Talk given at IATEFL Liverpool April 2012

1. OLPC Laptops in Schools: Holy Grail or
Digital Disaster?
Paul Woods English
Adviser
British Council
Uruguay

2. • What do we know about the impact of 1 to
1 laptops in schools - research from 6
states in USA
• The OLPC laptop project in Peru
• The Plan Ceibal project in Uruguay
XO laptops in a Uruguayan Primary School

3. What Do We Know About the Impact of
One-to-One?
North Carolina State University studied six statewide
1 to 1 initiatives
Five Student Outcomes
 Engagement
Teachers and students generally agreed that laptops increased
student engagement
 Motivation
Teachers and students in some states concurred that laptops
increase student motivation, but results were mixed.

4.  Achievement
Students and teachers in some of the states thought that the use of
laptops had a positive impact on student achievement, although this
was not always supported by the test scores
 Self-directed learning
Students not only were participating more in group work but also
were engaging in self-directed learning.
 21st century skills (technology, innovation, communication,
collaboration)
Improvements across the board in these skills

5. CHANGES TO INSTRUCTIONAL PRACTICES
 Technology use for Instruction and the Changes in Pedagogy that
Result:
Teachers in the initiatives used the technology in a number of ways
and reported a positive impact on classroom instruction, and teacher
readiness to integrate technology
 Teacher and student roles
Researchers noticed that the roles of teacher and students shift
during the implementation of a 1:1 program.

6. Summary
In general, the introduction of 1:1 initiatives led to
positive responses, ranging from improved student
achievement to shifts in the way in which classrooms are
run.
Laptop Initiatives: Summary of Research Across Six States
http://k12blueprint.com/k12/blueprint/story_impact_1_1.php

7. Motivating
factors 1.
Learning
can take
place
anywhere

8. Motivating
factors 2.
Both the
teachers and
the students
are learning
together

9. Motivating
factors 3.
Even at a
very early
age pupils
can access
the vast
range of
resources
on the
internet

10. Laptops in Peru
The Peruvian government spent $225m to supply and
support 850,000 One Laptop per Child (OLPC) laptops in
schools throughout the country.
“GIVING a child a
computer does not seem
to turn him or her into a
future Bill Gates—indeed
it does not accomplish
anything in particular.”

11. Inter-American Development Bank (IDB)
Report on OLPC Laptops in Peru
Findings:
• Children who received computers did not show any improvement in
maths or reading.
• No evidence that access to a laptop increased motivation, or time
devoted to homework or reading.
• Test scores remained dismal.
• Only 13% of seven-year-olds were at the required level in maths
• Only 30% reached required level in reading.
• Some positive effects were found in general cognitive skills

13. Conclusion from the official report
“The effective implementation of the “One Laptop
per Child” program was not enough to overcome
the difficulties of a design that places its trust in
the role of technologies themselves. The use of
technologies in education is not a magic and
rapid solution through which educational
problems and challenges can be solved with the
simple acquisition of technological devices and
systems”.
https://edutechdebate.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/OLPC_Peru_IDB_Report_Synopsis.pdf

14. Other conclusions from Peru
• Program implementation was effective
• Despite their availability, the laptops were only
used on some days of the week, especially at
school
• There were no effects on learning after three
months
• The evaluation found a higher level of teacher
satisfaction, and moderately positive results in
the development of students' analytical skills.
• The most important lesson was the need to
focus the use of technology to improve learning
in students, not only at a curricular level, but
also to develop their skills and relevant
competencies for their life in 21st Century
society.

