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What Are the Different Types of School Gadgets?
Different types of school gadgets are often designed to fulfill certain functions that students need, or to help students study and learn more easily. While mobile phones may seem like distractions for many students, there are a number of applications and programs that can be used with such phones to assist with learning. E-readers and similar devices, such as tablets, can also be used by students to help reduce textbook costs and make learning easier and more interactive. There are also more specialized school gadgets like smart pens, which can be used with special paper to make handwritten work behave more like digital media.
School gadgets can refer to a wide range of devices, though they are typically meant to assist students with learning. Many common electronic devices, such as computers, can be used in and out of the classroom to help students learn and complete assignments more easily. Other devices, like mobile phones, can also be used by students to make learning easier or more interactive. Applications developed for mobile phones, especially smart phones, can be used to make such phones act as school gadgets, allowing students to record audio and video from class for later reference, providing tools such as calculators, and facilitating conversation between students outside of class.
Other types of school gadgets include e-readers and tablet devices that are portable and allow a great deal of digital media to be easily carried by a student. Many e-readers provide textbooks for students at lower prices than physical books and with greatly reduced weight compared to carrying such books. Some of these e-readers even allow students to share texts or “rent” books for a semester at a lower price than fully purchasing the text. Tablet devices can also be used as school gadgets, allowing students to access not only text, but also audio and video media that can help students perform research and understand subjects.
Some school gadgets are more practical in nature, and allow students to learn and study even more easily. Smart pens, for example, can be used to make taking notes and recalling information from a class easier. These pens often feature microphones and speakers, and when used with specially printed paper, can allow students to easily import handwritten materials into a computer. Smart pens can even allow students to record audio from a teacher in class, while writing down notes, and then play back audio that was recorded based on what section of the notes a student has selected with the pen. These school gadgets can make learning easier, especially for students who may learn best through both aural and visual means.
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![The right applications can make a smart phone a valuable school gadget.]()
By: SilrobyThe right applications can make a smart phone a valuable school gadget. -
![Many e-readers provide textbooks to students at lower prices than physical books.]()
By: PaoleseMany e-readers provide textbooks to students at lower prices than physical books. -
![Tablet computers allow students to access online publications and databases.]()
By: bloomuaTablet computers allow students to access online publications and databases.
Discussion Comments
@umbra21 - You make a good point, but I do think that some of these new gadgets do open up areas for students. Take tablets, for example. With a tablet, a child who struggles to write out words can tell a story without needing to write. So they can practice the elements of storytelling that might otherwise have to wait until their penmanship catches up.
So it is about what they are learning, as well as how they are learning it.
@Ana1234 - I'm not so convinced about things like smartboards being a necessity in a classroom. I think it really is all about imagination and those sorts of technologies only make things easier, they don't really broaden horizons.
You can get your students to collaborate on a big sheet of paper, after all and you can show them video in almost any classroom. It doesn't take much to hook a laptop up to a standard television, so you can even do things like look up Youtube videos or whatever.
I do think that the internet is a vital tool and children should have access to it, because if they don't they are being disadvantaged in the real world. I think they should have a chance to learn to use technology. But I don't think they need all the latest and greatest gadgets at their fingertips to get a good education.
You have to look at what they're learning, not so much how they're learning it.
Smartboards are one of the best gadgets that any classroom can have and it's a shame that they are so expensive. I got to work in a classroom with one a few years ago and it was amazing. It basically worked like a whiteboard and a computer screen combined, or maybe like a giant tablet.
You could write things on it and save them for later and you could bring up video and audio clips for the class. You could get students to walk up and add their input, either by typing or drawing directly on the board.
You could save and print off a copy of something for everyone after they collaborated on it. The limit was really your imagination, or, more importantly, the kids' imaginations.
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