Throwing Away the Grade book

            Technology is quickly taking over the education system in classrooms. I am a bit older than the normal college student so you could say I am a bit "old school." When I was in grade school we didn't have much technology except for the basic computers and internet was just becoming a thing for schools when I was heading into 9th grade. 
          I found Dr. Haskell's video on "throwing away the  grade book" pretty interesting, however I am not sure that I completely agree with most of it. Like I said I am pretty old school. I believe in textbooks, sitting in a classroom, listening to a teacher give out information and I believe in grades. I work as a para-professional at a middle school and I can say first hand that technology in that school is doing nothing but hindering those students education. The students don't have textbooks so they aren't reading anything, there are only 4 laptop carts for the ENTIRE school so not every kid has their own computer to use during the day. Then to add on taking the blackboard away, could spell disaster. These kids already don't have a textbook to refer to for information, now take away the blackboard and they are literally staring at the wall.
        When I was in school homework helped me so much with backing up what I learned through out the day. You could always tell which kids didn't do their homework because they had no idea what we were talking about the next day. We could take our textbooks home and read about what we learned through out the day. I can see now in the middle school that I work at, how having no homework just does nothing but hurt these kids. I don't believe it has everything to do with the support system at home. My parents were very involved in my academics however, they never had to remind me to do my home work. I had serious goals for myself and I knew the first step in achieving my goals was to get good grades and a huge part of those grades was homework and that is how I retained the information for tests and papers. Then take away due dates???? What since of responsibility are we teaching these kids? "Oh here is what we will be learning this semester complete whenever you wish!" Talk about kids procrastinating! Like I said I am old school, I want a textbook in front of my child, not a computer.