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Kohn's ZoneChallenging the Conventional Wisdom About Education and Kids Author: Alfie Kohn
Over more than a third of a century, Alfie Kohn has offered a multifaceted defense of progressive education as well as research-based critiques of rewards and punishments, grades, standardized testing, homework, competition, and other aspects of traditional schooling (and parenting). Each episode of Kohns Zone will offer 20-30 minutes of provocative reflections on a topic having to do with teaching and learning or with human behavior more generally; occasional longer segments will feature conversations with leading experts in education. Watch this space for new episodes, which will appear as if by magic every two weeks or so. You can listen here, or, better yet, on the podcasts home, AlfieKohn.org/podcasts, which offers other resources. And to support us, please visit https://coff.ee/kohnszone. PRODUCTION SUPPORT: Ultraviolet Audio. ART: Abi Kohn. Language: en-us Genres: Kids & Family, Parenting, Science, Social Sciences Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
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Beyond “Electronic Flashcards”
Sunday, 1 February, 2026
February 1, 2026 Beyond "Electronic Flashcards": A Conversation with Gary Stager Computers in classrooms may have the potential to radically enrich and democratize student learning, but the reality of ed tech typically looks very different. This extended episode of Kohn's Zone features a stimulating conversation with Gary Stager, one of our foremost experts on this topic. He takes us beyond banal generalities ("technology has pluses and minuses") in order to tease out which types, uses, and purposes are constructive and which are a waste of time - or worse. In what he calls our current "age of rising pedagogical authoritarianism," tech often is put in the service of "managing children, 'delivering' instruction, narrowing the curriculum, and turn[ing] kids into question-answering ATMs." Whereas, Stager insists, computers can and should help students to mess around with possibilities, create thrilling projects, and make sense of the world. RESOURCES Sylvia Libow Martinez and Gary Stager, Invent to Learn: Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom (2nd ed.), 2019: https://tinyurl.com/33k48zd8 Gary Stager, Twenty Things to Do with a Computer - Forward 50, 2021: https://tinyurl.com/mpdky2cw https://constructingmodernknowledge.com/ Alfie Kohn, "The Sneaky Conservatism of Ed Tech," Education Week, September 27, 2023: https://www.alfiekohn.org/article/tech-conservatism/ A note from Alfie Kohn: My sincere thanks to the listeners who have taken a minute to click on the DONATE link and helped to cover our production costs, thereby keeping the podcast ad- and paywall-free. If you are not yet one of the listeners who has done this, it's not too late. It will also not be too late tomorrow, but doing so right now would be even better. Also, if you enjoy the podcast, please tell other people about it! Please click the button below to donate. If you don’t see a button, please go to this page (https://coff.ee/kohnszone). Donate PRODUCTION SUPPORT: Ultraviolet Audio ART: Abi Kohn
