HOLLAND TWP. — Students didn’t have to see the front of the classroom to learn about nuclear fission in a recent eighth-grade science class at the township school — it all there in the palm of their hands in iPads donated this year by the school’s PTO.
Ryan “Sully” Sullivan was one of three students reporting the findings of a group project and thinks it “definitely made it easier” for students to see and understand the Power Point presentation. “We could explain things better with the iPad,” he said on March 19. “They could hold it in their hands, look through all the slides and get the information better.”
Sully is also a member of the school student news crew and said the iPads, or computer tablets, have been great because it’s easy to take photos and videos of events inside and out with the tablets and edit them.
“There’s definitely been a progression since I was in fourth grade,” technology-wise at the township school, said Sully. “It makes you interact better with technology. This whole world is going to be using technology for everything. This helps us so later we know how to use it in our everyday life.”
The PTO donated 20 iPads for a cart that’s shared among the classrooms. In a couple of classrooms, that’s not enough for one-to-one usage by students, leaving teachers with the option of using the devices for group projects only or allowing a couple of students to bring in a personal iPad that day.
Jason Kries teaches technology to third and fourth graders and is also one of two technology coordinators at the township school. He had started his career as a social studies teacher in Somerset County, but says he found that incorporating technology “always seemed like the best way to engage the students” and so he did.
Where students’ grandparents might have learned to keep a ledger, they learn Excel spreadsheets. “Generally no one cheers when you say you’re going to learn Excel today,” said Kries. But he made a game of it for his third grade technology students, placing quick response (QR) codes around the computer room, scavenger-hunt style.
Students used the iPads to scan the QR codes and entered the information gleaned at desktop computers in spreadsheets.
Teachers have been learning new ways to incorporate technology into their lessons at Holland Township School by working with the technology coordinators and at in-service training sessions, asking for more.
The result, said Kries, is that the iPads have caught on quickly. For instance, he said, students who just a year or two ago would have printed out a paper report or designed a tri-fold brochure for a class project today are more likely to submit an electronic version that include multi-media links and “much richer pieces of information” that are also easier to share in and outside of the classroom.
The photographic and video capabilities of the iPads, he added, make it easy for students to document the steps of science experiments for lab reports. The end result, said Kries, is that technology is bringing “more life into activities” in the classroom.
Because tech support is “only a phone call or an email” away at the school, Kries said that teachers are willing to experiment more. Sometimes, he added, the students themselves answer questions about what to do next. “Once they’ve used a program, they master it,” he said.
The school also has three laptop carts with enough portable computers for each student in a classroom. Kries said that the advantage electronic tablets have are speed — they’re basically instant-on — and easier portability.
The goal, according to Principal Nancy Yard, is not to teach technology as a separate skill, but to incorporate technology into the curriculum. “There are so many new technologies today, we want to make sure it’s really being utilized,” said Yard.
Kries added, “We’re not just preparing to send them to Delaware Valley High School. If you’re not giving them the skills that translate to life skills and work skills, then they’re already falling behind because of the level of competition out there.”