:08:38.250 mediated entirely by a machine. It feels incredibly 00:08:38.250 --> 00:08:40.649 rigid. If we connect this to the bigger picture, 00:08:41.129 --> 00:08:43.250 you can really see the philosophical underpinnings 00:08:43.250 --> 00:08:46.879 of the era bleeding into education. This picture 00:08:46.879 --> 00:08:49.960 of a highly standardized computer -mediated curriculum 00:08:49.960 --> 00:08:53.059 was heavily promoted as a very efficient method 00:08:53.059 --> 00:08:56.080 of teaching. Efficiency. That is the magic word 00:08:56.080 --> 00:08:58.340 of the industrial age. Exactly. The promises 00:08:58.340 --> 00:09:01.139 being made about computers in education that 00:09:01.139 --> 00:09:03.779 they would improve efficiency, standardize output, 00:09:03.980 --> 00:09:06.820 and maximize productivity were the exact same 00:09:06.820 --> 00:09:09.559 promises being made to businesses and factories 00:09:09.559 --> 00:09:12.240 adopting mainframes at the time. So the school 00:09:12.240 --> 00:09:14.679 was essentially being conceptualized as an information 00:09:14.679 --> 00:09:17.399 factory. Yes. The curriculum is the raw material, 00:09:17.580 --> 00:09:19.580 the student is the product being assembled, and 00:09:19.580 --> 00:09:22.360 the computer is the ultimate efficient manager 00:09:22.360 --> 00:09:25.039 of the assembly line, ensuring every product 00:09:25.039 --> 00:09:27.759 meets the exact same standardized specifications. 00:09:28.419 --> 00:09:30.659 That is a striking vision, especially when you 00:09:30.659 --> 00:09:32.759 contrast it with modern educational philosophies 00:09:32.759 --> 00:09:35.159 that emphasize creativity, critical thinking, 00:09:35.379 --> 00:09:38.059 and personalized learning. But to me, the most 00:09:38.059 --> 00:09:40.120 mind -blowing part of Bushnell's vision isn't 00:09:40.120 --> 00:09:42.379 just the factory model philosophy. What is it? 00:09:42.460 --> 00:09:44.820 It's the technological reality of what he was 00:09:44.820 --> 00:09:47.190 actually proposing. We're talking about the physical 00:09:47.190 --> 00:09:50.429 hardware itself. Yes. Think about the timeline. 00:09:51.389 --> 00:09:54.669 Bushnell is proposing this grand automated computer 00:09:54.669 --> 00:09:58.649 mediated learning environment in 1963. The author 00:09:58.649 --> 00:10:00.889 points out that this was decades before the development 00:10:00.889 --> 00:10:03.590 of the general purpose desktop computer. This 00:10:03.590 --> 00:10:06.809 was long before the GUI. It's so easy to take 00:10:06.809 --> 00:10:09.549 for granted today that computing is accessible 00:10:09.549 --> 00:10:12.470 to almost anyone to perform almost any desired 00:10:12.470 --> 00:10:15.940 function. But in the early 1960s, computers were 00:10:15.940 --> 00:10:18.700 massive, intimidating machines. They were largely 00:10:18.700 --> 00:10:21.279 operated by specialized technicians. And the 00:10:21.279 --> 00:10:23.399 programming. Ackerman notes that these computers 00:10:23.399 --> 00:10:25.840 were programmed by physically reconfiguring the 00:10:25.840 --> 00:10:28.299 circuits. Yeah, that's wild. We aren't talking 00:10:28.299 --> 00:10:30.399 about typing code on a keyboard to change a variable. 00:10:30.639 --> 00:10:32.679 We're talking about technicians physically moving 00:10:32.679 --> 00:10:34.580 cables and plugging them into different sockets 00:10:34.580 --> 00:10:36.940 on massive plug boards to change the electrical 00:10:36.940 --> 00:10:39.519 pathways. The physical architecture was the program. 