OK you asked for it. LOL. Computer integration is the life blood of our schooling technique. We have had an ever increasing computer-integration in our classroom for 13 years. This is going to be a long post, but I hope you will find the ideas fascinating.
We homeschool using multiple computers - OK, not a traditional classroom view, but the advantages and problems are about the same. I homeschool my own four children as well as teach homeschool co-ops for high school subjects. Co-op classes typically contain 8 to 18 students. The computers are used extensively for both groups.
My 18 year old son has taught himself how to build and repair computers so we have very little money invested in our computers. I have always wondered why schools do not take advantage of all that free teen energy and get them making school furniture and computers instead of the schools having to buy from expensive school supply catalogues. Those prices are outrageous! The kids learn real world useful skills by building what the school needs. Anyway, that is a topic for another Yahoo Answers Question. LOL
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One difference is in the classroom layout - Our Schoolroom/Computer Lab Physical Setup:
MAIN SCHOOLROOM - Instead of the kids each having a traditional schooldesk each one has their own computer station and their own computer. We have six networked computers in the main school room plus a spare one in the bedroom that is also part of the network. All the computers have access to the internet on-demand via a broadband router 24/7. My husband has custom made two long counters on each side of the room which house three computers each. Each computer's space is about 3.5 feet wide by 3 feet deep. The deep counters and dropped keyboards allow the students to work at their station easily even with a bunch of resources spread out in front of them. They also have additional storage for school supplies and CDs. The children are each assigned their own computer which is where they work throughout most of the school day and it is their personal computer during free time in the evenings and weekends. The front of the room houses the white board. We have a mobile (on wheels), fold-down table for when we need a large flat surface to work on. It stays tucked out of the way until we need it. The chairs are adjustable-height, wheeled desk chairs with arms. It is surprising how often they are wheeling on their chairs between computers as they collaborate or show each other what they are creating. Every station has its own set of headphones and microphone. Several have their own printers, while all have access to the network printer and scanner.
MULTIMEDIA STUDIO - The computer in the bedroom is our multi-media studio with studio quality microphones, a studio sound mixer, a VHS tape player, portable DVD burner with VHS and TV inputs capability, surround sound speakers, and a digital camera that can take both digital stills and quicktime movies. We have a variety of multimedia design software installed on that system. It may seem like we invested a lot of money into our multimedia studio, but my son built the computer, we bought the mixer and studio mics second-hand on E-Bay, and the VHS tape machine is one we have had for years. By having this system in the bedroom, the door can be closed to allow for less background noise when the kids are producing multimedia products.
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SOFTWARE INSTALLED ON ALL SYSTEMS -
- PrintMaster Platinum is the main electronic notebooking software that the kids use. With it they make multimedia webapges that run from burned CD-ROMS. They also print out their e-notebooks. Their e-notebooks can be uploaded to the internet as standards compliant webpages.
- Inspiration Software - this is a terrific program that we use for a variety of purposes.The kids use it extensively for notetaking, organizing compositions, visuals for their e-notebooks, etc.
- PaintShop Pro 8 (also includes Animation Shop 3): This software is our primary graphics and photo editing workhorse. The kids use it for so many different things that I am not sure I can do it justice with a short listing. It is used for their illustrations, animated titling for their multimedia shows, animated features, desktop pictures, modifying photos, special lettering for their notebooks, etc.
- The operating systems vary - half of the systems are Windows XP and half are 98SE. We haven't had any compatibility issues.
- computer 3-d modelling software - All the systems have G-Max installed. This is a free downloaded modelling program that will let the student construct 3-d computer models with 'bones', lighting controls, texturing, camera angle control, and programable animation moevements. It is a watered down version of 3D Studio Max which is a professional game engine. This game engine is used by many well known computer games on the market. It is an awesome program. The company that made it avaiable has been bought out and the new owners have made the program very difficult now to locate. If you are intrigued by this feebie, you better find it fast before it is completely removed. It has a massive fan-base, so it is a shame that they have moved to block distribution.
