Laptops in Primary Years: Expanding our horizons

Dear BIS community members,

At the beginning of the 2017-2018 school year we undertook a significant restructuring and upgrade of the computers available to students across the Primary Years. This is a process that is always ongoing, as we renew hardware on a rotation to ensure the most efficient use of resources. In this article I want to share with you the goals and rationale driving our technology strategy in the service of learning.

Last year, with the very valuable support of the PTFA, BIS introduced touchscreen laptops across the division, with a 360 degree design and small form factor. The goal was to enable portable and innovative computing, allowing our students to bring the laptops to the spaces where they prefer to learn. After the first few months of adaptation that are to be expected with new hardware and software environments, we saw significant uptake in their use, and these devices have provided the enhanced access that we were aiming for.

In a second stage, we have introduced this year a more capable model to serve different uses. With a larger form factor and more powerful processors, but still with the 360 degree touchscreen design, BIS continues to explore the possibilities that this model of computer interface offers to our students.

This second stage also gave us the opportunity to implement a unified and consistent environment across all student computers, by rolling out the same platform on the existing desktop computers. Thanks to this, our students can easily move between different form factors. They can select the appropriate tool for the task at hand, with the certainty that the software applications they need are available to them everywhere.

In a future article I will share more details about our platform for the Primary computers, as well as how our teachers and supporting staff embody lifelong learning to better support our students.

Do not hesitate to contact me if you would like to talk about anything related to technology and how it impacts learning in the classroom and beyond.

Best regards.
Urko Masse – IT Manager
itmanager@baliis.net