The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

"it is a daycare centre for kids while parents go on about their careers?"

This is the kind of thing that could only be said by somebody who is not a parent. There might be a minority of parents for whom this is true, but I know zero other parents who don't care whether their kids are learning.

> I know zero other parents who don't care whether their kids are learning.

Nobody said that.

While I don't think you deserve to be downvoted, the reason you are is that you are complaining about generalization ("the kind of thing that could only be said by somebody who is not a parent") while immediately generalizing, implicitly, that commenters on Hacker News are not parents. I am a parent, I care about my son learning, and the experiences I've seen for very young children (less than 5) are very close to daycare, even at the very best schools.

It isn't saying much that very young children learn best with one-on-one time with a very engaged adult, which isn't something you can do in daycare. Some people believe that learning occurs because of a specific ethnic heritage, using a pile of money, or a piece of technology. If these are your beliefs, then it can be hard to make any progress whatsoever.

To your comment about even the best <=5 schools being glorified daycares, you might consider Montessori, if your kids are still in that 3-6 age band. There are many faux-Montessoris which are daycare with wooden toys, and use the name to collect that premium, but the real ones are very different, and do a good job of teaching independence in learning. You can look for the accredited ones on AMS’ site (you still have to evaluate the teacher, but it should weed out the worst offenders).