So we used our laptops today to practice our multiplication facts online. Later we used them to work on our poems and journals that we began after our recent trip – we’ve been learning to illustrate them by accessing and inserting our own photos from our Flickr account. We are learning about analogies so we went to an interactive site about analogies and students came up and used our interactive whiteboard to run the site. Next we used our laptops to use more interactive sites about analogies (here and here) to practice on our own.
We were in the middle of that activity when we had to put the laptops away for the day so we could go to “computers†in the computer lab for our usual 30 minute once a week session. Does anyone else see irony here?
I laughed out loud! (….and then quickly put my head in my hands….) I imagine this type of thing goes on more and more in schools today.
On the plus side, though, ten years ago, only the once-a-week lesson would have happened. As more and more teachers see the possibilities when technology is seamlessly integrated, I imagine we will someday see the demise of “computer classes.”
Thanks for the post….food for thought!
Elizabeth
Elizabeth – I laughed too! I only wish it did go on more in schools. I teach in a district (you know) that has 65,000 students – over 100 schools and my class of 26 fourth graders is the only class that has anything close to 1:1 access. Most still have once a week 30 to 45 minutes in the lab and one or two computers in their classroom.
We don’t have a laptop program at my school, but several of the classes have gotten their own mini-labs. As the facilitator of the school’s main computerlab, I encourage and even help those teachers do as many of the things that they used to come to the lab for in their own rooms instead. This makes more lab time available for the classes who are completely dependent on the main lab for computer access. I can’t imagine a computer lab facilitator not taking similar advantage of a situation like you have.
Doug – Good point! – Actually what we call our “Computer assistant” will probably gladly do just that. And she does a good job doing relevant things with our students. My point was strictly how early on in our 1:1 program things change in their relevance in many ways. One thing that made me and some of my students chuckle, was that when I announced to the class that we needed to get our computers put away so we can go to “Computer Class” some of them said … “all right! computers!” – maybe you had to be there. : )
Hilarious! I can see the same thing happening in other schools too… On the bright side, you are doing so many great things with those clamshell Macs in your classroom! Even if they do have to face the irony of giving them up for a half an hour a week 😉