[Yr7-10it] RE: Year 7-10 IT structures

[Litsa Tzelepis]

thank-you matia.
xo

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Bill Kerr 
  To: Year 7 - 10 Information Technology Teachers' Mailing List 
  Sent: Monday, October 22, 2007 9:56 AM
  Subject: Re: [Yr7-10it] RE: Year 7-10 IT structures


  There is a large elephant in the room that no one has referred to so far: the OLPC

  The one laptop per child non profit project not only plans to deliver millions of laptops to third world children but has also become a hand grenade in the commercial world - and has succeeded in forcing down the price of other laptops now on offer 


  "... the whole global mind-think around technology has changed. 
  No longer is low cost computing in education a fantasy, no longer are big technology companies secondary, and everyone wants to sell technology into classrooms. Intel introduced Classmate PC to Brazil, Asustek is selling Eee PC's in the USA, and even thin-client manufactures compare themselves to OLPC."
  http://www.olpcnews.com/sales_talk/countries/sales_inhibiting_xo_distribution.html

  How will schools and education departments in the wealthy west react to the fact that in a few years we will have the capability for every child to have their own laptop? 

  Will we treat them like mobile phones and ban them or try to figure out a way to utilise them for optimal educational development?

  The use and misuse of computers in schools has up until now been based around the idea that computers mainly belong in labs and / or that access is limited. The fact of limited access has acted as a powerful brake for many teachers not to extend their knowledge much beyond the basics. 

  Most (all?) of the maths curriculum could be taught using laptops. In fact MIT produced a series of books in the 80s for teaching much of maths and aspects of language and art using logo.

  Shouldn't we factor this potential into the discussion? If we are talking about the future it might be incorrect to assume that the pattern of distribution of computers in schools will remain similar to the present. 

  -- 
  Bill Kerr
  http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/

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