Digital Blog Post #F

For my previous education prerequisites, I had to do some observation hours at schools. Basically I would sit in a classroom and take notes on how teachers teach and ask any questions that came to mind. One particular day I was observing a 7th grade Gifted Language Arts class. The first thing I noticed was that every student was working on a laptop. Upon closer inspection I saw that they were actually Chromebooks . These devices were classwork and textbooks all in one. In class assignments were all done on their Chromebooks and any references they needed, they could pull up the textbook that was uploaded onto the device. Homework and classwork could all be kept, sent and connected to the teacher's Chromebook. There was also no need for textbooks(although they were still kept in class just in case). Teachers could send messages to students and vice versa. They could also see, in real time, the work and editing the students were doing. This form of one-to-one laptop computing(Maloy, p.306) is supposed to make sure that digital inequality is not present(every student has a computer). Several states including California, Massachusetts, and Illinois are incorporating laptops of sorts in the schools so this may be the future of education. Do you think laptops should be in schools? Click this link and let me know what you think. There comes a time at the beginning of each college semester where I ask myself two questions: Do I need the textbooks and where can I find it cheap? If I do follow through with getting the textbook then the 2nd question turns into "Do I want to rent or buy?" and that turns into "Paper textbook or digital textbook?". Often times I opt for a paper textbook because I have come to find that it is harder for me to study if my textbook is on my laptop or online. I enjoy something that I can hold, put in my backpack, and bring it out to open when I need it. Well a digital textbook, minus the physicality part, is the same thing. It can be put in a backpack(given that it is on a laptop, tablet, etc) and it can be brought out whenever. I have seen some of my classmates use digital textbooks and they have features such as word search where you can type in a particular word and the e-book will pull up any pages with that word. Converting from paper to digital textbooks is a task that LEAD Commission(Leading Education by Advancing Digital) has been working on since 2012(Maloy, p.310). So maybe digital is the future and there are some people like myself who still love books. But at the cost and learning possibilities I may switch to digital. It was not until after I had graduated from high school that I heard about a thing called "virtual schools". They are "organizations that teach students mainly through online learning"(Maloy, p.142). Some of the positives is that you can go to school anywhere and at anytime. Students can go at the pace they want to go. A plus side is that students with medical conditions or mobility issues that make it hard for them to go to school can be still be educated(p.142-143). I cannot believe that I missed out on an opportunity like this: I could have been done with school at an early age, gone to college ahead of time, and possibly be in a career at 24 years old instead of still working on an Associate's Degree. At the same time however I am glad that I went the traditional route. Otherwise I would not have been in as much contact with people my own age and I doubt that there would have been any one on one interaction and help from my teachers(p.143). But hey maybe it is for some people. I think that at least having that option is great. Maloy, Robert, Verock-O’Loughlin,Ruth-Ellen, Edwards, Sharon A., and Woolf, Beverly Park (2013). Transforming Learning with New Technologies. 2nd Edition. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.