Stager’s critique echoes many of my own concerns about technology in the classroom. I think what he says about Google Docs applies to many tech tools used in classrooms: they replace what was done already with paper.
What really struck me though is actually something that is a minor part of his article but that has been bothering me for some time: schools adopting Google without any concerns about the data collection and tracking. Nothing free is actually free, and yet, parents, teachers, and schools seems to have no qualms about requiring students to use Google. Free trumps safety and privacy. Free seems to make us less concerned about advertisers amassing a collection of 15 years of data on our children that they may use to target them in their adult, consumers lives.