Heavy Burden for Children

E

Epictetus

here & now
Registered Senior Member
Has anyone done an orthopedic study on the heavy book bags children have to carry around? I don't know how prevalent this is, provincial as I am, but where I've been for most of my adult life, school children are not provided lockers and have to carry extremely heavy back packs that are heavy even for me. I feel sorry for the little dickenses, I really do. Shouldn't the era of the paperless office be having a trickle down effect - the bookless schoolhouse? :(

girl+with+bookbag.jpg
 
As a bookseller, i've often been appalled by the size of textbooks - not so much for young children, who can perhaps leave most of their books at school, as for college students. Especially when i handle some of the algebra or literature textbooks from 1890-1950: in the old days, they somehow managed to cram the required material into a tome that fit into a jacket pocket. What makes the modern ones so bulky is thick, shiny paper between thick, shiny covers, with wide margins and lots of pictures and coloured highlighted boxes of trivia or addenda or cartoons. Everything has to be slick, accessible and fun. The damn are also indestructible - and quickly obsolete.

Most of the introductory college and university courses are now available in e-format, and i've heard that more advanced courses are coming. I don't know about the elementary and middle-school material - that's a less predictable market.
 
The TV series lied to me! I've always thought that individual school lockers were pretty much a universal thing on the US.

What next? Bacon and eggs as a breakfast isn't really a common thing too? I'm astonished.
 
You would think that schools would be jumping on the tablet/eReader bandwagon. That makes so much more sense.
 
gmilam said:
You would think that schools would be jumping on the tablet/eReader bandwagon. That makes so much more sense.
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The last thing they want is for children to have electronic devices on their desks. They'll spend all their time communicating with friends and playing games. Just like their parents. ;)
 
Fraggle Rocker said:
The last thing they want is for children to have electronic devices on their desks. They'll spend all their time communicating with friends and playing games. Just like their parents. ;)
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Suppose you do away with all electronic communications in the school perimeter, let the principal and school nurse handle emergencies like in the day. Even make the employees rely on landlines.

Then equip every class with an electronic presentation system. Kids can take notes on electronic tablets which they turn back in before they go home. When they get home, everything that happened in class, the presentation and their notes, will be waiting for them online.
 
Aqueous Id said:
Suppose you do away with all electronic communications in the school perimeter, let the principal and school nurse handle emergencies like in the day. Even make the employees rely on landlines.

Then equip every class with an electronic presentation system. Kids can take notes on electronic tablets which they turn back in before they go home. When they get home, everything that happened in class, the presentation and their notes, will be waiting for them online.
Click to expand...

My sister is doing her masters and she has compleatly liberated herself from paper and pen, she uses her iPad for all her lecture notes now
 
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