Lessons Learned for 1:1 Laptop Projects

Published by in 1:1, leadership on January 7th, 2006

A free 6 page PDF publication, “Starting School Laptop Programs: Lessons Learned,” was published in December 2005 by the Ubiquitous Computing Evaluation Consortium. The main purpose of this publication is to “help policymakers who are starting a laptop program to avoid potential pitfalls.” Advice for leaders considering 1:1 laptop projects is proliferating. Technology and Learning is promoting its “1:1 Computing Guidebook,” which was sponsored by Microsoft, HP, and Intel. (For more about it, refer to my blog post from December 5th.) Unlike that publication, this Ubiquitous Computing paper by Andrew Zucker does have overt corporate sponsorship.

In the brief, Bette Manchester of the MLTI is quoted saying:

There needs to be a leadership team that looks at things through three different lenses: the lens of curriculum and content; the lens of the culture of the building; and the lens of technical needs.

A focus on planning and GOALS for the project from the start is essential. The MLTI (Maine’s statewide laptop project) was started primarily to “help rural middle schools improve the teaching of mathematics using the laptops.” Interestingly, the positive results I have read and heard about from the Maine project center more on student writing skills and measures like student attendance, discipline referrals, and dropouts, rather than math skills. I am wondering if the definition of “success” in the MLTI has been changed from the project’s original goals to match observed / measured outcomes that have been seen in other areas? That is a rhetorical question I’ll be seeking an answer to myself in upcoming weeks.

In addition to aligning project policies and goals, LEADERSHIP is identified as key ingredient of success in 1:1 projects. Interestingly, in our own statewide TxTip 1:1 immersion project, the formal evaluation being conducted by the Texas Center for Educational Research is NOT including a focus on leadership aspects of the experience and outcomes on each participating campus.

The five areas the author of the “Lessons Learned” brief contend policymakers should pay attention to include:

  1. planning
  2. training and professional development
  3. hardware and software
  4. managing change
  5. program monitoring and evaluation

According to Zucker, these areas can be further broken down into the following critical factors which can differentiate successful 1:1 laptop projects from those with less positive results:

  1. Project goals specific to the campus are clearly identified and communicated.
  2. Campus project policies are aligned with goals.
  3. Strong leadership support is cultivated and sustained.
  4. Long term funding from multiple sources is utilized.
  5. Partnerships with organizations outside the school are cultivated.
  6. Logistical aspects (“maintenance, upgrades, insurance, replacement of equipment”) are planned and supported.
  7. Professional development focuses more on integration, content and pedagogy rather than technical skills.
  8. Parent support is cultivated and ongoing parent training is provided.
  9. Robust digital curriculum and tools are provided for student and teacher use.
  10. Productivity software tools are standardized.
  11. Robust network infrastructure is provided and supported at school.
  12. Just-in-time technical support is available and utilized.
  13. Lead time for teachers to receive laptops and use/train with them is provided in advance of student laptop rollouts.
  14. A variety of methods (professional development, model
    lessons, coaching, videos) are used to help teachers expand their own vision and pedagogy for classroom technology integration.

I agree with the authors’ contention that different and more robust measures of student achievement and learning will be needed to more authentically measure the effectiveness and impact of 1:1 initiatives. They write:

…the evaluation field is likely to require the development of more high-quality assessments of student learning—for example, to measure students’ higher order thinking, problem solving, and technology proficiency.

One problem with TxTip however, as I currently understand it, is that the same standardized measures of student achievement and performance (standardized, statewide TAKS assessment scores) are being used as the primary benchmark for learning. Should these indicators show improvement in an effectively conducted 1:1 laptop immersion project, even though they can’t capture the full scope of skills which students learn and refine as a result of the initiative? Probably? But do they, and which of the above differentiating factors seem to have the greatest impact on those positive results?

Those are answers I am currently pursuing in my ongoing dissertation research. :-)

Thanks to Sharon Betts for her blog post on Andy Zucker’s October 2005 preso at the T+L2 conference for indirectly bringing this new publication to my attention.

On this day..

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