Tomorrow’s Tech, Today: Innovation That Moves Us Forward
- Norway reports smartphone bans reduced bullying and raised grade point averages, per the Norwegian Institute of Public Health.
- The government plans a social media ban to keep people under sixteen off platforms and limit online harms.
- Officials will propose laws to increase funding for classroom books, marking a deliberate return to analog learning.
- The 2016 tablet program correlated with falling literacy and test scores, prompting a pullback from ubiquitous classroom screens.
There will be no tokenmaxxing happening in Norwegian classrooms. According to a report from Reuters, the nation’s Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere announced Friday that the government will impose restrictions on the use of AI tools in schools in an effort to combat what it sees as a negative impact on learning.
The new rules, which will take effect when students return to school in August of this year, will place a near-total ban on AI for primary school students in first through seventh grade, generally covering ages 6 to 13. As the students enter lower secondary school for grades 8 through 10, where the kids are typically between the ages of 14 to 16, they will be permitted to use AI tools under the supervision of their teachers. For students ages 17 and older entering upper secondary school, the rules loosen a bit. But those kids are still encouraged to only use AI when appropriate.
“The most important thing in school is that our children learn to read, write and do mathematics,” Stoere said, according to Reuters. When you put it that way, it seems pretty reasonable!
Norway has been one of the nations leading the pushback against the over-proliferation of technology in schools. In 2024, the nation banned smartphones from classrooms, requiring students to lock their devices up during school hours. It apparently did wonders. According to a study published by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, bullying decreased across the board, and grade point averages started to climb once the device restriction was implemented. The nation followed that up with a planned social media ban earlier this year, which would keep anyone under the age of 16 off social platforms.
As part of its luddite-ian mission to reduce reliance on tech in teaching environments, Norway’s leadership also said that it plans to propose legislation that would increase funds for the purchase and use of books in classrooms, per Reuters.
That shift is perhaps the most interesting for the nation, given what an about-face it is on its previous approach to tech in classrooms. Back in 2016, Norway announced a plan to issue a tablet to every student starting at the age of 5. The results were pretty devastating, as the country watched its literacy rate decline dramatically and its test scores tank. Now it’s in the process of getting screens out of classroom environments and returning to a more analog approach. And sure, it might risk creating a generation of hipsters, but at least they’ll be able to read.
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