As I have mentioned sometime ago, I am the school board president for our district in Northern New Mexico. We have something like 400 kids spread over a 1,000 square mile district. We have two separate Pueblos with their own native languages, and many Hispanic kids whose families can trace their roots back 500 years and still speak Spanish as a first language. Throw in a lot of poverty, and you can see we have our share of challenges in terms of meeting standards set in Santa Fe, etc. (By the way, big city kids would find themselves with a lot of catching up to do if they found themselves in our rural culture-but city dwellers get to set the educational standards for the rest of us. Further by the way-I am OK with that, as I want to equip our kids to do as well in the city as they do in the country)
But this note is about a very encouraging development in our district. Before the economy crashed, we were able to get a technology bond passed. We intend to use that money to, among other things, provide an ipod touch for in-school use by our children. We have started out on a test basis, by providing this for our second grade class. So far, the results have been phenomenal. We have downloaded applications from the "Apple Store" for spelling, various levels of mathematics, vocabulary, etc. My wife teaches this 2nd grade class, whose abilities range from functioning at a 4 year old level all the way to 8th grade. Most of the applications we use are available for free, the others cost $1.00. We have to require the kids to go out for recess-they want to stay inside and use their time to "play" with their ipods.
We spend less than an hour a day with the ipods, as there are many facets of learning that can't be learned from an ipod. But we are seeing dramatic improvements in learning sight words, basic addition, spelling and vocabulary. This is predicted and supported by sound educational pedagogy. The kids are using their sense of sight, touch and hearing all at the same time as they work through flashcards, puzzles and games that reward correct answers, and give a private, non-threatening opportunity to correct mistakes. We tried out a "color by number" app. with our 4 year old grand-daughter. You have to find the correct number to fill in the colors on very kid-attractive little pictures. After a little bit of help, she was zipping up and down a number line, and knew that 25 is a bigger number than 17, etc. When she had finished, she was able to show us the beautiful little picture she had created.
There is also an application for coins. For example, kids understandably have a hard time with the fact that the thin dime is worth two nickles. Their little ipod screen shows pictures of various coins, and provides visual and aural "rewards" for getting the questions right.
These things are not cheap-but, once you have made the investment, there are thousands (seriously) of applications for all educational levels. The ipod touches for these little kids have been locked down so they can't get out to the internet at all. I understand that our older kids will be getting ipod touches that can take them to a fenced in, school approved internet. I know these kids are pretty smart about getting around these restrictions, but so far that hasn't been a problem.
The Apple store also has free "pod-casts" providing high quality videos of the best lectures from some of the best college professors in the country. A really good professor puts together lectures that are educational, but also fascinating and entertaining. We were able to get Apple laptops for the teachers, and these come with the tools to allow our teachers to incorporate these lectures into their own, teacher created podcast. Our teachers will have a lot to learn as well as the students. We were able to get an Apple lecturer to spend a day with our teachers. He made an amazing, reassuring point that I knew was true as soon as he said it to. For the teachers who understandably are concerned about how to figure out this technology-there is a simple answer-ask for help from your kids! It is great for the kids to have a chance to contribute something of value. (In fact, my wife's second graders showed her how to adjust the volume on their ipods, and have also showed her additional things that could be opened up in their applications). For now, the educational bang for our buck has been incredible, and we are going to be getting some for our grand-children ASAP.
But this note is about a very encouraging development in our district. Before the economy crashed, we were able to get a technology bond passed. We intend to use that money to, among other things, provide an ipod touch for in-school use by our children. We have started out on a test basis, by providing this for our second grade class. So far, the results have been phenomenal. We have downloaded applications from the "Apple Store" for spelling, various levels of mathematics, vocabulary, etc. My wife teaches this 2nd grade class, whose abilities range from functioning at a 4 year old level all the way to 8th grade. Most of the applications we use are available for free, the others cost $1.00. We have to require the kids to go out for recess-they want to stay inside and use their time to "play" with their ipods.
We spend less than an hour a day with the ipods, as there are many facets of learning that can't be learned from an ipod. But we are seeing dramatic improvements in learning sight words, basic addition, spelling and vocabulary. This is predicted and supported by sound educational pedagogy. The kids are using their sense of sight, touch and hearing all at the same time as they work through flashcards, puzzles and games that reward correct answers, and give a private, non-threatening opportunity to correct mistakes. We tried out a "color by number" app. with our 4 year old grand-daughter. You have to find the correct number to fill in the colors on very kid-attractive little pictures. After a little bit of help, she was zipping up and down a number line, and knew that 25 is a bigger number than 17, etc. When she had finished, she was able to show us the beautiful little picture she had created.
There is also an application for coins. For example, kids understandably have a hard time with the fact that the thin dime is worth two nickles. Their little ipod screen shows pictures of various coins, and provides visual and aural "rewards" for getting the questions right.
These things are not cheap-but, once you have made the investment, there are thousands (seriously) of applications for all educational levels. The ipod touches for these little kids have been locked down so they can't get out to the internet at all. I understand that our older kids will be getting ipod touches that can take them to a fenced in, school approved internet. I know these kids are pretty smart about getting around these restrictions, but so far that hasn't been a problem.
The Apple store also has free "pod-casts" providing high quality videos of the best lectures from some of the best college professors in the country. A really good professor puts together lectures that are educational, but also fascinating and entertaining. We were able to get Apple laptops for the teachers, and these come with the tools to allow our teachers to incorporate these lectures into their own, teacher created podcast. Our teachers will have a lot to learn as well as the students. We were able to get an Apple lecturer to spend a day with our teachers. He made an amazing, reassuring point that I knew was true as soon as he said it to. For the teachers who understandably are concerned about how to figure out this technology-there is a simple answer-ask for help from your kids! It is great for the kids to have a chance to contribute something of value. (In fact, my wife's second graders showed her how to adjust the volume on their ipods, and have also showed her additional things that could be opened up in their applications). For now, the educational bang for our buck has been incredible, and we are going to be getting some for our grand-children ASAP.
