The following is a note received from Bedford Community Schools, Bedford, IA,: one of the schools that visited O'Neill last spring:
I thought I would share something a sophomore girl wrote in her writing journal about the laptops and the school year so far.
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The laptops are pretty cool so far. They really do make school a bit more interesting for me. It makes things a lot more organized too. I like typing and researching things on the computer. I think iChat is really cool too. I love being able to talk to my friends and video chat from home. I think it's also very cool that I can just iChat my teachers and ask them for help. I love the moodle page. It keeps me organized with all my class work. One of my favorite parts about the laptops is that we can listen to music during school. I like that we can use our phones in between classes too. It makes me feel like I actually have a life outside of school. I don't feel so locked up in a school for hours running up and down the stairs sitting in classrooms listens to teachers talk wishing I could fall asleep. Hopefully the students can all be smart with the laptops. We're pretty lucky to have this opportunity and I hope we're able to keep doing this successfully.
Carl
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Carl W. Rankin, MA
HS Language Arts, Yearbook, Speech & Technical Theatre
Bedford Community High School
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Thanks Katie for all you have done to help us. In 27 years of being in education I have not seen anything that has had the impact that the one-to-one has had on our students and teachers. It is truly amazing. It would not have been possible without your support and help and your willingness to share what you have done at O'Neill. Please thank everyone involved at your school!
Joe Drake
Superintendent
Bedford Community Schools
I visited Bedford last week to help train their staff. The school is located in a small, rural community in southwestern Iowa. I delivered tDay #5 in an entire week of professional development for the teachers getting ready to implement Bulldog One2One: Leading the Pack. Eagerness to start something of future value for the entire community was evident. The school facility was inviting, progressively updated, and the people were top-notch. Many similarities exist between Bedford and O'Neill and we hope to continue partnerships and collaboration with our staffs as we are similar in size and student composition.
Other schools that we at O'Neill directly helped launch their laptop initiatives include the following:
- High Plains Community School 1:1 Technology Initiative
- CO2OL: Chambers One 2 One Learning
- Wheeler Central Public Schools
- Bloomfield Community Schools 24-7 Laptop Initiative
The world is waiting to see the exciting learning endeavors that come out of these and other technology-infused schools this year, and O'Neill is as well!
1 comment:
Our school went 1:1 last year, and while we had teething problems and staff points of view that needed challenging, we found that one tool really help bring class-wide participation to the fore, and that was classroom response via our netbooks. We found a program called Student Response Network and it turned around how we are using our netbooks by ensuring every student has a voice in class. In conjunction with the netbooks, it's opened up our classroom so much, compared to the time when it was just the netbooks. We found students were working more alone with the computers, and Student Response Network drew them out and back to the class as a whole group.
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