Launch the media gallery 1 playerLaptop Re-Adoption: Looking Ahead to the 2014-2015 School Year
August 11, 2014
3.5 school years ago, Northwood-Kensett schools rolled out MacBooks on a special “Rollout” night at the high school. Students were excited to get the shiny, new white MacBooks to use at home as well as at school. No one knew what opportunities, exactly, these laptops would bring, but we were interested to find out.
Now, at the end of May, those laptops don’t look nearly as shiny and new as the day they were placed in the students’ hands. Many of them are in need of repair, or at least a deep cleaning. Thankfully, staff and students will be issued a MacBook Air at the start of the 2014-2015 school year. Once again, shiny silver laptops will be distributed to our students, and we will be reminded of how fortunate we are to be a part of this school district & community, where adults are willing to “ante up” on their young people’s education.
While many districts in Iowa are going to one-to-one laptop models in parts of their schools, very few provide laptops to students as young as 4th grade. Our students have the opportunity to grow their technology literacy for several years before the average Iowa student uses a computer with any regularity. Our district has also re-adopted Apple laptops and the software that comes along with it. Many districts- in their first laptop adoption or the second- have opted for less expensive models that leave the laptop machines with limitations for students. The machines we have leased for the next few years will be more durable than the last ones we adopted. They will also be lighter and allow students to continue with projects and programs here at school that have been made possible by the laptop adoption.
VREP (Virtual Reality Education Pathfinders) is a program that is designed for engineering students or other computer-aided design students to begin working with imaging software and is made possible by the capabilities of the MacBooks. Students learn problem solving skills along side the technical skills. Additionally, Video Production class and the Big History Project are much more possible when each student has a dependable laptop for their regular use. The iMovie software that is included in our laptops is the best home-movie editing software available for student use, and we are happy to keep providing it as a tool for students and educators. These three courses were not offered 3.5 years ago and would likely be discontinued if we did not have the technology accessibility we enjoy in our district. In classrooms across the district, projects of many varieties are more frequently occurring and encourage more meaningful, relevant learning because laptops bring the world into the classroom. Information is a few keystrokes away, and creative possibilities are virtually limitless.
While 4-12th grade have MacBook Airs, the PreK-3 group will gain laptop accessibility, as well. A class set of MacBooks will be shared between two classrooms (with the exception that Pre-K & Kindergarten will share one cart) in addition to their classroom sets of iPads. Teachers will increasingly have the ability to blend teaching beginning computer skills with learning critical early skills, as well. As we maintain our commitment to preparing our students for a world outside the school doors, we will continue to grow and adapt to the way students best learn and focus on the kinds of classroom instruction that will allow our students to become lifelong learners and problem solvers-- necessary skills in a world where the jobs our Kindergarten students will hold have not been invented yet.
