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Learning Curve: Cellphone as teacher
By MAUREEN DOWNEY
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
7:42 a.
m.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Many students headed back to the classroom today are being forced to leave their cellphones behind, thanks to...
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Print this page Close
Learning Curve: Cellphone as teacher
By MAUREEN DOWNEY
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
7:42 a.
m.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Many students headed back to the classroom today are being forced to leave their cellphones behind, thanks to school rules banning their possession.
The day may be coming, though, when students could find themselves in trouble for leaving their cellphones home.
Only they won’t be called cellphones.
They will be dubbed mobile devices or hand-held computers.
Already, they are being used around the world by innovative schools
capitalizing on children’s natural affinity for technology and the omnipresence of cellphones.
(By one count, 60 percent of second-graders are predicted to carry cellphones
by the end of 2010.
)
In pilot programs, teachers are utilizing even basic cellphones to teach math, record dramatic presentations, document chemical changes and give tests.
“Laptops are very ’90s,” says University of Michigan researcher Elliot Sol
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