As education systems, including Israel’s under Education Minister Yoav Kisch, continue pushing AI and other digital tools into classrooms, a striking experiment in Minneapolis suggests a return to basics can work better. At Washburn High School, English and literature teacher Morine Mulvaney banned not only smartphones but also laptops, forcing students back to notebooks, pencils, and printed books in order to curb copying, distractions, and falling literacy.
The results were dramatic. Before the experiment began in September, only 46% of Mulvaney’s students said they felt confident in their reading and comprehension. By February, five months later, that figure had risen to 95%. The transition was difficult at first, students could barely write by hand for more than half a page during the first two days, but they gradually built up what the article describes as writing endurance and eventually produced five and six page texts.
About 79% of the students said it was easier to organize their thoughts on paper than on a screen. Some also said disconnecting from the internet removed the temptation to use AI tools and helped revive their own creativity. The article presents the Minneapolis case as part of a wider global “digital disillusionment” in education.
Across Europe, countries such as Sweden and France have taken a tougher line in the past two years against too many screens in classrooms. Sweden recently announced a major return to printed textbooks after finding that rapid digitization hurt language skills, while China has imposed strict limits on smartphones and digital devices in schools to fight distraction. In Israel, the Education Ministry is also trying to limit smartphones in class, but the article says it often leaves responsibility to local authorities and schools.
The piece argues that the technology promise dating back to the 1980s, from Apple II computers to “one computer per child” programs, has been challenged by newer neurological and cognitive research. Handwriting activates more parts of the brain tied to memory and information processing, while typing does less, and screen reading encourages skimming rather than deep reading. The Washburn experiment, it concludes, shows the students had not changed biologically, the technology had changed their behavior.
