The learning experience for Wrangell students continues to get more technological, with new devices and programs hitting local schools this year.
Technology director Matt Gore gave the Sentinel a run-through of some of these developments Tuesday. It started with “tech time in the morning,” an informal zero-hour period where students are encouraged to undertake various technological projects. For instance, that morning found senior JD Barratt soldering together components for a lighting setup, while Kellan Eagle put together the frame for a homemade drone.
Over at the Evergreen Elementary School campus, Gore explained students Leeann Martin and Elizabeth Johnson have been combining forces for their on-the-job training (OJT) projects. The two have led a typing club for burgeoning young tech users, building skills that will help them quickly compose reports, letters and most any other sort of message.
A computer lab has been set up in one of the school’s available rooms, but the setups are not your ordinary desktop. A number of Raspberry Pi 3 systems are hooked up to monitors. The small, single-board computers are relatively inexpensive and simple in design, with capabilities comparable to an older-model smartphone. They each run on a Linux operating system and make use of open sourced programming, taking out much of the expense and hassle of licensing. One such unit can cost around $50.
Gore explained the systems are good for learning about computers. For instance, their boards and components are all exposed, allowing students better opportunity to see and understand how computers actually work. Because they are so simple, students also can have the opportunity to build and set-up the units themselves.
“It’s one of the ways we’re keeping things in-house,” he said.
Martin and Johnson have been leading students in typing courses, but have also been instructing them on how to use Scratch, a graphical programming tool which allows users to create working animations. While exercising students’ imaginations, the software also illustrates basic coding techniques.
“It helps teach them the concepts,” said Gore. “As a team they make that all come together.”
Working with industrial arts instructor Drew Larrabee, Gore has been finding ways to bring greater technological skills to the earlier grades. While all students at Evergreen now make use of iPad devices in the course of classwork, they seem genuinely excited by the Pi 3 setups, which they refer to as “real computers” with a slight touch of awe.
Other new devices have been finding their way into classrooms. The school acquired a Promethean-brand interactive whiteboard for the language classroom last month. The 70-inch touch screen device has a number of functions helpful in the classroom, particularly with video-conferencing and interactive presentations.
“The point of it is for digital interaction,” said Gore.
The board is already getting use by Tlingit language instructor Virginia Oliver, who uses it for her online instruction book. Gore explained the system allows writing with a stylus, and is useful for when a keyboard is unavailable. The device has also been a hit with the Spanish classroom led by Odile Meister.
One drawback to the interactive board is its price tag, retailing for around $8,000. A smaller model the school initially ordered was damaged during shipping, so it got the 70-inch model for the same price at $6,500. Even there, the cost makes it unlikely that the device will become a staple fixture in every classroom.
“We’re looking for a more effective price point,” Gore admitted.
With all this technology afoot, one area of concern that has accompanied increased use has been the concept of screen time, or hours spent staring at a device. At last week’s school board meeting, Gore reported that in the last year he estimated Stikine Middle School students spend between two and three hours per day on their computers, based on usage data provided by their Chromebooks. The high schoolers’ laptops and elementary students’ iPads do not provide similar data, but the estimate is roughly the same.
For some time, researchers have linked excessive screen time to slowed neural development, particularly among younger children. As a result, Gore said Wrangell schools, like others across the country, have been trying to strike the right balance between that potential harm and the benefits technology brings to the classroom. One way has been to diversify the ways tech manifests itself.
“Technology is not your screen. Your screen is one way to interact with that,” he remarked.
Increased use of audio format materials and “electronic paper” e-reader devices that are softer on the eyes are one way the school system has tried to reduce screen time. While the public library already makes a large collection of digital books available to users’ devices through the Overdrive application, Gore said Wrangell schools will soon be following suit. It recently joined the Small School District Council Consortium, which makes around $10,000 worth of digital materials available for Wrangell students through the same application. And with an already-sizable collection of books on compact disc, the high school library has been making its collection available for students to stream, he added.
An initiative to make not only students, but also faculty and parents, more aware of their daily screen time has been ongoing this fall. Showings of the documentary “Screenagers” at the school and for the general public have introduced the pitfalls of excessive device time to some residents, for example. Habits often begin at home, and students may be more apt to be mindful of their eyes and brains if their parents are thinking similarly.
One other important component of Wrangell schools’ technological education has been digital citizenship, teaching students how to be mindful of others when working or recreating online. This also includes the idea of one’s “digital self” online, and how that might relate to how one behaves on a daily basis. The concepts have been integral to Johnson and Martin’s work at the elementary, and has been included in higher-level multimedia course work at the high school.
Making things tangible, Gore plans to have students participate in Wrangell Cooperative Association’s annual e-waste drive, which he expects will be held in February. Responsible use of technology does not end when you power down for the day, but extends to how those resources get disposed of or reused as well.
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