00:10:39.620 --> 00:10:41.600 If you wanted to change the math lesson, you 00:10:41.600 --> 00:10:44.320 had to literally re - wire or the machine, which 00:10:44.320 --> 00:10:47.039 creates a fascinating paradox for Bushnell's 00:10:47.039 --> 00:10:50.299 vision of education. Because the technology required 00:10:50.299 --> 00:10:53.220 dedicated technicians to operate and physical 00:10:53.220 --> 00:10:56.200 reconfiguration to program, the actual computers 00:10:56.200 --> 00:10:58.159 themselves could not be in the classroom with 00:10:58.159 --> 00:11:01.440 the students. Exactly. The text states that in 00:11:01.440 --> 00:11:04.120 the education envisioned by Bushnell, students 00:11:04.120 --> 00:11:06.299 and teachers would interact with the information, 00:11:06.659 --> 00:11:09.320 presumably through some kind of rudimentary terminal 00:11:09.320 --> 00:11:12.500 or punch card system, but the devices themselves, 00:11:12.679 --> 00:11:15.360 the actual mainframes doing the processing, would 00:11:15.360 --> 00:11:18.200 remain completely unseen and untouched by the 00:11:18.200 --> 00:11:20.360 students and teachers. They would be hidden away 00:11:20.360 --> 00:11:22.960 in some climate -controlled back room or basement, 00:11:23.419 --> 00:11:26.039 humming away, processing the data, and feeding 00:11:26.039 --> 00:11:27.980 the standardized curriculum to the terminals. 00:11:28.240 --> 00:11:30.539 the ultimate invisible authority in the school 00:11:30.539 --> 00:11:32.879 building. It's a powerful image. The invisible 00:11:32.879 --> 00:11:35.740 teacher made of wires and vacuum tubes hidden 00:11:35.740 --> 00:11:38.320 behind a wall, measuring your worth based on 00:11:38.320 --> 00:11:40.860 how well your answers match its stored data. 00:11:41.220 --> 00:11:43.379 It feels a bit like dystopian science fiction, 00:11:43.379 --> 00:11:46.919 but this was the genuine documented blueprint 00:11:46.919 --> 00:11:49.919 for the future of education being promoted by 00:11:49.919 --> 00:11:53.480 serious advocates in the 1960s. It highlights 00:11:53.480 --> 00:11:56.200 a massive disconnect between the theoretical 00:11:56.200 --> 00:11:59.200 desire to use computers for teaching and the 00:11:59.200 --> 00:12:01.620 physical reality of what computers actually were 00:12:01.620 --> 00:12:04.059 at that point in history. Right. The advocates 00:12:04.059 --> 00:12:06.559 wanted a revolution in learning, but the tools 00:12:06.559 --> 00:12:09.480 they had available were basically gigantic and 00:12:09.480 --> 00:12:12.200 flexible calculators built for war and corporate 00:12:12.200 --> 00:12:14.379 logistics. And you can't help but wonder how 00:12:14.379 --> 00:12:16.779 that physical separation impacted the psychology 00:12:16.779 --> 00:12:19.299 of the students. I mean, you're being judged 00:12:19.299 --> 00:12:21.100 and evaluated by a machine you're not allowed 00:12:21.100 --> 00:12:24.269 to see, let alone touch or understand. It reinforces 00:12:24.269 --> 00:12:26.429 that factory model where the student is merely 00:12:26.429 --> 00:12:29.190 a passive recipient of standardization. So what 00:12:29.190 --> 00:12:31.330 does this all mean? If we trace the journey we've 00:12:31.330 --> 00:12:33.350 been on today, it's quite right. It really is. 00:12:33.450 --> 00:12:35.389 We started with a machine built to calculate 00:12:35.389 --> 00:12:38.500 the physics of the atomic bomb. We watched that 00:12:38.500 --> 00:12:40.960 technology transition into a post -war economy, 00:12:41.440 --> 00:12:43.279 where annual sales were literally in the single 