The Guardian reports that Sweden’s minister of schools Lotta Edholm is behind the push. Politicians in the country are beginning to question whether a technologically focused approach to education is helping or hurting. Last month, the national education board in Sweden rolled out a plan to introduce tablets to students as early as nursery school. Edholm announced shortly after that that the Swedish government was interested in reversing the decision.

Sweden’s Karolinska Institute said in a press release that there was clear evidence that digital tools impair rather than enhance student learning.

“We believe the focus should return to acquiring knowledge through printed textbooks and teacher expertise, rather than primarily from freely available digital sources that have not been vetted for accuracy.”

Sweden saw a drop in student performance on the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study from 2016 to 2021. Swedish fourth graders saw an 11-point drop from a score of 555 in 2016 to 544 in 2021.

Obstacles other than technology, like covid-19, obviously played a role in disrupting education during those five years. Still, when comparing those results to the UK (which saw a drop from 559 to 558 in the same time frame) it does appear that Sweden has room for improvement.