Registered: Oct 2000
Location:
Posts: 61

I think they should be allowed. Kids who are going to goof off are going to goof off with or without them. It just holds the good ones back. Many colleges are going to PDAs so it will be old hat by the time they get to college. Think of all the trees they can save.....though there will be problems like I did my homework but my PDA crashed!

With any new technology there will be growing pains but just as with adults who use pdas some will excel at using them and others won't. My biggest problem in school was trying to find which book I had stuffed my notes in!

Ok, maybe I didn't take that many notes but sometimes my photographic memory gets overexposed......

Registered: May 2001
Location: NY metro area
Posts: 219

I think it is very interesting that all this discussion takes place on the same day as an interesting article in the NY Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/23/t...its/23PALM.html (I hope I did this correctly, if not could someone fix it for me)

I agree with most of the comments made so far. I think that PDA's can be valauble to students if not abused. When abuse is found correct the problem by banning that student from bringing theirs to school.

When I was in HS I wish that we had PDA's, they would have made my life much easier, but we barely had calculators and most teachers did not allow their use in class for fear that we would not learn how to do the math on our own. It was not until my senior year (1968) that a teacher would let calculators be used. Boy have times changed.

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Jonathan

Registered: Aug 2001
Location: Maryland Go Terps!
Posts: 59

quote:

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Originally posted by jhappel
I think it is very interesting that all this discussion takes place on the same day as an interesting article in the NY Times.

"[URL =http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/23/technology/circuits/23PALM.html[/URL] (I hope I did this correctly, if not could someone fix it for me)"

I agree with most of the comments made so far. I think that PDA's can be valauble to students if not abused. When abuse is found correct the problem by banning that student from bringing theirs to school.

When I was in HS I wish that we had PDA's, they would have made my life much easier, but we barely had calculators and most teachers did not allow their use in class for fear that we would not learn how to do the math on our own. It was not until my senior year (1968) that a teacher would let calculators be used. Boy have times changed.

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Registered: May 2001
Location: NY metro area
Posts: 219

Many thanx chuckster.

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Jonathan

Registered: Nov 1999
Location: Greenwood, IN
Posts: 125

quote:

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Originally posted by mrjoec
BertBert, I have to disagree with you.

The problem with schools these days is that teachers are expected to do the job of teacher, parent, babysitter, moral advisor, potty trainer, and just about everything else under the sun. And the people who are charged with this monumental task are given no authority over the situation, and no compensation for the extra burden.

No support from parents, even less support from administration, a pay scale that starts out okay but then goes nowhere for fifty years�it's a wonder anyone lasts more than five years in the profession.

Teachers spend four years in college learning all the pedagogy, then watch in awe as Principals and politicians make decisions that are in direct contrast to all that pedagogy. If they speak up, they get branded a troublemaker and find themselves in the basement classroom with no windows next year. Or laid off because they haven't been tenured yet.

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BertBert
Mark 12:28-31

Registered: Dec 2000
Location:
Posts: 37

BertBert, this time I totally agree with you.

I guess its a natural tendancy to look for something easy to blame whenever you see a problem. My generalizing Principals and politicians is no better than people who generalize about teachers. Fact is, there are so many factors crippling our educational system that oversimplifying the problem isn't going to help much.

I guess I'm just a little tired of seeing the teachers and only the teachers getting the shaft on this one, when there are so many great teachers out their busting their humps to make a difference. You can only imagine how many parents took the old "I pay your salary, you do what I want you to do" attitude toward me when I was a teacher, and their kids inherited it.

There are a lot of bad teachers out there, though. Just as there are some bad administrators, and some crooked politicians. And the good people in all of those fields often get crushed by those bad people.

PDAs could be a great tool for learning. They could also become a great hinderance, if not handled properly. That proper handling takes time and effort on the part of parents, students, the community, teachers, and administrators. Sadly, a lot of people in those categories don't want to hold up their end of that commitment. They'd rather ban it than go through the trouble of ensuring its proper use. After all, it's a lot easier to take a PDA away from a kid than it is to show him or her how to use it to better his or her mind. And its a lot easier for a kid to play Galax during English class than to take notes on his or her stowaway.

