New Technologies Enter and Exit Classrooms

A friend and former faculty colleague, Henry Levin, once wrote about his experience in a 1940s classroom. I started school in 1943, and by the time we were in third grade we were introduced to writing cursive using an ink pen. Initially these were the pens with long tapered wooden handles with replaceable pen tips or nibs, but by sixth grade we were expected to use fountain pens because they were less messy. I remember filling carefully my pen by maneuvering a lever on its side that compressed a rubber bladder inside to draw ink from the inkwell on its release. I was also given the responsibility of refilling the inkwells each day or every other day. We used huge bottles of Quink (perhaps a liter), and they had to be manipulated in just the right way to fill (three quarters), but not overfill the inkwell. My recollection is that this was a permanent ink that could not be removed from my clothing. Once I dropped the entire bottle on the floor, leading to a large spill. That required…