There is a second fallacy, which is also very important, which we might call the miracle transformation fallacy -- i.e., the notion that, if we could get little green laptops into children's hands, it would miraculously transform their lives. This fallacy falls within an approach known as "media determinism," the notion that a particular media or technology will automatically have a certain effect no matter what context it is deployed in.

He found that the single strongest factor determining whether students received a positive benefit from school use of technology was the children's socioeconomic status (SES), with low-SES children tending to see test scores go down with computer use and high-SES children tending to see them go up.

Wenglinsky's data suggests that this is in part due to the differential ways computers are used by teachers of high- and low-SES students.