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mrjoec
www.mrjoec.com

Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Aberdeen, SD
Posts: 2531

[aside]Geez! I wish I had had one of those over-protective and permissive parents! I didn't dare tell mom when I got in trouble at school because the punishment at home was worse. There was a lot I didn't tell her. [/aside]

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-Joshua
Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

Registered: Aug 2001
Location:
Posts: 383

quote:

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I guess what I'm saying here is that I think it would be great if kids could use PDAs in the classroom. I think a lot of teachers would have no problems with it, either. But school-wide bans on items like this are usually not created by the teachers. It's usually the Principal and VPs who come up with this kind of nonsense, because they want to make their jobs easier. Then they force-feed it to the teachers, who by contract are not allowed to publically speak out against the decision.

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I got some teachers who you can bring some banned items in their classroom but as far as they're concerned they didn't see it. Its not right and what ever happened against the 1st amendment? Luckily for me my schools are pretty much "PDA dumb" so when I bring it in all I see is people in awe, a few people saying isn't it against the rules to bring those in (no) and a few people who want to play games on it (not until after school do you want these things to get banned?). So in my town I have a responsibility as I am a PDA pioneer and if I screw it up I screw it up for me and all those that come after (dang I feel a lot of responsibility). I want a stowaway to take notes in class (I can't wait to see what reaction I get pulling that thing out but I do type faster than I write ). But after the wowness factor wears off I'm pretty much fine and it becomes norm. It just worries me someone else will get one and screw it up. I remember lots of things get banned not just PDAs (Finger Skateboards, Pokemon, gameboy) but are never put in the handbook. I remember last year I brought in my gameboy and during a movie in flex (Muppets in Space) I was playing gameboy a teacher said it wasn't allowed but I checked the handbook and it didn't say that so I just continued to bring it in and wasn't bothered because I just used it at lunch time.

Registered: May 2000
Location: St. Paul, MN
Posts: 1429

I wish I was able to post sooner here. (It is kinda hard to do this from a Visor!)

There's a lot of points taken here, and I haveto agree with some, disagree with others. Let's start with Omniremote..

I had it in school one day, and others with visors saw that I had it... IT DID NOT! take that long for it to spread - out of a school of 800 kids, about 10 with Visors, by the end of the day everyone had it. Everyclassroom has a TV, and boy did the teacehrs get mad when they found out about this one! People would turn on the TV in the middle of a lecture, etc..etc.. It was the closet we got from the Visor being banned.

I think that most kids in my school, used it mainyl for todo stuff. Than the next thing was games. I tryed hard to show that games wasn't a good thing to do, and deleted everyone from my visor (not good for populatiry, when people wanted to use the visor) But I was trying to publicly demonstrate a fact to my colelgues, that the visor in't a toy, but a tool.

I have said everywhere this, but I found the Visor required for taking notes. It's amazing how nice it is after taking all these notes, to be able to just use find, and find the exact paragraph of whatI'm talking about. To be able to print them out - be able to read them. Just for that it was well worth it.

About tests and other things...

MY French teacher never adapted tothe PDA... She really didn't even like people using it to set schedules and stuff - I never found out why, but it's a break form tradition, and this teacher has been teaching for a long time..

Most Social Studies tests for Essays - You would take one part of the test, turn it in, and than oyou would write your essay questions. My SS teacher realyl had no problems with people using notes when writing essays - checking facts etc..etc.. With the Visor, I was able to take this to the extreme, and becuase of that my essays were quite often long, imformative, andf the info was correct (I also had the NY tiems andother papers in avantgo :-D) To print I would run up to the library and ir it the printer.

Science I could take my whole test on the visor, but I felt no ned to cheate and look at notes -= though most of our tests were open book..

This probablyts a bit boring but I'm trying to get a point acorrss, that in my school the visor has greatly enhanced my learning. Whe n goign over current events and than discussing them, instead of jsut going off a small phrase, I could look up entire articles off Avantgo.. Madfe for nice long discussions.

I m moving to a new school this year - one that has 2200 some kids, and one where I p[robably (for now) won't be using my visor in class as much. The school has many many more traditional teachers, I don't know anyone yet there (IT helped for my visor, that I was on the good side of almost everybody there... I jsut had to show it to them, and say the principal said it was cool - which he did). I will have my Visor with me, and will use it on tech team, but I don't think it will be comign out of my pocket as much.. and this is why:

I took a course at this school last year, and maybe becuase the kids were all 16+, but the Visor always shockied the class. It was math, so I really never used my Visor in that class, but everytime I did take out my visor, it would stop the class.

