The "Digital Age" has set Gen A up for failure in school.

Question

My claim is that Gen Alpha has been set up for failure in the classroom due to the digital age usage in classrooms. It is very clear how technology has impacted education especially after the pandemics when everything was online. Now, even in as young as elementary school, assignments for kids are online. In the tagged article, it mentions that only 33% of fourth graders in America scored at or above proficiency on a reading exam. As technology and AI continue to grow, our education system will decrease.

Answer 1

Hello, I don't believe that this statement is true, and your evidence is rather lacking. This post ends up feeling more opinion-based than factual. I was unfortunately unable to access your source, so I'll just have to take your word for it. To say that the entire Gen Alpha cohort is set up for failure based on a study of 4th graders isn't very accurate. Gen Alpha is defined as ages 0-13/14, depending on the source. Based on your claim, it would be more accurate to use test results from all of these age ranges. I was able to find a source that includes statistics for all of Gen Alpha (or at least the ages that could produce dependable results) (Updated) Gen Alpha IQ and Intelligence Statistics, Facts and Trends for 2025. In relation to the question of the "digital age," setting up Gen Alpha for failure you will see in my source that, "Approximately 70% of Gen Alpha children demonstrate advanced adaptive learning capabilities when using educational technology. (Source)". Additionally ~75% of Gen Alpha children demonstrate advanced visual-spatial processing skills when tested on digital platforms. The constant interaction with 3D gaming environments and visual interfaces is enhancing these cognitive abilities. There are various other interesting statistics shown on this source that I would encourage anyone to take a look at. In conclusion, your source isn't quite strong enough to back up such a devastating claim.

Answer 2

My first red flag was that the link to the article didn't work. So I searched for this: “only 33% of fourth graders in America scored at or above proficiency on a reading exam.” and I found this article https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/reading/nation/achievement/?grade=4 that had similar info, but looking more into the years and the percentage from each year, the difference isn't incredibly significant. I think this claim is mostly an opinion, and although it might be true, the evidence you used doesn't do a whole lot for your claim, and it's lacking in evidence that students are actually doing worse BECAUSE of digital age usage. basically, i see no correlation between digital age usage being the reason for these proficiency scores.