15. What people told “The Economist”
“Part of the problem
is that students
learn faster than
many of their
teachers”
Lily Miranda, who runs
a computer lab at a
state school in San
Borja, a middle-class
area of Lima
“If teachers are telling kids
to turn on computers and
copy what is being written
on the blackboard, then
we have invested in
expensive notebooks,”
Sandro Marcone - in
charge of educational
technologies at the Ministry
of Education

16. What is OLPC?
• Mission - the "$100 Laptop" - could
revolutionize how we educate the
world's children.
• Goal - to provide children around the
world with new opportunities to
explore, experiment, and express
themselves.
• OLPC XO rolled out to developing
countries in November 2007.
• Worldwide over 2.5 million children
and teachers have XO laptops

17. 1:1 learning - OLPC classroom devices
“OLPC's mission
is to empower the
world's poorest
children through
education”
Nicholas
Negroponte, MIT
“As the pace of change in
the world increases
dramatically, the urgency
to prepare all children to
be full citizens of the
emerging world also
increases dramatically”.
“What children lack is not
capability, it is opportunity
and resources.
In the first years of OLPC
we have seen two million
previously marginalized
children learn, achieve
and begin to transform
their communities.”

18. Where are the OLPC laptops?
• Uruguay
• Paraguay
• Peru
• Madagascar
• India
• Nepal
• Gaza &
Ramallah
• Kenya
• Afghanistan
• Rwanda

19. Nepal
Down Every Path

20. Uruguay
Students in Artigas

21. Kenya

22. Gaza and Ramallah

23. Afghanistan

24. Madagascar

25. Peru

26. Nicaragua

27. Rwanda

28. India

29. Laptops in Use in Schools in the Americas
North America
Canada 5,000 OLPC laptops
Mexico 50,000 OLPC laptops
United States of America 16,500 OLPC laptops
65,000 Apple Mac notebooks
25,000 Dell laptops
Caribbean and Latin America
Argentina 60,000 OLPC laptops (La Rioja)
1800,000 Intel Classmates
350,000 netbooks
Venezuela 500,000 Intel Classmates
Colombia 20,000 OLPC laptops
Haiti 13,000 OLPC laptops
Peru 870,000 OLPC laptops
Uruguay 510,000 mostly OLPC laptops
Brazil 1,500,000 Intel Classmates
Paraguay 4,000 OLPC laptops

30. What are some of the criticisms?
 Lack of teacher training and ongoing support
 OLPC gives underprivileged children laptops and "walks
away“: this "drive-by" implementation model was the
official strategy of the project.
 Nicolas Negroponte - "You actually can" give children a
connected laptop and walk away
 Experiences with self-guided learning in India (Sugata
Mitra).
 “Laptops are getting opened and turned on, but then kids
and teachers are getting frustrated by hardware and
software bugs, don't understand what to do, and
promptly box them up to put back in the corner.“ (Intern
in Peru)

31. Intel Classmate
• Intel teamed up with the British Council to introduce
computer-based language learning in Egypt
• Egypt’s National Strategic Plan for Education Reform is
designed to deliver high-quality education to all citizens.
• The Ministry of Education ran a computer-learning pilot
program, in collaboration with the British Council and
Intel, in a school in Cairo.
• The pilot was based on Intel-powered classmate PCs
pre-loaded with English language learning software from
the British Council.

32. Assessment
• The pilot had four assessment
areas:
 training implications for
teachers
 impact of technology on
student motivation
 impact of technology on
attitudes towards
technology
 relevance of computer-based
English language
material from the British
Council to the school’s
English syllabus

33. Impact
• Highly engaged learning: the children and teachers
readily engaged with the classmate - pilot evaluations
highlighted increased levels of enjoyment and
engagement
• Greater learner satisfaction: teachers and students
reported higher levels of motivation and commitment
Result
British Council has teamed up with Intel to pre-load
LearnEnglish materials onto Classmates – 150 million by
2015

34. Argentina – LearnEnglish Materials
3 million children are now using laptops in schools and
potentially have access to British Council LearnEnglish
materials
The LE materials have been mapped to the City of
Buenos Aires curriculum
In-service training is taking place for teachers in how to
use appropriate materials on the laptops
British Council recruited a trainer of trainers to work with
local trainers
Working with 41 teacher training colleges in Province of
Bs As and 26 trainers, to reach 2600 trainees initially

