Comments on: Would you send your child to school with a laptop from home?

By: Sanjay

Sanjay — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 16:12:27 +0000

Angus,
Excellent classification of students in 4 categories.
So which ones do you think would adopt 1:1 quicker and which ones would be benifitted the maximum? I am now talking about tablets in 1:1.

Best
Sanjay

By: eric f

eric f — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

Not a scientific study, but:

http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/article/3662/when-shown-how-in-class-laptop-use-lowers-test-scores-students-stop-surfing

I’ve testing this myself in meetings – I tend to participate more actively when I don’t have it with me. Sure I take better notes with it, but I learn better when I’m actively engaged and participating, not when I’m taking notes, bookmarking mentioned websites, etc.

… no laptop for my kiddo in class.

By: ande warren

ande warren — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

ABSOLUTELY!…
big issues now are with smartphones (iphones, blackberry, pre…) IT dept’s are having issues with persons wanting them on the ‘internal’ network and the security issues.

the very positive thing is that the users are building their own 1:1 environments with their own devices that corp/district IT folks do not have to support/pay for.
it becomes more of keeping access live and providing the web based curriculum instead of firefighting tech break/fix issues for so many machines.

By: Jesse

Jesse — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

Since I’m still a student (University though), I probably have a different perspective (though I ain’t got kids, but a dude in my class does). If I had a kid, and they were allowed to bring a laptop to school to use in classes, unless it was an actual requirement, I wouldn’t let ‘em. And if it was a requirement, I’d question the hell out of it.

Ever been in a class when you got people in there using laptops? You have basically 4 kinds of people:

1) The one who’s using it to look at the posted notes so they can read things better, and sometimes actually typing notes (this guy’s alright, I was usually this guy)
2) The one doing other work (this guy’s slightly annoying, due to all the typing, but not so bad)
3) The one looking at facebook/digg/playing games (this fellow is downright rude).
4) The group of people talking to each other over an IM client trying to figure out what’s going on because the prof/instructor/teacher doesn’t make any sense.

I know different school systems are different, but back when I was in high school (a mighty 10 years ago now), we never had any non-class time other than that break in the morning and lunch.

So, what are laptops actually good for in a classroom environment? Taking notes, I guess, kinda, except when there’s diagrams or formulas (you’d need a tablet for diagrams, and then there’s issues with that too), but the clicking of a keyboard is annoying to everyone else in the class. Referencing material maybe, if the wifi actually works in the room and the channels aren’t clogged anyway, and you don’t get caught in a wiki-loop.

Things laptops aren’t that good for? Taking notes in classes with diagrams and formulas (so math and science classes, sometimes even english and social studies, geography, other stuff). Doing pretty much anything in an art or music class. Looking like you’re paying attention when you’re really not (this is best accomplished by sitting in the back and drawing in your notebook instead of taking notes). Standing up to the weight of everything else that school kids have to lug around. Doing work in computer courses using software that everyone’s expected to have (well, I guess they’re great for this, sometimes, but not everyone’s gonna buy a copy of Office, you dig?).

I really don’t see it as a “digital divide” issue as much as “schools are filled with people who don’t want to be there, so they’re going to take every opportunity to not pay attention and not give a hoot about the rules” issue.

By: Gerald

Gerald — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

I work for a private international school in Indonesia where we actually require all our high school students to bring their own laptops.

Because of the economic background of our students, the digital divide is not really such an issue although we do get a huge range of laptops from top-end Macs to $300 netbooks.

The fact that the kids are bringing in their own laptops which they also use at home puts the onus on them to take care of them and keep them in great condition. It also means that students and parents get to choose the laptop that suits them best rather than the school choosing a standard and imposing a surcharge to pay for it.

By: Holly Hoskins

Holly Hoskins — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

While I think computers in the hands of students in the classroom is essential to 21st century learning, I find the idea of students bringing their laptops from home a classroom management nightmare, from a teacher’s perspective. It is hard enough to give teachers the professional development and support that they need to make the necessary shift to technology integration, but add to that computers running on various platforms, operating systems, applications, and so forth, trouble shooting and trying to plan lessons to consider this is difficult even for the most adept teachers.
It may be a starting point for some schools, but I fear that it may be so difficult for teachers to handle that they will be turned off by the whole idea of 1:1 teaching.

By: Phil

Phil — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

My children went to a school that gave them HP Tablets to use for the last two years. They quickly learned which teachers would sync the notes, handouts, lectures and which would just ignore the technology. Their issue, as everyone else has pointed out, is if it is just one more thing to carry why bother? How it is used is more important than if it is used.

In a public school setting I have seen students fact checking teachers on iPhones and other smart technology. We have one teacher using it to immerse the students in a global language. Every student tweets in Spanish and follows others in the language of the class.

The direct answer to your question– in a middle school it is very hard for any student to stand out. The sharks will circle and attack. I have seen students do this(bring netbooks/laptops) at our high school and they are praised by peers and teachers as leaders. Different levels have different socialization aspects. An ugly fact but true.

By: Darren Draper

Darren Draper — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

Scott,

I’d be very interested to know more about the policies related to the laptops students bring from home. For example, what happens when laptops get broken or stolen? Is this scenario adressed in policy?

By: Hadass

Hadass — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

My son (grade 7) occasionally takes his $500 used laptop to school. He doesn’t seem to care that some of the other kids have $3000 Macs. There is no wireless for the kids to access, so it is of limited utility in the class anyway. I generally discourage it because I’m concerned it will get damaged, and as somebody mentioned in the other comments, his backpack is already ridiculously heavy.

I would not want it to be a requirement given the wide range of social economic situations in our school, but I do wish better use could be made of those that are brought – the teachers generally don’t allow them to be used in class so they are playing games with them during their lunch break.

By: Scott McLeod

Scott McLeod — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

@Darren Draper:

Great question. I thought a little about this too. All I know is that students can bring in their own laptops and that the district is providing a separate “guest” wireless network that resides next to its internal wireless network.

I’m guessing – but I don’t know – that computing devices might be treated like any other expensive item that gets brought to school: bring at your own risk…