Sorry bout spelling... I will try to check back again and respodn to others comments.

Visors in School can be good and or bad. IT really really depends on how the first couple of kids use themm. I hope that I can be a trend setter - but It's a group effort, not a single man operation.

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-miradu

Registered: May 2000
Location: St. Paul, MN
Posts: 1429

btw.. about losing the PDA or being stolen.

I am very concrened about my stuff being stolen. I am carrying normally about $700 of EASILY sellible stuff on me, and on some days up to $1000. I try to keep minimal, and I always keep everything in my Pocket - maybe thats why I'm on my 5th Visor, and 2nd stowaway - PDA's are not really th best at 16/5/190 (like 16hours 5 days .etc..) usage.

I've looked closely at insurance - but as a minor, it seems like it's just too much hassle to deal with - and I doubt the local police offecers taht hang aroudn the school would consider it worthy enough to write me the police report required for insurance..

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-miradu

Registered: Mar 2001
Location: Nebraska- the Good life
Posts: 695

PDA's in schools?

I strongly believe we need to be teaching students better organizational skills starting pretty dang young (3rd grade or so- just when homework starts to really kick in). Of course, there is no one system that works for everyone, so I think younger students should have the opportunity to try several systems and be taught several techniques.

In later grades (say 6-8 or 9), PDA's should be allowed as an organizational and study tools, with certain usage guidelines set up in the classrooms- IR off (unless the teacher uses it to sync your stuff), no games or loud noises, and not in use during a test (it would be just way too easy to load cheats, and almost impossible to monitor). Violate a rule, and the PDA is confiscated for the day, violate it again, and yours is barred from the classroom.

By late high school and college, I would pretty near consider them mandatory if the school can intelligently support that tech level- the ability to up/download assignments, software banks, electronic libraries, etc. Wouldn't it be great, and a massive savings to the schools, to have 50% or more of the books set up as e-documents, loaded a chapter or so at a time. Possibly a native reader with photo/graphics support, interactive sections, self-testing, hypertext links, etc. Instead of outdated books, we could be carrying the latest data electronically. The best format would also be Word compatable so they could save 'old' chapters on a computer (even if it is on their disk in the computer lab).

I can see it now- issue the students a PDA, keyboard, software package, and rules (as an e-document as well). Offer the students the chance to upgrade the PDA, purchased reduiced price accessories (especially safe cases), and participate in an insurance program.

I can also see some sort of 'super IR' device with the ability to blanket the classroom to download assignments and reading matter to the room as a whole.

The PDA part is probably a feeble dream (although it is actually happing on an experiemntal level many places)- but I am serious about the need for organizational skills.

Registered: Feb 2001
Location:
Posts: 38

I keep my in a "sports bag" AKA fanny pack (nylon, black). I slip
the strap under my belt so it doesn't look that weird. I suppose
some people might not think it's "cool" but I guess I'm too old to
care now. No one's going to get it without a fight. A backpack
would probably be safe as long as you always kept your eye on it.

Registered: Aug 2001
Location:
Posts: 383

I keep mine in my pocket and generally when someone asks if they can see it I will give them a demonstration and if they ask if they can try it I usually say no.

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Kansas City, MO
Posts: 295

Teachers can simply place a piece of black electrical tape over the IR if schools are concerned about classroom TV's being switched on.

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<><

Registered: Jan 2001
Location: Northern Virginia, U.S.A.
Posts: 36

educational pdas?

Following up on Madkins 007's ideas, how about an "education" model? A bare-bones (b&w, minimal RAM, basic programs) that could be sold at a low-low discount price?

If there were some way to fix it so a student could NOT add programs, and in the ideal situation, all students got one, there would be no "wow" factor. No games to distract anyone. The things would just get used for the basic necessities at school: readin', writin' and 'rithmetic. Used as a planner, as a calculator, as a note-taker. Just a standard-issue piece of equipment. Boooorrrr-ing. But useful.

When they want a better model, I'd go with Madkins007's guidelines.

Last edited by kam on 08-27-2001 at 04:25 PM

Registered: Apr 2001
Location: Spring Lake Park, MN (45min from minneapolis)
Posts: 313

theres a program called restrictor and kids pilot at iscomplete it lets you choose what programs can be used and a password is needed to get out of kidspilot launcher and into the main launcher. i use it when my friends wwant to play with my visor. so i can let them only play games.

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