In our world everything we do has screens: at the store checking out, restaurant kiosks, or table payment “ziosks”, and even at school trying to get classwork done. From the moment we wake up, we have some sort of screen in our faces. Although this can be convenient in some ways, paper always beats pixels when it comes to learning and staying focused.

When writing on paper, you remember what you’re learning better, and it’s easier to just quickly jot stuff quickly without the distractions of games or other assignments. Teachers can just lock the tab for students with school-issued Chromebooks with programs like GoGuardian, but for students who don’t, they can be on whatever, whenever.

It’s much better for visual learners like myself to be able to see everything in front of them and focus solely on it. When trying to understand something on a Chromebook, I’ve noticed myself having to reread the information over and over to fully process it. When I’m reading something on paper directly in front of me, my brain understands it better.

With a Chromebook, you have to worry about all the technical problems. You have to keep it charged and keep the charger on you. You have to worry about things not saving or the entire Chromebook just not working. You have to be connected to the internet or you’re not getting anything done, and what you do won’t save.

Without my Chromebook, it feels like I can just throw my backpack around like it’s a bag of feathers. When the Chromebook is inside, I have to use all my might to get it up onto a table I can sit the bag on, then grab the straps and put them on. Backpacks have been proven to cause back pain and the more weight, the more damage. 

Some might say, “Chromebooks are better because it’s just one thing you have to keep up with.” What about when you accidentally leave your Chromebook at the beach vacation you were just on? Or the charger? These are so easy to lose and can be expensive to replace; plus it comes out of the student’s pocket, not the school’s. 

Chromebooks have proven themselves less than reliable a billion times over, yet we still use them for everything we do in school. While technology has become so common and very helpful in many aspects of our lives, paper is still much more efficient for students doing school work.