Labs vs. In-class: The Debate Continued

This article is by far the most germane to my research question of determining the distribution of student computers within an elementary school. The article admits to a long and unresolved debate over placement of computers often between either a computer lab or distributed among the classrooms of a school. Additionally, it discusses the large pedagogical impact of such a decision.

Jenson and Rose examine, first hand, 32 Canadian elementary schools in six different provinces of Canada. Schools included ranged from old low-income, inner city ones to those designed and built within the last five years. The article comes out of a larger Canadian study of technology use in education but the authors quickly realized that the fundamental and “seemingly basic” question of where to locate computers drives much of both how their thought of and, ultimately, how well they’re integrated into the daily curriculum of the school. In fact, “physical location and access” were cited as the most important factors affecting how well teachers were integrating technology into their teaching.
In addition to reciting the advantages and disadvantages of one location vs. another, the paper strongly suggests that schools not take an all-or-nothing approach and attempt to find solutions that are more flexile such as laptop carts. This same solution was echoed by several readers of the very recent ZDNet Educational Blog written by Christopher Dawson “In-class computers vs. labs.” While laptop carts may be an excellent solution for schools that have control over their own technology budget, some schools are simply allocated technology from a district level and thus may not have an opportunity to choose laptops.
Finally, as helpful as this article was in helping to understand that placement question, it did not give a quantitative account of where computers were located in the 32 visited schools.

Jenson, J., & Rose, C. (2006). Finding space for technology: Pedagogical observations on the organization of computers in school environments. Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology, 32(1).