Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

Textbook-free schools share experiences, insights

Arizona's Vail School District, one of the first districts in the nation to move to an all-digital curriculum, used its textbook money to buy laptops—forcing the teachers to learn how to instruct differently.

Nearly one year after a pilot program that put Virginia’s fourth, seventh, and ninth grade social studies curriculum on an iPad, Virginia state officials say they have learned much from the implementation.

The program, which is a collaboration between education publishing giant Pearson and the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE), was spawned from VDOE’s “Beyond Textbooks” initiative, which encourages schools to “explore the potential of wireless technology and digital textbooks to enhance teaching and learning.”

Now a year into the program, many challenges and benefits have emerged.…Read More

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Many U.S. schools adding iPads, trimming textbooks

A Burlington High student checks out her new iPad as her mother looks on. (AP)

For incoming freshmen at western Connecticut’s suburban Brookfield High School, hefting a backpack weighed down with textbooks is about to give way to tapping out notes and flipping electronic pages on a glossy iPad tablet computer.

A few hours away, every student at Burlington High School near Boston also will start the year with new school-issued iPads, each loaded with electronic textbooks and other online resources in place of traditional bulky texts.

While iPads have rocketed to popularity on many college campuses since Apple Inc. introduced the device in spring 2010, many public secondary schools this fall will move away from textbooks in favor of the lightweight tablet computers.…Read More

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At Westside High, learning ‘is no longer a six-hours-a-day event’

iPads are just one of the many tools that Westside High uses to help personalize learning.

Westside High School (WHS), part of Nebraska’s Westside Community Schools, owes much of its success to its focus on effective ed-tech integration that extends learning beyond the school bell. Its one-to-one computing program encourages student creativity and productivity—and school leaders are committed to using technology to meet the unique needs of every learner.

For these reasons, WHS was chosen as our “eSchool of the Month” for July/August. Here, Kent Kingston, the district’s executive director of administrative and technology services, describes some of the school’s accomplishments and its keys to success.

(Editor’s note: To nominate your school or district for our “eSchool of the Month” feature, go to: http://www.eschoolnews.com/eschool-of-the-month.) …Read More

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Study reveals factors in ed-tech success

 

When properly implemented, technology can have a positive impact on student achievement.
If schools can afford to make only one key investment in education technology, it should be infusing their intervention classes with technology, the study suggests.

 

Schools with one-to-one computing programs have fewer discipline problems, lower dropout rates, and higher rates of college attendance than schools with a higher ratio of students to computers, according to the results of a major new study. But for one-to-one programs to boost student achievement as well, they must be properly implemented, the study found.…Read More

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Will $99 Moby tablet swim or sink?

 

Marvell also announced a pilot program in partnership with DCPS.
Marvell announced a pilot program for its Moby tablet in partnership with Washington, D.C., Public Schools.

 

In a development that it claims will be a game-changer in education, technology company Marvell has announced the prototype of a $99 tablet computer that students can use to surf the web, interact with electronic textbooks and other digital media, and collaborate with each other around the globe.…Read More

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One-to-one computing programs only as effective as their teachers

Studies show that 1:1 success depends more on teachers than on the equipment itself.
Studies show that 1:1 success depends more on teachers than on the equipment itself.

A compilation of four new studies of one-to-one computing projects in K-12 schools identifies several factors that are key to the projects’ success, including adequate planning, stakeholder buy-in, and strong school or district leadership. Not surprisingly, the researchers say the most important factor of all is the teaching practices of instructors—suggesting school laptop programs are only as effective as the teachers who apply them.

The studies were published in January by the Journal of Technology, Learning, and Assessment, a peer-reviewed online journal from Boston College’s Lynch School of Education.

Despite growing interest in school 1-to-1 computing programs, “little published research has focused on teaching and learning in these intensive computing environments,” say editors Damian Bebell, an assistant research professor at BC’s education school, and Laura O’Dwyer, an assistant professor of education.…Read More

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