Give A Computer, Take A Computer
from the huh? dept
Here’s an odd one. A high school in Virginia gave all of its students Apple iBooks to help them with their schoolwork. It’s not that surprising to find out that the students did other things beyond schoolwork (often during school) with those iBooks. One student even tried to hack into his teacher’s computer to change his grades (oh, those crazy kids). It didn’t take long, in fact, before the school district recalled all the computers. Easy come, easy go. However, according to the article, the school district planned this all along. I don’t buy it. The article doesn’t really detail why the school bought the kids laptops just to take them away again. They are changing all the laptops to force the students to focus on schoolwork at school, and will then give them back again. If they really “planned” it this way, why not just set it up that way in the first place?
Comments on “Give A Computer, Take A Computer”
So do you take away their pens?
I’ve worked with school systems for over a decade. I have to say I’m not surprised. But consider this point. If you give a child a pen an paper, will you take them away if they write notes to each other? Of course not. You need to engage in proper classroom management. Taking away their tools is not the answer. It’s supposed to be about teaching; so get to it. Teach them how to use the tools responsibly. Computers need be no more special than plain old pencil and paper.
Kinda makes sense
…the best way to figure out what undesirable behaviour you want to avoid is to give the students the opportunity to indulge in some undesirable behaviour.
And since they were bringing the computers back for upgrades later anyways (best explained by the mysterious rules of financial accounting and annual budgets)…