About TTPC Isaac on 20 Nov 2006 01:00 pm
My Intro
I teach mathematics in the Chicago metro area. Last year, a couple of my friends started using TabletPCs in class every day. While I am a big fan of bleeding edge technology in my own life, I am very hesitant when it comes to the latest educational fad, so I mostly sat back and listened to what they said. After hearing about it for a year, I decided it was worth playing with and found myself a B-stock IBM X41 tablet at CDW at the beginning of June.
My tablet has barely left my hands since then. I’ve used it nearly every day in class instead of an overhead or blackboards or whiteboards, predominantly using Journal. As the semester has progressed, I’ve gotten better at using Journal (the kids really enjoy the lasso tool, though I’m not sure why they enjoy it so much) and I’ve gotten into using other tools (VirtualTI is great; writing right on worksheets in Word is fun).
As my school slowly rolls out tablets to many of the other faculty, I am hoping to see increased tablet use in the classroom, at least within my department, and I am hoping that we will find more interesting and effective ways to teach with the tablet.
5 Responses to “My Intro”
on 25 Jan 2007 at 8:17 am
1.Ryanbetts2 said …
Hi Isaac.
I’m a teacher in a small suburban district outside of NYC. I bought my table last year (HP tc4200) for grad. school and work. I teach elementary right now, but am pursuing a 2nd master and certification in special ed. I use my tablet all day, everyday for teaching and grad. school.
I wanted to build a site like this, but you beat me to it! I am an avid reader of studenttabletpc.com I am willing to help you get this thing going. Let me know if you need help authoring this site.
I am a beginner at web design, but I have had a lot of experience with tablets as a teacher and as a student. I think tablets have huge potential in the field of education.
Talk to you soon,
Ryan
on 25 Jan 2007 at 11:36 am
2.Isaac said …
I could definitely use the help with authoring and content. I think I’ve got a decent handle on the infrastructure stuff, but as you probably noticed, I haven’t been updating it as much as I probably should. I’ll email you so we can discuss this more directly, but hopefully in posting this here too, others might be encouraged to volunteer as well.
on 08 Feb 2007 at 8:12 am
3.Bob said …
Welcome to Edublogland, Isaac. I look forward to learning more about how students respond to you using various Ink features. It’s interesting that an increasing number of IL teachers and schools are venturing into Pen and Ink based instruction. What’s the stimulus in IL, faculty uses at UI Chicago as well as Urbana-Champaign?
on 08 Feb 2007 at 11:31 am
4.Isaac said …
From my perspective, it seems likely that the large number of users here has to do with having a few bleeding-edge schools with money that have been using tablets for some time now (I’m thinking particularly of Hinsdale Central High School), the networks among teachers (such as the Metropolitan Math Club of Chicago) that allow the benefits to be communicated, and movement of personnel (e.g. a teacher from Hinsdale Central was hired by New Trier specifically to do things with technology).
on 08 Feb 2007 at 3:49 pm
5.Alex Ander said …
Oh my gosh. I think you’re talking about my tennis coach that left Hinsdale Central to go to New Trier! I go to Central. It’s neat that you know about us.
Alex