The Facial Action Coding System should not be used in schools to help students. There are benefits to this system, but the bad outweigh the good. This technology used to reconize emotions will affect students in ways that aren't necessary, and cause unwanted problems in the classroom.

Firstly, the article metions this system being used on computers while students are working to analyze their emotions. The author writes " 'A classroom computer could recognize when a student is becoming comfused or bored,' Dr. Huang predicts. 'Then it could modify the lesson, like an effective human instructor'" (Alto 6). Having a computer watch students' facial expressions while working could make the students feel uncomfortable and give them anxiety. Being uncomfortable while working will effect the way a student learns. They will not be focusuing on the material they are learning, but instead the idea that they are being watched. This is a problem that's not needed in the classroom and can be avoided.

Secondly there are tons and tons of emotions a human can express. The author writes " Then Dr. Huang relies on the work of psychologists, such as Dr. Paul Eckman, creator of FACS. Eckman has classified six basic emotions- happiness, suprise, anger, disgust, fear, and sadness- and then associated each with characteristic movements of the facial muscles" (Alto 3). Having only classified six emotions, is not a very wide range. What if for example, a student were to show an emotion that the computer doesn't have programmed and reconizes it as somthing else, changing the lesson to fit the wrong emotion? This would cause the lesson to be changed when the student didn't need it to be. This creates a technology problem along with the problem of fixing the lesson and wasting time the student could be using to learn.

Lastly, having a computer analize a students emotions while working would leave the teacher with nothing to teach or help the students with. This might seem like a good thing at first, but teachers create the classroom atmosphere and keep students ingaged in learning. Why have a computer analyze student emotions when teachers have been doing it perfectly for years?

The Facial Action Coding System is a great advance in technology, but when it comes to schools, the System should not be used. It only creates problems that are not needed. These problems could be avoided by not using the system.