In my high school, when I was a freshman, everyone was required to buy a tablet PC – basically, a laptop who’s screen could swivel and lie flat on top of the keyboard to act as a notebook, and the computer came with a little stylus that acted as a pen on the screen of the computer. It was a really neat idea, and a lot of students really liked it, but I found it much more distracting than helpful. Everyone would always be staring at their screen doing something else (googling, reading news articles, etc since Facebook was blocked) instead of actively participating in class discussions. While the notebook setting was a great idea, most people abused the system so that they wouldn’t have to pay attention in class. Although this technology was great, and we didn’t have to carry around a ton of notebooks and textbooks all the time, we lost a lot of concentration along the way. It seems that with the rise of technology, everyone’s attention span is getting shorter and shorter – we’re so used to being entertained all the time, that when we have to go through something that’s a little boring, we immediately stop paying attention because it isn’t as engaging as what we’re used to.
My high school is instituting something similar to that, but teachers are being taught different apps and methods to prevent students from Googling and getting distracted. For example, all students have to log into an app with the presentation to bring it up on their screens. The screen is then locked to the presentation while the iPad is on and the only way to access the internet or other apps is to close out of the presentation. When that happens, the teacher gets an alert on his/her app saying that Johnny logged out of the presentation. Hopefully this app will help to maintain engagement in class.