00:12:43.279 --> 00:12:45.759 digits, adopted only by the most data -heavy, 00:12:45.879 --> 00:12:48.820 cash -rich industries. We saw how the relentless 00:12:48.820 --> 00:12:52.080 cycle of industry push and market pull eventually 00:12:52.080 --> 00:12:55.259 drove costs down enough by the 1960s to make 00:12:55.259 --> 00:12:57.980 the educational market a target. We explored 00:12:57.980 --> 00:13:01.139 the cynics view that perhaps this push into schools 00:13:01.139 --> 00:13:03.820 was more about opening new revenue streams than 00:13:03.820 --> 00:13:07.200 genuine pedagogy. Right. And we unpacked the 00:13:07.200 --> 00:13:10.580 incredibly standardized factory model vision 00:13:10.580 --> 00:13:13.039 of education that those early computers inspired, 00:13:13.539 --> 00:13:15.679 where learning was reduced to matching stored 00:13:15.679 --> 00:13:18.960 data on an unseen machine hidden away from the 00:13:18.960 --> 00:13:20.860 students and teachers. I want to bring this right 00:13:20.860 --> 00:13:22.820 back to you, the listener. The next time you 00:13:22.820 --> 00:13:24.940 open up your lightweight laptop or you tap on 00:13:24.940 --> 00:13:27.220 an educational app on your phone or you watch 00:13:27.220 --> 00:13:29.379 a kid interacting with a colorful touch screen 00:13:29.379 --> 00:13:31.919 to learn math or language, take a moment to think 00:13:31.919 --> 00:13:34.399 about this history. Yeah. Think about how completely 00:13:34.399 --> 00:13:37.129 different your tactile, personalized, highly 00:13:37.129 --> 00:13:40.570 visible experiences compared to the rigid, unseen 00:13:40.570 --> 00:13:42.809 mainframes that the visionaries of the 1960s 00:13:42.809 --> 00:13:45.370 were imagining. We've come incredibly far from 00:13:45.370 --> 00:13:47.490 the days of technicians rewiring circuits in 00:13:47.490 --> 00:13:49.690 a hidden basement just to deliver a multiple 00:13:49.690 --> 00:13:52.490 choice question. This raises an important question, 00:13:52.750 --> 00:13:54.370 one that I think is worth keeping in the back 00:13:54.370 --> 00:13:56.570 of your mind long after this deep dive is over. 00:13:56.769 --> 00:14:00.379 Okay, let's hear it. If the original 1960s push 00:14:00.379 --> 00:14:03.059 for computers in schools was so deeply rooted 00:14:03.059 --> 00:14:06.820 in industrial -era efficiency, this idea of treating 00:14:06.820 --> 00:14:09.360 the student's mind like a standardized factory 00:14:09.360 --> 00:14:12.200 product to be measured against stored data, how 00:14:12.200 --> 00:14:14.860 much of today's modern educational technology 00:14:14.860 --> 00:14:17.860 is still secretly carrying that exact same philosophy, 00:14:18.279 --> 00:14:20.679 just hidden behind a much prettier, touchable 00:14:20.679 --> 00:14:23.759 screen? Oh, wow. That is a brilliant question 00:14:23.759 --> 00:14:26.460 to end on. Are we really experiencing a different 00:14:26.460 --> 00:14:29.139 philosophy of learning? Or just a more beautiful, 00:14:29.179 --> 00:14:32.120 user -friendly interface for the same old standardization? 00:14:32.740 --> 00:14:34.539 That's something for all of us to chew on. Thank 00:14:34.539 --> 00:14:36.379 you so much for joining us on this deep dive 00:14:36.379 --> 00:14:38.500 into the source material. It's always a privilege 00:14:38.500 --> 00:14:40.639 to explore these complex histories when you'll. 00:14:40.879 --> 00:14:43.279 Until next time, speak curious, keep questioning 00:14:43.279 --> 00:14:45.559 the world around you, and most importantly, keep 00:14:45.559 --> 00:14:45.820 learning.