Laptop 1 to 1 - Our Story

Before 1 to 1 laptops.

Last year I was teaching Algebra 1 with cognitive tutor software from Carnegie Learning. In order to teach the class I had ordered a set of laptops in a cart for the class. About two months into the school year a student asked me if she could borrow a laptop to complete a project for a another class. After speaking with her I realized that while most students had access to a computer at home it had issues.

Most times there was only one computer in the house that was shared by all the family members. This limited a students ability to use the technology when needed. The computers that they had at home did not have the same software as what they used at school. This made it difficult or impossible to complete a project at home. The computer that they had at home also may have been several years old, slow and potentially full of viruses.

Students started to learn about the opportunity to borrow laptops and soon the laptop cart was looking very empty every night.

Another part of my job was to help teachers to leverage technology to improve student learning in the classroom. A second laptop cart was purchased so that we could do Professional Development with the teachers. We held several PD sessions during the school day and I began working with the teachers in their PLC (Professional Learning Communities). I also held Saturday sessions once a month where teachers could work with each other for extended periods of time. We learned that a 40 minute PLC, once a week did not allow for completion of an NEW learning activity where they could walk out with something they could use in their classroom.

A second set of laptops was purchased to trial the idea of allowing students to carry the laptops full time. These students met with me for an additional our on Wednesday after school where we would explore different ways they could use the laptops to complete assignments in class.  This ended up being a great way to get technology into the classrooms. These students were not all in the same class or even the same grade level. There might be the only student in some classes that had a laptop. The students began to adapt there assignments and utilize the laptop to complete their assignments, take notes in class, or even research information on the fly during a discussion. Students were taking assignments and completing them with the laptops instead of paper. The students used the laptops to do additional work on there own that they were interested in and to communicate with each other and their teachers.

As the school year ended, the students that were using the laptops asked if they could use them over the summer. We were able to allow students to borrow the laptops over the summer to continue their work on different projects.

At the start of this school year we purchased enough laptops so that every full time student could carry one all the time. By the third week in September all the laptops were imaged, setup and placed into the hands of the students.
 
We are now just completing the third quarter of the year. During this time we have seen tremendous growth in the students and teachers ability to use the laptops. We have seen increased communication between teachers and students via email. Students can reach out to teachers from anywhere when they have a question. Students also now have another way to voice the questions or concerns to teachers with out interrupting a class or having to physically locate the teacher in the building.

Some students have started exploring alternative things they are interested in learning.  They are taking courses via iTunes University.  Some are taking courses via moodle that are taught at our other schools.

These changes are causing changes for teachers in their classroom. No longer are teachers the dispenser of knowledge. They have started to become more of a guide in the process of learning. This is causing classrooms to start to move towards more projects and student centered learning.

Students are reading more on the computers. We have started to see increased gains in Lexile scores that we believe are the result of the student reading more on the laptops. They have access to the information they want to read all the time and so they have been reading more. The use of email and chat has also caused them to write more often.

There have also been some issues along the way. Trying to keep 300 laptops up to date with all the latest software updates for each program was taking time since the students did not have administrator rights on the laptops. We have recently install puppet and munki to help automate the process of configuration and software updates. We believe that this will minimize the support issues due to out of date software.

This has also allowed us to implement a new program to help guide the students on how to be responsible digital citizens. This new set of educational programs and procedures will be rolled out in the forth quarter of this year. The new system has different levels (Gold,Green,Yellow,Orange and Red) that the students will move between as they demonstrate they can use the technology appropriately.

This new system was developed by the teachers, administrators, and students. We held several meetings with the student council to get their input on how to shape the program. The students have had some great ideas that I believe will make the program much more effective.

We will be holding Saturday sessions with the teachers to discuss the success and challenges with using the laptops this year in their classes. We will be developing sets of long term and short term goals so that we can align our PLC sessions and PD.

The teachers and students have found new ways to learn using the laptops. As I look around at the laptop screens on a typical day you will see:

• Students taking notes in Curio or MSword.
• Looking up information on google.
• math problems being completed in Kahn Academy
• students using Cognitive Tutor.
• working with Read 180
• learning Spanish with Rosetta Stone.
• Chatting with classmates or teachers about homework assignments.
• Posting on Moodle or working on an assessment.

 The speed of change has been very fast this year and thanks to the support of the administration, the understanding of teachers, and the enthusiasm of the students. All of this would not be possible with out everyone's hard work!

OneToOne Impacts - Students in the drivers seat!!

This week I had several messages from students. Some came as an email, some as a moodle message, some in conversation. All the messages told me about the impact of the laptops on their learning.

In the past students only used technology when they had a specific assignment in a class and the teacher gave them time to work on it in one of the computer labs.  But now they have access to the technology ALL the time. They can use it when they want. The power has shifted from the teachers to the students.

Here are some of the things I heard from students this week:

"I just completed unit 6-6 in tutor" (Math tutor software)
"My restaurant just made a profit!" (Virtual Restaurant Simulator)
"I am working on Khan Academy to learn trig."
"I want to learn about web design."
"I want to learn how to make an app."

These students were completing work that was not assigned as homework, because they wanted to accomplish a goal! They are starting to see learning as a reward in itself not just a grade.

I have several other students that are going to be starting a class on HTML web design. It is not in their schedule, they are not looking for a grade, they want to learn! They are going to be completing a course developed by another teacher (in moodle) from one of our other schools. They came to me and asked for this class, it is not a requirement.

The laptops are placing a wealth of learning opportunities in front of our students. Now we need to help teach them how to find and learn without a classroom! Or do we need to help our teachers learn to teach with out the walls of the classroom? How will teachers teach classes that are not on their schedule?