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Guilford Schools to Get New Chromebooks

When students return to school in September, they’ll be greeted by new teachers, new textbooks, and, after the approval of a $400,000 lease agreement, new laptop computers to help keep them connected to a classroom that’s increasingly tech driven.

The lease was approved unanimously on June 1 at the Board of Selectman Meeting. While the school system is investing in a variety of technological learning tools, including iPads, Chromebooks, and laptop carts, this iteration of the lease, was mainly for Chromebook laptops, according to Superintendent of Schools Dr. Paul Freeman. They were first distributed at Adams Middle School last year, and are now finding their way into all levels of the school district, including the elementary school.

The Chromebook was first released by Google in 2011, and has become a popular choice for classroom use due to relatively low price, ease of set up, and battery life.

Because technology is progressing rapidly, the school district is leasing the equipment rather than purchasing it outright. Freeman said he doesn’t want the Guilford School District to be stuck with primitive equipment in the event of another technological leap.

“We have been doing technology leases for a number of years now,” said Freeman. “The idea is a simple: technology, particularly the user interfaces, the computer stations, just age incredibly quickly.”

An advantage to using the Chromebook in school, according to Freeman, is that it gives students the ability to not be limited to one device. Their work is saved in Google Docs, and they can access it from anywhere in the building.

“It’s also really important to note that at the same time we’ve started this push, we’ve also changed our school policy to encourage students to bring their own devices from home,” said Freeman. “We also want to avoid what happened years ago, when I was still fairly new to education, that you sort of became platform dependent. You can walk into a classroom, and you can pick up any pen or pencil and begin doing your work. You aren’t limited to any one brand name of pen. We want our students to be able to pick up a smart phone, a computer, a tablet, or a Chromebook and know that they can use that tool to create the work and do the research.”

This rapid technological growth, however, is increasing the social dynamic within classrooms. It’s seldom that students use devices by themselves. Rather, three or four of them share a screen, which allows students to be “much more collaborative around activities,” according to Freeman. This has less to do with the device itself and more with the software available, Freeman explained.

Freeman said the biggest difference the technology brings to the classroom is that istudents and teachers both have to learn how to use a new device together. He said the essence of what is taught hasn’t changed, but the way it’s taught has.

“Reading skills are still good reading skills,” Freeman said, “and students need to understand good syntax. They need to know how sentences combine to create paragraphs, and how paragraphs combine to create meaning. But we are accessing that information differently, and reading in the digital world, it’s not just going to be an illustration with a caption.”

There is still some familiarity within classrooms for parents, however. Printed textbooks haven’t completely faded. Devices are used to enhance the learning experience.

“The industry is not there yet,” Dr. Freeman said when asked about technology completely supplanting printed books in class.