35. http://learnenglish.educ.ar/

36. Criticisms
• Many pupils take the laptops
home and don’t use them at
school
• Some schools lack connectivity
• Teachers have not been trained
to use the laptops, or have
received insufficient training
• Inadequate arrangements for
maintenance when things go
wrong
INGLES EN
INGLES.wmv

37. Uruguay – Plan Ceibal
• Every child has a laptop
• Tele-presence
technology
• Remote teachers Mexico,
Colombia and Argentina.
Soon to include The
Philippines
• RT 45 minutes per week
• CT 2 x 45 minutes per
week
• Proof of concept phase
• Progressive expansion

38. Uruguay – Remote Teaching using OLPC
Local classroom:
•TV screen showing
remote teacher
•Lesson materials shown
via Webex, Promethean
software
2-way video & audio
Remote teacher
using video-conferencing
“This is Uruguay's problem: 40% of children who attend
public schools come from the poorest fifth rung of society. And
out of this fifth, just 3% makes it to college. Through Plan
CEIBAL we decided to take a chance on making a change and
to find a way out of this crisis we live in.”
Miguel Brechner, Plan Ceibal
Joint lesson
planning
Students with
Classroom
laptops
Local class
teacher
managing activity

39. How do children use the Laptops outside
school?
Hours of use outside
school
Hours per week % of children
Up to 3 hrs
3-7 hrs approx
7 – 14 hrs approx
14 – 20 hrs
Over 20 hrs
Not used at
home
Total
Hours of use outside
School per week
Average: 10 hrs 20 min
Median: 7 hrs
Percentiles:
25 - 3 hrs 30 min
50 - 7 hrs
75 – 13 hrs
A L Martinez: :Plan Ceiba -: evaluación y lecciones aprendidas en la primera experiencia 1 a 1 a
nivel nacional

40. In what way do children use the laptop and with whom?
How do they acquire the knowledge?
With help from a
teacher Individual self
discovery
In Pairs
Has the child taught someone else to use the
XO?
Whom?
Parents: 73%
Siblings: 46%
Other children:
42%
Teachers: 9%
A L Martinez:Plan Ceibal: evaluación y lecciones aprendidas en la primera experiencia 1 a 1 a
nivel nacional

41. Key Findings in
Uruguay:
• Internet via Cyber cafes (65%
2006, 25% 2008 in the country
side) Internet via school (32%
2006 67% 2008)
• Children take two weeks to
learn to handle the XO. Most
learned by individual exploration.
• 50% of teachers use XO at least
once a week, 21% almost daily.

42. •92% of children use XO for
homework.
•Browse activity is most preferred
•Activities such as Write, Paint, and
Memorize less preferred by children in
higher grades.
•Access to the XO not only closes the
gap in access to computers and the
Internet but also its use levels the
students who don’t have a computer at
home with the ones who do.

43. So - is the jury still out?
• Teachers need to be trained adequately,
both in how to maximise use of the
software on the laptops and how to
manage a class where the pupils have
laptops, for example, encouraging
students to create their own simple blogs
• Where laptops are to be used as part of a
structured programme, materials need to
be mapped to or created for the local
syllabus
• With young learners not everything can
be done on the laptops – they need to
touch, feel, handle, move round the
room, do things actively with other
children
• Testing should test what the students
have been taught!

44. In Uruguay we are demonstrating that, with sufficient
support, appropriate training for classroom teachers
and appropriate materials for the pupils, learners are
highly motivated, develop autonomy and achieve
measurable results through lessons delivered via
tele-presence technology and 1 to 1 laptops,
supported by classroom teachers with only a very
limited knowledge of English.
Using the language

45. Thank you for listening!
paul.woods@britishcouncil.org.ar
www.facebook.com/rphwoods
Twitter - @rphwoods
Linked In – Paul Woods

46. A L Martinez:Plan Ceibal: evaluación y lecciones aprendidas en la primera experiencia 1 a 1 a nivel nacional