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Colorado districts built up a supply of Chromebooks. Some are nearing their end

coloradosun.com

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Re: Colorado districts built up a supply of Chromebooks. Some are nearing their end

#21

Post by lacker »

pathartl wrote: post #12

There's something core to this discussion that I feel like everyone misses. Yes, kids annihilate computers. Yes, Chromebooks have an expiration date that's pretty arbitrary. Yes, Chromebooks generally have lower end hardware that doesn't last as long. Yes, making them last longer could mean you cycle through 8,000 Chromebooks in 4 years instead of 16,000. My question is, do we really need 1:1 programs for kids? I abs…

From this parent's point of view, using laptops in school doesn't have much to do with computer science. My kids in elementary school use their Chromebooks for all homework. It seems very good for their computer skills. Word processing to write papers, learning to type, learning to use the mouse, using learning applications, using the internet to do research, and creating presentations.

When you say "proper equipment", well, proper equipment for a professional software engineer is often just a Macbook. How does that differ from a Chromebook? Okay, they can't run Xcode on a Chromebook, but a 4th grader isn't going to be learning that anyway.

The main thing for this generation is that so many of them are native touch screen users. They are used to iPads and iPhones and get very good at understanding those UIs. Which is great, but they will also need to learn how to use the keyboard+mouse+windows UI. Chromebooks seem great at that.

Re: Colorado districts built up a supply of Chromebooks. Some are nearing their end

#22

Post by lacker »

pathartl wrote: post #19
anonymouscaller wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a high schooler and I can say I need a chromebook/personal device for almost every one of my classes. Everything is digital and embeded into the Google ecosystem. A good 95% of writing is done on Google Docs, slideshows are created on Google Slides, and then this work is turned in on Google Classroom. While yes, computer labs with traditional desktop PCs would be more economically feasible, they simply aren't pos…

The immediate rebuttal I can think of is of course you need a Chromebook; your school is now vendor locked to Google's platform. They did this by offering deep discounts to their cloud offerings. The point about writing is a good one that resonates with me. I grew up in the age where typewriters were dead, we would outline on paper, and then do drafts/final revisions in the computer lab. I can absolutely see why goin…

I think the big issue is whether you give all the kids a laptop or not. If you don't, some of the kids won't have a computer at home. How are they working on, say, a writing project, then? Only at school?

The well-off, computer-savvy parents will buy their kids a laptop and make sure you can log into the school system so that they get the same working environment at home, whether it's Google Classroom or anything else. That paper you started in class, show it to your parents, and keep working on it at home. It seems like a huge advantage if some kids can't do that.

Once you're giving all the kids a laptop, it doesn't really matter whether it's a Chromebook, it's just the cheapest way to do it, and it's good enough.

Re: Colorado districts built up a supply of Chromebooks. Some are nearing their end

#23

Post by pathartl »

lacker wrote: post #21
pathartl wrote: post #12

There's something core to this discussion that I feel like everyone misses. Yes, kids annihilate computers. Yes, Chromebooks have an expiration date that's pretty arbitrary. Yes, Chromebooks generally have lower end hardware that doesn't last as long. Yes, making them last longer could mean you cycle through 8,000 Chromebooks in 4 years instead of 16,000. My question is, do we really need 1:1 programs for kids? I abs…

From this parent's point of view, using laptops in school doesn't have much to do with computer science. My kids in elementary school use their Chromebooks for all homework. It seems very good for their computer skills. Word processing to write papers, learning to type, learning to use the mouse, using learning applications, using the internet to do research, and creating presentations. When you say "proper equipment…

I agree for things like writing papers having access to a computer for research and word proccessing is a net positive, but I still believe that this is better handled by shared equipment contained within the classroom or lab. I may be a bit biased as I'm still not convinced that homework actually provides a ton of benefit, and I'm even more not convinced that homework should require a computer to be completed.

However, to further your first point even more, having one laptop per student is a great way to bring computers into the home of those that might not be fortunate enough to purchase them. In the school district I worked for (very rural Wisconsin) we were able to secure hotspots for households that couldn't afford a broadband internet service. However, even though I've been out of the education sector for a number of years I haven't seen a real uptick in computing skills so I wonder how effective these devices actually are.

I have nephews that entered the system about the time I started in the education sector (and actually worked in their district), but I can't confidently say their skills match or exceed the average student from the era of mid 2000's labs. Simply put without sounding like an old man, I'm questioning whether constant exposure to tech is replacing quality education about it.

By "proper equipment" I mean traditional laptops/desktops that are spec'd to be shared by multiple people and have quality components, or even repairable components so we don't end up with these mountains of e-waste.

Re: Colorado districts built up a supply of Chromebooks. Some are nearing their end

#24

Post by pathartl »

lacker wrote: post #22
pathartl wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The immediate rebuttal I can think of is of course you need a Chromebook; your school is now vendor locked to Google's platform. They did this by offering deep discounts to their cloud offerings. The point about writing is a good one that resonates with me. I grew up in the age where typewriters were dead, we would outline on paper, and then do drafts/final revisions in the computer lab. I can absolutely see why goin…

I think the big issue is whether you give all the kids a laptop or not. If you don't, some of the kids won't have a computer at home. How are they working on, say, a writing project, then? Only at school? The well-off, computer-savvy parents will buy their kids a laptop and make sure you can log into the school system so that they get the same working environment at home, whether it's Google Classroom or anything els…

I think that writing projects should be done in school while students have access to their educational resources, yes. This is purely my own experience so there's a huge grain of salt, but I have to believe that learning how to compose an essay should be iterative with the educator instead of being reactionary. The concept of writing a paper and handing it in for a grade only to be told you haven't met the criteria is wild to me. I can't remember any good paper I wrote that I actually wrote at home. Most of the time it was in class with the ability to ask the teacher questions.

Re: Colorado districts built up a supply of Chromebooks. Some are nearing their end

#25

Post by techniquetech »

rahimnathwani wrote: post #6

The end-of-life problem seems like it could be solved, depending on the specific model. Many Chromebooks can have coreboot installed ( https://mrchromebox.tech/ ), turning them into regular PCs. And since Google bought Neverware, a regular PC can be turned into a Chromebook by installing ChromeOS Flex.

.... or linux machines. Have an old Chromebook with Gallium OS installed on it and it's a fantastic little machine!

Re: Colorado districts built up a supply of Chromebooks. Some are nearing their end

#26

Post by rahimnathwani »

techniquetech wrote: post #25
rahimnathwani wrote: post #6

The end-of-life problem seems like it could be solved, depending on the specific model. Many Chromebooks can have coreboot installed ( https://mrchromebox.tech/ ), turning them into regular PCs. And since Google bought Neverware, a regular PC can be turned into a Chromebook by installing ChromeOS Flex.

.... or linux machines. Have an old Chromebook with Gallium OS installed on it and it's a fantastic little machine!

GalliumOS is great but sadly it's no longer maintained. I think you can get most of the same benefits with a vanilla distro, but you have to be willing to do the tweaking yourself.

I installed Arch on a CB3-111 last week, and it seems to work fine. I will probably make it swap to zram, and see if I can install a better touchpad driver, but the other limitations aren't things I can fix, most importantly:

- only 4GB RAM

- no meta (windows) key, so I'm using alt as the meta key for i3

- function keys are labelled as media keys, so I have to remember which one is F1

But neither GalliumOS nor Arch are a practical solutions for schools today, unless there's an easy way to lock them down and have central management?

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