Jim Cordery (@jcordery) shared that Chromebooks were coming to class in the coming school year. I started writing a comment, but seeing that I don’t know how to shut up, it turned into this. Please read Jim’s post first, before reading the extended comment.

Jim,

This is great that your school has done this. Even more awesome is that you’re thinking about how to best utilize the new power. And it is power! And a la Spiderman, with great power comes great responsibility!

I clearly have my own predilections, so if I were in your position, here are some things that I would do with this tech at my disposal (in no means am I giving ‘advice’) in reference to your questions (given in my response for convenience). These are just quick thoughts.

1. How will this change my instruction?
   

   My instruction would most certainly shift. And it would start with discussing responsibilities, digital professionalism, etc. As for content and student engagement, I think it’ll be easy to have everything get out of hand, which may not be a bad thing, but a little bit of guidance and direction to get students to self-direct is probably going to be more necessary than what may have been done in the past. I would do this upfront and regularly through the year. I don’t think I’d do a lot of video watching. In general, I’ve felt that video watching is too passive — it would have to be connected with doing something. As such, I’d probably alter my lessons on grammar, spelling, “writing” (it’ll be typing and handwriting together, discuss making a font, for example (requires a sense of style / penmanship)) and route those towards understanding why the computer is flagging things. I would absolutely not allow a passive “well the spellcheck will fix it for me” attitude — it’s the calculator disaster with Math. Math will incorporate more programming. Science and social studies, holy moly, the things I could do — certainly there, videos can help. In a nutshell, I’d probably have a great burden the first time around finding good content to share, provide, and incorporate within curriculum. They will learn at least the basics with how to work with a spreadsheet! My college students cannot do this!

2. How will this change my assessment of student learning?
   

   As for assessments, hmm … tricky, tricky. I think the assessment practice would be mixed. I may incorporate more projects as part of the assessment. But rather than make them subject-based projects, I’d want say a Math & Social Studies project, for example. Like, how much food did an army need when they were laying siege to an enemy stronghold? You’ve got math, science, and history broadly speaking rolled into one.

3. Is there an assumption that teachers will know how to best use this technology?
   

   My guess is that if external PD / resources aren’t being provided, then the assumption is the teacher had better figure it out. I’ve generally never cared for external PD that I haven’t sought out. So I’d just do the research on my own.

4. How will this change what I can expect students to create to demonstrate understanding?
   

   Old school doesn’t necessarily mean bad school and new school doesn’t necessarily mean better school despite what people will swear by. I’ve blathered on endlessly about the need to understand the basics. As a mathematician, I still work out problems on paper before I start programming the solutions. If anything, I would emphasize the need to plan before just haphazardly doing and the need to think before planning. (Plug for my company: Think. Plan. Do. LLC. — does any other order really make sense?) Can they plan on the computer? Sure. Can they think things through on the computer? Sure. Is it a necessity? No, just the same way that it isn’t a necessity to always work on paper and pencil. In a nutshell, I wouldn’t be prescriptive about how students explore their thoughts, but I’d still like for them to be able to work in both the digital and physical media. The computer isn’t supplanting physical-based learning and thinking.

   One thing that I don’t think people realize is that working out some preliminaries on paper helps to slow down the thought process. Our thoughts tend to move very quickly and once a project / problem gets ‘large’, it escapes us and we get twisted and turned around. Paper and pencil can help to organize and to bring greater clarity. This can be achieved on a computer, but believe it or not, I find it more cumbersome to goof around with a mouse and keyboard than pencil and paper when I am scribbling, drafting, or otherwise brainstorming. Plus I get to see all my ideas, no matter how ridiculous they were.

5. How will this increase transparency in my classroom?
   

   Interesting. I have no real idea on this one! It can become draconian with every mouse move and key click being recorded or it can be complete anarchy with no controls or reporting. Somewhere in the middle, of course, is balance. A little bureaucracy doesn’t hurt.