It's a good question. Of course they were. And they dutifully recorded for us teachers the answers to the questions we asked them. Their test scores were fine. I just don't think they learned anything.

I guess here I have to discuss for a moment what "learning" is, according to my definition. Any reasonably intelligent being can repeat back information. Parrots can do it. But no one believes parrots have taken the phrases into their being and been altered by them. Neither, in my opinion, did that happen with these kids.

Yes, the weeks we were there, they took notes and they responded relatively accurately to test questions. But if they'd learned something, we could test them again right now and they'd do pretty well--not just the information but the meaning would have stuck. Having seen a good number of them just yesterday, I have to say I don't think that test would go well at all. I think they've retained almost none of it.

Tony Robbins once said that information without emotion is not retained. My experience is that he's correct. We gave them information. We could not engage them emotionally. And I don't believe what we taught them was retained.

I freely admit I might be wrong about this. I hope I am.

P.S. I should say this: I think they retained some things exceptionally well--that the school cared about them to the point of doing absurd things to try to protect them, that the things we did probably really were absurd and perhaps even unnecessary, and that masks suck and they hate them. THOSE things were learned, that's for sure. Not all of those things are desirable learning, I don't think. Kids learn whether we like it or not. They just don't always learn what we intend to teach.