Adventures in Learning

creative-education:

[Rant]
I just heard that my school, a 1:1 school using MacBooks for students in grades 6-12, has been told Apple will no longer make those machines. They say we should replace our laptops with iPads.
 
I get it. iPads are “consumer” devices. They are very popular, solid state - making them profitable to make (with cheap labor in China), and the device driving Apple’s business decision to get into the e-textbook game. BUT! e-textbooks on iPads will not transform education. The only thing it transforms is the textbook!
 
I am not saying e-textbooks on an iPad are not better than traditional text books. They are much better. But they are still textbooks. Textbooks, paper or digital, are obsolete! For Apple to stop making MacBooks and say that schools should use e-textbooks on iPads is about PROFIT FOR APPLE - and, from a 21st century education standpoint, a step in the wrong direction!
[End Rant]
 
OK. I realize that 80% of the time, my students are consumers of information from my Web-based curriculum and could be using an iPad. But 20% of the time, my students are producers of information. If it were not for “standards” and other political BS, that 20% would be much higher. My point is that the iPad is not designed as an information-producing device. We will have to make it work and students will not be gaining experience with the high quality information-producing software available on a “real” computer!

I agree with you! Not a rant it is common sense! In many ways Apple has made it harder to transform education, because it keeps making traditional education so easy.