

Ask HN: Laptops in high school? - slackerIII

My high school recently contacted me to see if I had any advice about whether or not they should require their students to have laptops/tablets.  It seems inevitable that education will move in that direction, so I'm curious if anyone who has been in high school more recently than me has any advice that I can pass along to  the administrators who will be implementing this program.
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OneWhoFrogs
I'm a sophomore in a high school that allows, but does not require, a laptop.
Two of my sisters go to separate schools which require them. I can't speak
much about how well that has worked out there, but at the very least they
haven't revoked the policy yet.

Last year I brought my laptop to school to take notes on. As someone with
terrible handwriting, it was was enormously helpful. I will admit, though,
that I did not hesitate to browse the web during class. Sure, the school put
up filters, but HotSpot shield (and in my case, an SSH tunnel) could
circumvent them with no trouble. A few students spent all of their time on
sports websites, only getting minimal notes for the purpose of plausible
deniability.

So your old high school should know that it is impossible to block students
from messing around. However, laptops can be very useful. At my sisters'
schools where laptops are required, teachers are using tools such as Moodle
for homework, and email for communication. These make it more convenient for
everyone. Whether the latter balances out the former is difficult to judge.

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octopus
Well, I think is not such a bad idea to require students to use their laptops
at courses.

If one wants to learn one will use his laptop in this sense, for a serious
student using a laptop can boost his performance. If one is not interested in
learning,one will find other ways to distribute his attention.

What your school should not do is to impose regulations about the operating
system and configuration a student laptop should have. A student should have
the liberty to run Windows, Linux or Mac on his computer. A diversity of
machines will let others to learn about alternatives. They should be
encouraged to learn to use as many applications as possible.

Today, the education should not be about quantity, but about creating the mind
set for organizing the information. About learning to think with your own
mind. In this sense a laptop could be a valuable asset for letting the
students access this information.

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stonemetal
Right now today in classes kids text, and call each other all the time in
class. Give them a Laptop with access to wireless and they will be on IM,
Twitter, or facebook. Blocking those sites just means they will take measures
to work around it. I wouldn't put it past some enterprising student to build
and run their own chat server, basically anytime they are allowed to use it in
school they will be doing something you don't want with it. Don't be dumb and
end up like that one school district who got in trouble for spying on
students.

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damoncali
I don't know about high school, but I went to a graduate school program that
required laptops. It was normal for everyone in the room to have theirs open
during class. It was a horrible idea. The better professors forbid laptops
during class because they were such a distraction. And we're talking 25-30
year old adults who were paying a good chunk of change to be there. I shudder
to think of what 15-year-olds would do with a laptop in class.

Requiring laptops is like requiring paper. You just don't need to do it.

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brudgers
> _"whether or not they should require their students to have
> laptops/tablets."_

A requirement for laptops should be in response to a specific educational
purpose. Sounds a bit like the tail wagging the dog...or free laptops for
administrators for every 50 the school buys. Curriculum should come first, not
technology.

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kevinstubbs
I'm a high school senior right now and I think it would be a pretty bad move
to -require- students have laptops.

They won't pay attention to the teacher for sure. If there's a web filter then
students will download games from home and put them on; especially Flash
games. If even one student knows they can do that, then it'll spread pretty
fast... And I'm sure there will be a good handful that do.

I think basically, if you give students something to do other than listen to
their teachers, most will stop listening.

It's better to let students bring laptops, so the serious ones will actually
put them to use. Maybe they could even make laptops available to loan, if
poorer students want one but couldn't get their own?