- Open Office is on every machine. This is a very nice suite of tools very much like Microsoft Office but they are downloaded free via the internet. Included in it is a word processor, a presentation maker (like Powerpoint), a speadsheet, a database, and a drawing program is integrated into each.
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Another difference is in what the students produce and how they produce it -
Electronic Notebooking and multi-media productions: With the exception of math, the kids do not typically work out of textbooks and workbooks. Instead they are using real world resources in the production of electronic notebooks and multi-media. This is done for all subjects except for math - well, sometimes even for math too.
I have unique technical challenges in that I am teaching multiple grade levels simultaneously - kindergarten, 7th, 10th, and 12th grade as far as my own children go. Even when I am teaching co-ops the grade span is typically anywhere from 6th to 12th grade children. Though the grade span is much broader than a typical classroom, it is a fact that even in a grade leveled classromm kids have widely varying skill sets. It may sound like my day is a nightmare trying to teach so many levels at once, but it is not. The bulk of what they do is independent research and working on the expression of their own design for their webpage/e-notebooks. The kids are primarily all studying the same topic at any one time, but at each one's ability level.
For instance, we are gearing up for our summer biology unit. In past summers we have already covered animal biology (2 summers ago) and human biology (last summer). This summer our topic is plant biology. The high schoolers and my 7th grader will be using resources that go into much more scientific detail than my kindergartener. Their e-notebooks will be more research product oriented while my kindergartener will be more introductory in nature and have a more scrapbook-like feel to his notebook - lots of pictures with short captions of what he did and learned. I will be teaching the plant biology as a co-op too. During our one-day per week meeting the kids will bring their homework to me via jumpdrives. I will off-load their files while they are here and check their work after they have gone as I have time. I then e-mail them personal feedback. We do group activities and the kids will use the hardware and software that they don't have access to at home - the multi-media studio for example. The stuff that they can do at home on their own sysems becomes homework for the next week.
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How the network plays into the process:
All the computers are networked together. Each student has their own schoolwork folder that is set to 'shared' on the network. Into this folder the kids place all of their work and I place assignment instructions and feedback. I check their work by accessing the folders from my computer through the network. Typically, at the end of their school day I go into each one's folder and take a look at the assignment shet that I placed in their folder. As they complete each assignment they change the circle bullet to a check-mark bullet on the list. They also create a link to the file in which the work was done. All I have to do is take the link to see their work. As I look over each item on teir completed list, I am making a wordprocessor file with all the feedback. I will often include links back to their original too, so that they can quickly access the file I am talking about without having to open their original assignment checklist. I will make a copy of the assignment list, student files, and feedback sheet to my portable hard drive - 120Gigs of portable memory for archiving. I then update the assignment sheet for the next day's assignments. The student is to clean out archived feedback files periodically to save room on their own systems. Between the assignment list, the student's files, and the feedback file, I have an easily maintained record-keeping system and archive in place should I need to prove to anyone that we are schooling.
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The electronic notebooks -
The heart of what the kids are producing is the electronic notebook. They make one notebook per topic with the typical e-notebook being 24 to 70 webpages in length. Within any one page though there may be hyperlinks to outside files for multimedia (video and sound), Open Office (Powerpoint) slideshows, speadsheet files, etc. In total each e-notebook contains an incredible breadth of learning by the time you count the content, the creation of original graphics and multi-media, the original compositions based on research, and the computer skills needed to put such a product together.
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Issues -
In a classroom setting there will probably be abuse issues to deal with in regards to hardware. Here is this not an issue because the kids own their own systems. It is in their best interest not to abuse the equipment. However, even fro co-ops, I have not had any serious problems. One boy had to be monitored if he finished an assignment early or he would explore other people's files. He wouldn't do this so long as he was busy. In his case, I was aware of his behavioral issues of crossing boundaries when bored - hence his being pulled out of public school to be homeschooled. He was incredibly intelligent (genius level actually), but boredom could definitely make him a problem. Fortunately, he didn't have much chance of becoming bored. LOL.
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There is so much more yet to tell, but this is already looking more like a book than a post. I hope it will inspire you to head off in your own directions for integrating technology into your classroom.