Robots for All Children in Our Schools: So Speaks the First Lady of the United States

I generally don’t pay much attention to Melania Trump but this bit turned up in the New York Times and really pushed my buttons. Let me explain.

I am a skeptic when it comes to technology in our classrooms and right now big tech (and the oligarchs who own it) and ed tech (the people who package and sell technology to schools) are in a heated hurry to get AI and robotics to the point where children in our schools will have their own personal mechanical humanoids, despite the fact that technology in our schools hasn’t improved student learning, and maybe even harmed it.

I’m a former teacher, student of human development, social science researcher, and concerned citizen who doesn’t think more exposure to screens, AI, chatbots, or robots is what we need right now. You might not agree, but science is telling us that screens are especially bad for our kids. So what will the outcome be if we, the tax-paying-public buy the ed tech marketing and fork over billions of dollars to provide every child in our schools with his/her/their own personal robot?

I follow the emergence of AI and chatbots powered by AI with a great deal of concern because I know from my own study of human development that screens and anything that takes us away from each other and foists us into a world where our interactions are mediated through some machine is a bad idea. Humans learn how to be human not by ingesting AI through screens and being raised, coached, and taught by robots, but by having contact with other humans, including their parents, caregivers, teachers, and peers.

I also know that the more we depend on AI to do our work for us, the stupider we will get. Critical thinking and deep thinking will escape us because our minds are like the muscles in our body. If we don’t use them, and stretch them to work hard for us, they will get weak. The reason we want kids to read, and then write about what they think and know, is so that they will become top-notch problem solvers, inventors, artists, and philosophers.

Remember that it was the emperors of big tech who were sitting behind Trump and Melania at their last inauguration? These big donors and their money own a fair share of Washington DC power, and they want as much technology wrapping itself around us as possible, and that especially includes our children. So, if we want our human offspring and future citizens to be like robots then we are headed in the right direction. Their thinking will come out sounding like AI and if you watch the video of Melania and the robot gliding down a carpeted hall in the White House, you can see how kids will walk if they learn to walk by watching a robot. Melania was gliding but the robot was definitely not.

And so, here is what was offered when Melania appeared at a White House summit on children and technology for other first spouses. Her presentation touting the value of robots for each child felt like a bad infomercial to me, and I’ll bet she didn’t even get an honorarium from the company who loaned her the robot. I would love to know what some of the attendees thought about the whole performance, as I would guess a few of them know more about how children learn and grow than she does.

I invite you to catch the video I am about to describe.

Melanie and the robot (Figure 3), side by side, emerge from a side room and turn on to a long, red-carpeted hallway. Melania is in model mode until she takes a side look at her mechanical guest and does a bit of a wobble. The first lady is dressed in an all-white pant suit. Figure 3 isn’t wearing any clothes and gives no hint of its gender, until it speaks. The robot is mostly white with black accents at the elbows, the hands and wrists, the midriff, the ankles and soles of the feet. Its face is black and the back of its head is white. Figure 3 walks tentatively and uses coordinated arms and leg movements. It has a bit of the old-guy walk that got Joe Biden removed from the last presidential ticket.

Figure 3 speaks in a female voice when she introduces herself to the assembled guests and welcomes them. Of course, all the guests applaud. I’m not sure what for, as the entire performance must be one of the weirdest things ever to take place at the White House. Questions ran through my mind: Whose idea was this? Melania has enough trouble coming across as human. Why pair her with a robot and then promote it as the next best thing to come along for children’s education? Education for what? Becoming a robot? So much for deep thinking.

I wanted to throw up and writhe in hysterics at the same time.

If you heard all of Melania’s comments, she basically tells everyone that if they don’t jump on the robot-for-every-child-bandwagon, they are shortchanging the futures of their country’s children. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, just about everything she said has been found dubious or false when it comes to educational research and human development. Maybe she should hire people who are more informed to choose her causes and write her speeches.

I think I’ll stop right there.