Bella Marciano
On Monday, November 17, parents and teachers met in the Wagner Room to discuss ways to better student’s education. One focus of the meeting was to address the implementation of the OneXOne program. This program would allow every student to have an electronic device to use for class work or other school activities.
The OneXOne program administrators is predicted to permeate the curriculum and modernize learning. “The premise of the OneXOne program is focused on individualization.” Superintendent Dr. Bryan Luizzi said. “Given the power of mobile technology, moving away from a ‘stand and deliver’ approach in a classroom to a student centered, more individualized approach, requires working with whatever the content is.”
Dr. Luizzi looks forward to the program’s facilitation of self-directed learning.“The program would provide the tools to students, so that they can become masters of their own learning,” he said. “If they have personal devices, they can find the right tools and the right resources that really support how they learn individually.”
Dr. Robert Miller, the director of digital learning at NCPS, is involved in the implementation of the program. “I really think moving from the paper, pencil, and book format, to a digital format is something that mirrors how society works today and what we are moving towards in the future,” he said.
Principal Dr. Veronica LeDuc said that students gravitating to electronic devices in the classroom inspired the idea for the project. “We observed the use of the devices and how when a teacher asks questions, a student could go to their phone and quickly search the internet for the answer,” she said. “This precipitated the investigation into what we could do with education if every student had a device that would allow them to videotape or explore the internet or share documents immediately.”
Dr. Luizzi, Dr. Miller and Dr. LeDuc are involved in the process of developing a pilot for the program. “We have a little pilot, it’s going to involve a small number of students in the district which will take place in the springtime and it will involve classes with two different kinds of devices,” Dr. LeDuc said. “After the results of that pilot, there’s a bigger pilot planned for the system that we think is most effective for the fall. And hopefully, at the end of that pilot we’ll be able to make a decision of exactly what direction we want to take. The second pilot would probably involve an entire grade. The first pilot might be 70 students, the next one might be 300 students.”
The OneXOne project has been implemented into other school systems in the area such as Greenwich Public Schools, Westport Public Schools, and Brookfield High School. “Greenwich Public Schools implemented Chromebooks in a couple classes at one of their middle schools this year, and iPads in elementary schools last year,” Dr. Miller said. “Westport has emerged with a ‘Bring Your Own Technology’ program around the same time period that we started here. They saw a great impact when students would bring their devices to school. Students were using them, and teachers were taking advantage of that tool too, once again, immersing students in the way of ‘21st Century learning.’”
One of the goals of the project is to merge technological and educational advancement. “We aim to purposely integrate technology into the learning experience for all of our students, and the goal is to provide access for all students, while using these tools appropriately,” Dr. Luizzi said. “Another goal is to learn, and for all of us to learn the appropriate uses of technology in our lives, so that we can always strike a balance, not only in class, but in all that we do. We want to teach people to use the technology provided in an appropriate manner.”
The program is anticipated to change the way students are able to explore learning, adapting education to 21st century advancements. “The program is supposed to transform teaching and learning in the building and expand the power at your fingertips, while tearing down the walls of the classroom, making it a global classroom,” Dr. Miller said. “This really takes that individualized learning, or just 24 students in a room, and makes it authentic, and makes it really replicate what society is going to be for students, and what society is for adults right now.”
