This post first appeared on aud.life

In the ... working-class schools, work is following the steps of a procedure. The procedure is usually mechanical, involving rote behavior and very little decision making or choice. The teachers rarely explain why the work is being assigned, how it might connect to other assignments, or what the idea is that lies  behind the procedure or gives it coherence and perhaps meaning or significance. ...Most of the rules regarding work are designations of what the children are to do; the rules are steps to follow. These steps are told to the children by the teachers and often written on the board. The children are usually told to copy the steps as notes. These notes are to be studied. Work is often evaluated not according to whether it is right or wrong, but according to whether the children followed the right steps.

~Jean Anyon, "Social Class and the Hidden Curriculum of Work" (1980) (PDF)

How does education technology reinscribe this hidden curriculum? How does education technology, particularly in an age of algorithms and data mining, change school "work"?