“Class, take out your iPods.”
By Jeffrey | October 10, 2007
The New York Times has an interesting article from Monday discussing schools that are pushing the use of media players in the classroom for their learning capabilities.
But even as students have been told to leave their iPods at home, the school here in Hudson County has been handing out the portable digital players to help bilingual students with limited English ability sharpen their vocabulary and grammar by singing along to popular songs.
A couple years ago when I was still a misguided Bachelor of Arts student sitting in French 1010 my iPod saved my grade, in a way similar to these schools’ approach, albeit without the singing.
Hopefully other districts will take up a similar approach, as the possibilities for learning via iPod (or any similar media player). Encyclopedias, textbooks, notes, lectures, and various other classroom materials are all beginning to be available in iPod format.
The students are going to bring them to class anyway, so the powers that be would be wise to take advantage of that instead of following the traditional “crackdown” approach.
Although, it would make much more sense - both financially and logically - to use cheap media players that can be had for $50 or less instead of the much more expensive, and less open, iPod.
Topics: Rants |
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