The gigantic billboard casts its enigmatic presence over the motorway, greeting visitors and those returning home on the way into town from Suvarnabhumi Airport. The ever-smiling face of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra beams triumphantly along with well-crafted words testifying to her success in carrying out one of her most controversial populist policies. It's like the prime minister is graciously telling the motorists and tourists alike _ "Hey, our kids finally have a tablet!"
As if that's not enough to wake me up from post-inflight insomnia fatigue during my return journey from Stockholm last week, my daughter then presented her returning mummy with a letter from the parents' committee asking for my vote on the tablet issue. I just had to tick, it's pro-tablet or no tablet, and the school will let the ministry know of the parents' stance.
To be honest, I don't really know whether I was for or against the tablet and my "no" could be unfair to other parents, considering my six-year-old has had the privilege of enjoying an iPad while her mama has an iPhone, both given to us as a present from my dearest friend.
My kid has learned a lot from the iPad with those maths, phonics, vocab, and other educational apps I downloaded for her, although none of those are of much significance when it comes to standard educational assessment.
And standard educational assessment is actually what I see as the real drawback of this tablet giveaway policy. My daughter's school desires to ditch the device, deeming it unnecessary and a distracting burden because the lessons go much further than what is provided in the equipped apps. And right, if the elite schools think their educational standard is far superior to the tablet lessons, which conform to the Education Ministry's protocol, the tablet becomes nothing more than a plaything that lets the kids have a laugh over the revision of basic letters they have learned since kindergarten.
And there's also the problem of maintenance _ which schools could see as a burden should the tablet be incorporated as an integral part in the system. I don't think I even need to go into detail about the kind of problems that could arise if, let's say, a student's device is broken and needs repair. The situation isn't like a kid forgetting a textbook at home and needs to share one with a friend sitting nearby, for only a day.
Having your essential study tool in the repair shop without a substitute during its absence must feel more like an insurance broker forgetting his mobile phone at home.
Personally, the maintenance factor is what holds me back from being pro-tablet. I admit that even though the iPad my daughter and I use was given to my daughter _ mark my word, it's for my daughter and not me (as I said, I got iPhone!) _ we agreed from the beginning that I'd be the one using it, taking care of it, having full authority over it until the day I believe she's fit to take responsibility for the device. This means understanding its basic mechanisms and basic trouble-shooting like rebooting and restarting as well as having enough pocket money to afford any repair.
Of course I'm a mischievous mother because this poor hand-me-down iPad1 will have reached the end of its life long before that six-year-old brat is capable of all the above.
But I know I have set these rules for the benefit of my offspring. The iPad is too much for her age _ too big a responsibility and too unnecessary for someone whose tender age can only allow her to treat it as a more of a plaything than an educational or professional tool. The same goes with the giveaway tablets, which leaves me and my mum with another responsibility of making sure it's functional, that she takes it to school, and that she doesn't forget it anywhere.
And wait, do I need to buy a new one myself if my silly chick just forgets it somewhere like she often forgot her pink Domo pencil case, hair bands, her raincoat, etc?
But I guess, like in many cases, I'm not part of the majority. After returning home one day my kid came over to me with a smile, asking if I really voted no to the tablet and why.
She wasn't upset, she just wondered, but that didn't stop me fearing that she was thinking I was standing in the way of her glorious future, like some pro-tablet grown-ups consider the no-tablet parents. She said I was only one of the three parents who voted against the tablets.
And I couldn't help going back to the same old reasoning, asking her if she thought mummy is clever. Of course she said "yes" (please don't frown, this is just something she's genetically programmed to say) and I told her I never had a personal computer until I was 20. Of course, the world has changed so much since then, but I guess the learning curve of children won't change much with or without a tablet.
Strangely, that put her at peace, and she said she'd then do just fine without one, just like mother.
Samila Wenin is deputy editor of Life.