Google, one of the world’s most prominent and well-known companies, has massively impacted the world. People can have any piece of information desired at our fingertips, and Google’s education has drastically changed the way children learn.

Google’s education has become so pertinent that the corporation has launched its own app to help teachers in the classroom make assignments, known as Google Classroom. More than 30 million children use Google educational apps such as Google Classroom or Google Docs. The corporation has become so important in schools that Chromebooks (Google-powered laptops) are used by thousands of students and teachers in the classroom. A child in the state of Nebraska has the same access to information as a child in New York, Florida or California. Google’s education has made the world smaller, but it comes at the price of shrinking our brains.

The connectivity of the internet is useful, but some see the internet as a drawback to education as well. Google’s education has made the world smaller, but it comes at the price of shrinking our brains. Having constant access to almost limitless information is not only bad for human discourse; it’s reportedly making us worse at remembering things. And even if we aren’t conscious of it, our brains are primed to think about the Internet as soon as we start trying to recall the answer to a tough trivia question.

Google’s education has transformed education from learning over time into a faster process, one that can easily become a mental-crutch. “Google established itself as a fact in schools,” said Hal Friedlander, former chief information officer for the New York City Department of Education, the U.S.’s largest school district. Before Google established itself in school systems, children would have to research information in textbooks and have to talk to specific adults or mentors about certain topics. Now, the first place students conduct research is on Google.

While students are capable of having research at the touch of a button, teachers are concerned about the newfound capabilities of students’ almost unlimited information resources. Teachers feel that students may be overconfident with their research methods and capabilities. Some teachers believe that students are missing out on the true and somewhat old-fashioned research experience of looking through textbooks and talking to librarians. There’s also the risk of credibility with internet sources. Not every piece of information found on Google is a reliable source of information, and without accurately researching, students are blind to false information versus the truth.

Google’s education has helped expand informational resources to every person with internet access, but there is also the possibility that this access is making our minds less powerful. There has not been much extensive research on this topic yet, and more will need to be done in the future to better understand how Google’s education affects developing minds.

– Mary Waller

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