iPods in the Classroom
From the NYTimes: In Some Schools, iPods Are Required Listening:
Grace Poli, a media specialist at José Martí, said that she approached district officials about buying 23 iPods for an after-school bilingual program in 2004 after being struck by students’ passion for them. Spanish-speaking students seemed bored by their English-language textbooks, she said, which they found outdated and irrelevant.
Ms. Poli said her Spanish-speaking students — known around the school as Pod People — have been able to move out of bilingual classes after just a year of using the digital devices, compared with an average of four to six years for most bilingual students.
It’s phenomenal to see educators teaching using technology and methods other than osmosis. It’s a small but important step that marks the change that formalized learning is going to see in the next 5-10 years.
