New Jersey School Implements 1to1 Chromebook Initiative
Eleanor Van Gelder School in Edgewater, NJ is preparing to roll out
Chromebooks to all of its grade six students in January.
Edgewater School District has
been using educational technology such as Smart Boards, Chromebooks and Google
Apps of Education in its classrooms for years, but now it's taking the
implementation to the next level by providing all 88 of its grade 6 students
and their teachers with a personalized Chromebook, protective case and mouse,
which they will be able to use at school and at home until the end of the
school year in June, according to a report in the Edgewater View.
As part of the implementation, the district will provide the teachers with
professional development on effective use of the devices in the classroom, and
it will brief parents on the details of the initiative.
The Chromebooks will use filtering technology to restrict students' access
to online content and to restrict email to the school's internal network, so
students will only be able to contact each other, their teachers and school
staff.
The district is already planning further expansion of its 1-to-1 initiative.
Before its current technology plan expires at the end of the current school
year, Edgewater may expand the number of iPads at its other school, George
Washington School, and it is considering expanding its 1-to-1 technology
initiative to include grade five students sometime in the next three years.
While instructional technology is taking on a greater role in the district,
Kerry Postma, the superintendent of Edgewater School District, stresses that
its role is to support instruction. "We remind teachers: curriculum first and
technology if needed," Postma told the Edgewater View. "We use a Chromebook as
a tool to carry out content that we want students to obtain but not as the end
all, rather as a means to an end."
About the Author
Leila Meyer is a technology writer based in British Columbia. She can be reached at [email protected].