Active Angel investor, startup mentor and serial entrepreneur here in Boston, Bill Warner, is behind an iPad pilot program that has been running since February at the fifty year old Cambridge Friends School.
According to an announcement from the school today, Cambridge Friends School Head Peter Sommer approached Warner about the feasibility of introducing such a pilot program into the classrooms earlier this year. With Warner’s son having graduated from the school in 2010, he agreed, purchasing iPads for the school’s two 6th grade classrooms and teachers this February.
Prior to the Cambridge Friends School Sommer was a director of education at Columbia University’s Center for New Media Teaching and Learning. Meaning, he fundamentally understands the vast possibilities that exist around using the tablets in educational settings for more interactive learning. A corresponding curriculum was put into place for the sixth graders across subjects from science and math to English.
“Our 6th-grade classroom teachers have done an exemplary job in integrating the iPads throughout the curriculum,” shared Sommer. “They have used them across the board in every subject area: in history and in English, in math, and in science, where they collaborated with Science Teacher Debby Knight on students viewing time-release photos of an osmosis and diffusion lab.”
And the results are in on the impact of this first pilot of the program.
One of the teachers, Ms. Chandler, spoke to the heightened engagement and affinity to learn she has witnessed over the past few months with these students. “Students are engaged in the material. They love sharing content as well as tips on using the technology. And while we as teachers make jokes about how there are such things as books still, [we] feel certain that our students are often learning more than they would have without the iPads.”
6th graders were selected for the program given the research focus across all disciplines at this grade level. The other teacher, Ms. Rojas, gave one example of how they leveraged and incorporated the iPad into lessons:
“During a project on Mayan culture, for example, students were asked to research the lives of the ancient Maya. From ancient trade routes to Mayan numbers, students used iPads as one of their research tools,” she said.
Time Tours: Chichén Itzá was the app used in this particular research assignment, and is one she says is a great example of the iPad’s interactive nature. She went on to explain, “In this exercise, students viewed Mayan ruins today, and with the swipe of a finger see that image transformed into what it looked like a thousand years ago. That’s something which is more difficult to achieve in the 2D environment of the printed page.”
Sommer is hoping to expand the program into other middle school grades.
“Reports from faculty and students have been very encouraging, and we are entirely grateful for the Warners’ extraordinary support,” Sommer said. “With such a successful pilot program, we are hoping to expand the iPad initiative to other Middle School grades.”
Congrats to all involved in this great program. We’d love to hear reactions from some of the students!
