This is a draft checklist. It’s part of what I would use to create a work plan for a project. Perhaps it will be useful as a start for you to monitor your progress to use mobile PCs, especially Tablet PCs and Ultra-Mobile PCs (UMPCs), in your school or district.
An extended checklist is under development for K12 as are separate short and extended checklists for higher education. Use of mobile PCs follows a different pattern in higher education from K12 schools.
Please let me know what adjustments would make this short form more useful for you. Thank you. rwh
Checklist of Mobile PC Successes in K12 Schools – Short Form
This checklist is based on observations, literature, and project development logic about using Tablet PCs and other mobile PCs successfully in schools.
Getting Started with Mobile PCs
1. Identify and count increases among school educators in awareness and acceptance of a Tablet PC and Ultra-Mobile PCs on campus as an instruction and learning tool.
2. Identify and count the frequency educators use mobile PCs during teacher inservice preparation meetings.
3. Identify and count the frequency of use of mobile PCs during other teacher gatherings, such as in a teacher’s lunchroom and a principal’s office.
4. Identify and count the number of individuals and cohorts of teachers independently initiating use of mobile PCs for instruction.
5. Identify and count increases of teachers using mobile PCs for student learning, for example, a fifth grade teacher using one to instruct a geography lesson, then also using one to offer a series of lessons in mathematics and in English grammar.
Increases in Student Learning
6. Count the frequency of increases in student learning when teachers or students use mobile PCs in any academic activity or subject.
7. Count the frequency of increases in student learning in selected subjects, for example in mathematics and science.
8. Count the frequency of students earning increased classroom test scores on subjects with state standards.
9. Identify and compare increases in state standard scores for students using mobile PCs and those not using them.
10. Identify increases in measured academic performance with mobile PCs of students who exceed minimum state standards requirements and progress to independent learning.
Context of Checklist
More notebooks and other forms of mobile personal computers are sold today than desktop computers. Hardware manufacturers and software publishers plan for each newly released notebook PC model to support updated annotation Ink and other features of current Tablet PCs.
The wireless function of Tablets and UMPCs is arguably an unparalleled tool for learners and teachers. It allows both to develop new strategies and curricula to increase learning rates.
Uncounted hundreds of teachers and administrators use mobile PCs in more than 100 schools enrolling thousands of kindergarten through post graduate students for probably millions of learning and administrative transactions daily. These deployments range from one Tablet PC used by one teacher in one tutoring session to 1,800 Tablet PCs used by students and teachers in one school to all students and teachers in countries using Tablet PCs. These numbers appear to continue growing.
Educators have started using mobile PCs in schools in one classroom at a time, one grade of multiple classrooms at a time, one building at a time, one school district at a time, and one country at a time.
And, a growing number of 1:1 learning, paperless classrooms, etc. result, at least in part, from use of mobile PCs to expand and sometimes to refocus traditional academic lessons.
Notes
A growing body of software programs exists to support student learning with mobile PCs. These use annotation (pen and Ink) recognition, gestures, handwriting-to-print font text, speech-to-text translation, text-to-speech translation, editing tools, idea mapping, outlining, productivity and organization tools.
Many schools use mobile PCs as a remediation tool, a way for students to catch up with age peers and with state standards. This is a good use for mobile PCs.
Arguably the strongest reason for using mobile PCs in schools is for student independent learning. That is, for students to learn with a minimum of mediation from an educator’s immediate time and attention. For example, some teachers and parents use mobile PCs and software for preschool and kindergarten students to learn addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division of two digit integers. Yes, the software exists and students four years of age and older use it successfully.
Young students may also learn Latin or Mandarin Chinese online when the school does not offer this instruction, or a 9th grade student can learn to design, assemble and program a robot.
Such uses of mobile PCs are just an elite fantasy, some educators say. Other people point out that such learning occurs daily as a practical reality in and out of schools. Just as some students raise the curve in regular classes with traditional talk and chalk instruction, an increasing number of students are raising the learning bar with mobile PCs.