School+Statements

Laptop learning complements traditional learning processes with an approach that is more relevant to the world in the 21st century. By authentically integrating the laptop into a Rocky Hill student's academic program, we expect to graduate young men and women who are active learners, who love learning, who know how to learn and adapt easily, and who can construct their own knowledge from the information they discover. The mission of the school, "to guide our students…in the pursuit of knowledge and self-awareness," will be realized in a program of excellence.
 * 1) [|Rocky Hill School]
 * Statement:**

The Rocky Hill School Student Laptop Program is a major curriculum initiative and represents a commitment to the present and future of education inside and outside of the classroom. Even more importantly, it is embedded in the Harkness method, and this combination embodies the optimal teaching and learning environment.

Faculty continue to redesign and reconfigure their lessons to incorporate the obvious strengths that laptops and Harkness can offer in terms of communication, collaboration, visualization and problem solving.

2. [|Rye Country Day School] RCDS started its laptop computer program for grades 7-12 in 1999. The central goal of the program has always been to make the information processing power of the computer available to students whenever and wherever needed. This does not mean that laptops are or should be used all the time. Instead it means that the computer will be there whenever there is a benefit to be gained from its use. This approach is essentially no different from how pencil and paper have been deployed in schools. Pencil and paper are not used all the time, but we want them to be immediately accessible at all times.

Following are some of the specific reasons we have laptop computers at RCDS:

1. Schools that help their students and teachers harness the information processing power that laptop computers provide will place their students at a competitive advantage. Students will be more engaged in learning the content of the curriculum while at the same time developing deep competency using the problem-solving environment provided by the computer.

2. Laptops help promote a positive shift toward more project-based, hands-on learning, and away from lecture-based learning. Lecture-based learning will not, and should not, disappear. However, the information manipulation environment provided by laptops allows teachers to reduce their reliance on lecturing.

3. Writing is done across the curriculum. Word processing makes writing a significantly more enjoyable process for students. Students do more writing and revision when they have laptops.

4. Mathematics education is made richer and more engaging with the aid of software tools like spreadsheets, Geometer's SketchPad, and Mathematica.

5. History, social studies, and current events instruction is tremendously enriched by students having immediate access to the vast wealth of information available on the Internet. Laptops provide a platform for the creation and presentation of multimedia rich projects.

6. Science education is greatly enhanced by the data gathering, data analysis and simulation software tools that run within the virtual digital workshop the laptop provides.

7. Foreign Language instruction success correlates highly with the time students are able to spend immersed in the language. The multimedia capabilities of laptops allow students to spend more time listening and speaking in the language of instruction. With the right software and a set of headphones, a laptop can function like a language lab work station. Laptops also provide access, through the Internet, to the media of the countries where the language of instruction is the native language.

8. In art, music and drama, laptops provide easy access to examples of best practices. Students visit virtual museums, listen to music clips, and watch videos of great performances. Students also use various software applications to assist in the creation of artwork, music, scripts and digital video.

9. Laptops provide easy storage and access to a student's accumulating body of work. By viewing previous work, students can better gauge their own progress and avoid repeating tasks already accomplished. In many situations, laptops can also help students who struggle with organization.

10. All students develop a strong competency in using computers. Providing laptops to students goes a long way toward eliminating any digital divides in the use of technology.

In sum, enabling students with laptops helps create a more humane school environment in which drudgery and repetitive tasks are minimized while exploratory and creative tasks are maximized.

3. [|Hackley School] At Hackley School the curriculum employs technology to provide resources, to access information, and to teach critical thinking skills in support of the School’s mission. Technology is not an end in itself, but rather a means to enrich the academic experience at the school by providing tools for research, information management, and presentation of materials for the classroom.

On our fully wired campus with computers in many classrooms, faculty and students have school wide, ready access to the Internet and Hackley network. Faculty participate in a laptop professional development program and students use computers in our cutting edge computer labs, individual library laptop sign out, and wireless laptop group exercises in traditional classrooms. Moving beyond just Computer Science, the Upper School Computer curriculum now includes Computer Applications and Electronic Publications for both the Web and print media. Every academic area now engages the use of technology from guided Internet research to formal application use such as Geomoter’s Sketchpad in mathematics, Rossetta Stone in Foreign Languages, and computer based measurements in Physic’s labs.

4. [|Chadwick School] Chadwick School places an emphasis on helping teachers use technology to improve learning. From the early grades, students learn to use Internet resources and library subscription databases to conduct research. They create presentations with multimedia software and use sophisticated applications to collect and analyze scientific data. In math, students use laptops to model and solve problems. The campus boasts eight computer labs with Macintosh and IBM-compatible computers and a publications lab with Macs, scanners, and printers. Chadwick’s wireless computer capabilities allow students to access the Internet and the school’s own network and library catalog from every classroom. In addition, students have the use of digital video equipment, still cameras, projectors, SmartBoards, and scanners.