Paperless Classroom

Having a paperless classroom is a wish of mine for the last decade. I am an environmental science teacher at heart and would love to make my class paperless first of all to reduce the amount of paper that is used in schools. After reading the article, I see there is much more that can be done to a paperless classroom. Allowing the students the ability to access the ‘class’ would allow learning to occur anywhere. This would change my role from giver of data to facilitator of learning.

If I could have a paperless class, I would be able to encourage parent involvement in education much easier. Having students access the class at home, would allow the parents to see exactly what is occurring in their child’s learning. This can start a dialog in the home and that discussion will enhance the discussion in the classroom.

With a paperless classroom, assessments of learning would also have to change. Many grades would come from projects, discussions, and online tests. Activities can be group activities or can start out individual that lead to a class discussion on a blog, forum, or wiki! While meaningful learning does not mean that students learn what is on the test but in this age of testing, teachers need to know if the students actually learning what the standards say they should know.

I think it would be easier to build a learning network with a paperless class since it will be incorporated into the class. Once the student learns about learning networks, I think they would be more willing to participate one on their own. Also, including other subjects in the learning network would help all classes and would see how learning could be done outside of science.