2006+Curriculum+Statement


 * LAPTOP PROGRAM**

Advances in communications technology are dramatically transforming the sharing of information. Citizens of the 21st Century live in a global community that is increasingly interconnected. As an educational institution, Ensworth High School has the responsibility to prepare its students to participate in this new world community and to serve as leaders for using the power and potential of technology to bind us all together more closely.

The best way to teach students how to succeed in the world’s new media environment is to build technology into the fabric of school life and to immerse students in it. To this end, all faculty and students will be equipped with wireless laptop computers enabling their interconnectivity to each other, to school resources, and to the internet at any time and in any location. Both at school and at home, each community member will have a computer dedicated to his or her own use rather than having to seek intermittent access to shared equipment.

The norm for school communication will be electronic rather than paper. Common hardware, software, and licensing will streamline maintenance and operational continuity and will permit the entire community to share assignments, educational resources, work products, and status reports online. Students will be able to check and submit assignments electronically, as well as access their schedules and grades. As course materials become increasingly available online or on CD, students will be able to utilize quick searching and resource linking without toting around numerous standard textbooks.

Laptops will be the primary tool for writing, researching, and interfacing with laboratory and mathematical instrumentation. In addition to using laptops for individual writing and small group collaboration, instructors will be able to extend discussion beyond the walls of the classrooms by managing sites for continuing conversations and tutorials. Furthermore, students will be able to organize and save their work in network portfolios and share it publicly as desired.

This immersive environment will help students learn not only how to use technology but also how not to use it. Because the technology will be ubiquitous, issues of copyright, privacy, and appropriate use can be addressed in the context of our entire curricular program rather than sequestered as separate subjects in computer classes. In fact, our wireless network will enable the entire campus of Ensworth High School to serve as the classroom for this endeavor.

Facility with technology will also provide opportunities for enhancement of the school curriculum. Instructors will be encouraged to employ the ever-improving tools of technology whenever they would help to effectuate curricular goals. This does not mean that instructors will be pressured to inject technology into the curriculum for its own sake, nor that they should create new lessons simply as vehicles for employing new technology, but that they will be free to avail themselves of the benefits that new technology might offer.

Technology is evolving at a startling pace. The original development of computers for speedier processing ultimately led to a world-wide web that has revolutionized our world. By giving students a strong foundation in the technology of today, Ensworth High School is equipping them to be the leaders in using or even creating the technology for the future.


 * Department Statements**


 * English Department**: The Ensworth High School laptop program makes it possible for students to come to understand that writing at its best is a process, a way of learning, starting from first thoughts to exploration to the final product. In the English program, therefore, laptops are used extensively for in-class writing, teacher response, peer response, small group collaboration, extending the class discussion outside the class (with discussion boards), accessing available literary material, and research.

how to submit work and receive teacher comments electronically. In addition, students hone their collaborative skills through the electronic sharing of notes and ideas, thus strengthening group projects and presentations.
 * History Department**: The History Department uses laptops to enhance the teaching of the Core Skills and to help students learn to use information technology to communicate in the modern world. In conjunction with the school’s website, the History Department’s web pages and regular email, laptops foster effective correspondence among students and instructors. Students have easy access to assignments and learn

Laptops also allow students to apply the Core Skills to internet research, including evaluating the validity and accuracy of sources. While laptops will not obviate the need for using hard texts for research and reading assignments, their use in conjunction with these materials equips our students to be leaders in the use of technology in the future.

a portfolio of work that is easily transportable and accessible. The Foreign Language Department will also use digital textbooks with Internet sites as soon as they become available. Finally, the laptop program allows students to be in continuing communication with other schools around the world.
 * Foreign Language Department**: In the Foreign Language curriculum, the laptop computer serves in a number of ways. It provides a word-processing capability that allows students to do work quickly and have it easily checked by the instructor. Internet access provides multiple research opportunities by making available on-line foreign language dictionaries, newspapers, and magazines. Students can create a file of Favorites, which would be their own research libraries. Students will also be able to use Word documents, PowerPoint, and Flash-movie capabilities, which allow them to generate


 * Visual/Performing Arts Department:** The Visual/Performing Arts Department is excited about the use of laptops in its curriculum. In the Foundation course in visual arts, students learn Adobe Illustrator and PhotoShop. In the Foundation course in music, Finale supports the introduction to recording sound and composing music. And the Foundation course in theater/dance introduces light control and stage design with laptops working together with the new systems in our Arts building.

In elective classes, the computer design lab will support on-going development of the use of computers and their application to understanding the production of the performing and visual arts. We are planning a course in graphic design, recording studio, and stagecraft that will be computer-centered. Our desire is to teach how laptops can be used as design and communication tools for the 21st Century art student.


 * Mathematics Department:** Mathematics Department software with unlimited site licenses allows that which has in the past been reserved for demonstration by faculty now to be used by all students. For example, Geometer Sketchpad provides an interactive approach in the development of Euclidean Geometry, and laptops enable this tool to be used more comprehensively in the teaching of critical thinking skills. Data analysis software and accompanying graphics packages provide platforms for students to present problems and projects with detailed analysis, and upper level courses have access to real world data sets as they are developed. The continued development of calculator skills is also strongly supported by the laptop program, and three-dimensional graphing analysis is more practical.


 * Science Department:** In the Science curriculum the laptop computer serves as a word processor, number cruncher, data logger, communication tool, textbook, tutor, and facilitator. In the science laboratory programs such as Datalogger© and Science Workshop© software allows the computers to interface with laboratory instrumentation and seamlessly provide a built-in electronic laboratory notebook. Microscopes, spectrometers, thermometers, pH meters, photogates, and a wide variety of sensors and instruments are computer interfaced. Writing assignments are more interactive through the use of Calibrated Peer Review©, a web based tool that enables a writing to learn science pedagogy. The biology and chemistry textbooks in the Science Level 1 course are digital. Each student has both online and CD access to these texts. Students also have access to an online subscription to Scientific American.