Are pupils using laptops in classrooms?

[creamedcustard]

Just watching the film Senior Year and I know it's set in the US but every pupil in class has their laptop out!

Do school pupils in the UK use laptops during normal lessons e.g. to write essays on? And are exams still handwritten?

Can't believe I don't know this ...

My three all use Ipads. As they are issued by the school, every student has one. This is the same for all three bog-standard comps in our town and neighbouring towns five or six schools.

Exams are still handwritten but they are looking to move them online I believe.

My kids school has chrome books for all of the children to use. They are issued by the school and they are not used for every lesson.

My teens both use a laptop in lessons. Homework is sent to them via google classroom.

I'm surprised that it hadn't occured to you!

Dd1 is sitting her GCSE exams and they are still handwritten.

In the Gdst school we applied for they use Ipads as the norm and I expect its the same in other independent schools.

In my bog standard comprehensive we barely have enough paper due to a global shortage and our text books are falling apart, we can order laptops for specific lessons but the WiFi is sketchy in my part of the building, half won't log on and the other half are always almost out of charge.

However, students with dyspraxic, injured arms or other mobility issues can use a laptop for all lessons and exams are handwritten unless you have exam access arrangements that say you can word process the answers. Even then students just type onto a word doc with auto correct turned off, the actual exam paper isn't formatted to be used online.

Yes, my son is 8 and his class use laptops regularly throughout the week. It's a vital part of the curriculum now as they are going into a world and workplace where computer literacy is vital - think of it like learning to be totally fluent in another language!

They don't use them all the time, but often

Exams are still handwritten unless a child has specific needs which require using a PC. In my indie school we ask them to have a device available (not just a phone) and they are used to varying degrees depending on the teacher but all are expected to use Teams to access homework, see notices etc.

No...at the comprehensive I work in laptop use is rare...only for the odd specific lesson (computer studies lessons on top of this too of course). Regular laptop use in other subjects is only for students with specific learning or physical needs that means handwriting is difficult. Budgets and WiFi issues are potentially part of the reason for this but it's not really something the school are actively striving for either I don't think. At my kids' primary it's similar I think- they have regular lessons in the ICT room but don't have devices in the classroom every day for each lesson.

We had to purchase a school laptop for DS when he moved up to high school. He chose an engineering and business school so they are used daily but exams are still handwritten.
They use the laptop less frequently in the core subjects.

Exams and essays are still handwritten up to GCSE. A level exams are handwritten but essays not. Uni work is all typed.

DS is year 7 and almost all of his homework is online now. He doesn’t use a laptop in class though.

Is the film as bad as it looks?

If it's a film called Senior Year is it about 18 year olds in their last year of US high school? So almost at university stage where yes, in the UK too, many would have laptops? I don't know how sixth form teaching works on an every day basis but maybe by 18 it's the norm here too for older students to be regularly using them in lessons..?

I work in a state secondary school. No way can it afford laptops or iPads. PCs for computer science lessons but they're a bit clunky and laptops for children who have special arrangements. DD has one for some lessons where there's a lot of writing as she has EDS and problems with her wrists and fingers which makes writing pages and pages of notes painful. It's a bit slow and unreliable though.

I teach in a sixth form and lots of students use laptops even though all exams are handwritten unless you have exam permission to use laptop which only very few do.

However my subject (MFL) benefits from handwriting to help learning so we do all writing by hand even though we use a lot of tech and web tools in other aspects of our learning

Online exams are still a long long way off yet.

Both my son’s are in state secondary. We were asked to buy a chrome book for one and an iPad for the other the start of yr 7. They are discounted and you can pay in instalments. The one with the iPad have an apple genius area at school if they have an tech difficulties.

Every student in my eldest child’s high school is allocated an iPad and they do loads on them.

My youngest goes to a special school and again, iPads and laptops are used a lot as quite a few children including mine get more out of interactive activities on them than worksheets and exercise books.

State school here and no one uses a laptop in lessons or exams unless they have access arrangements. Maybe out of 250 in year 11 this year about 10 will type.

Nope, the only pupils who have laptops are those with specific needs or if they have an injury so can’t write. This is probably only about 3 pupils out of 700. There are no iPads in school for pupil use. Sometimes you can’t even book a computer room due to timetabled lessons. It’s a state church school, high achieving, mainly well-off pupils, but school budget is very tight. School really doesn’t have a lot of money at all.

At my school all students have iPads and most written work is set and marked on a virtual platform. Typing in exams is becoming more common but still has to be applied for. I suspect that schools and exam boards don’t really have the infra structure for this yet. It was a godsend during lockdown

I work in a primary school and laptops are used regularly from year 3 upwards. They're used for research and for writing up work.

Started with IPads and now school is transitioning to chromebooks. They are not used for every lesson though.

I work at an independent secondary- only pupils with additional needs who are allowed to use laptops in exams use them in class. Everyone else uses paper, like they'll have to in their exams.

Question for other teachers who use laptops as standard- how do you know that all the kids are doing what they're meant to be doing? And what if someone's laptop starts on an update when they're meant to be working? Or if it's just old and slow? Do any maths teachers have kids working on tablets/laptops/chrome books as standard?

In my experience it has been hard getting permission for laptop use in lessons, even with medical need, especially in lower years, somewhat more pupils use them after assessments in yr9/10. They do all now use laptops but with each one it has been a battle, despite the pain they experience and few others in their year groups had them early.

My teens use laptops for a couple of lessons, the school provides them dependant on the lesson eg the maths teacher might have 30 laptops assigned to his classroom.

yes chrome books had to buy them in year 7. Needed that bombshell, along with everything else.

I teach in a state secondary school in England. Only our sixth formers (Y12/13, post-GCSEs) routinely use laptops in lessons. In Years 7-11, it’s all handwritten unless a student has additional needs.