Friday, August 1, 2008
The Kentucky Migrant Technology Project (KMTP), sponsored through its parent agency, the Ohio Valley Educational Cooperative, serves public school children of migrant workers in more than 19 districts in the west-central part of Kentucky. The children's frequent moves cause discontinuity in their education. KMTP provides services and technology to help students overcome this discontinuity.
One of KMTP's newest services, project coordinator Mike Abell tells Education World, is the use of handheld computers. "Our goal is to provide portable technology students can use even if they don't have an Internet connection at home or at school," Abell explains.
Using a collapsible portable keyboard that opens up to about the size of a laptop computer's keyboard, migrant students can write short essays and homework assignments on their PDAs, Abell said. The students then use the built-in infrared communications capability to beam their completed assignments to a teacher's PDA. Once teachers have collected all their students' assignments, they can dock their PDAs to a desktop computer and upload all the assignments at once.
The devices also enable students to carry educational content around with them easily. Abell says students can store such resources as a Spanish-English dictionary, e-books, and content from an online course that they download to a school computer and transfer to the device.
Abell says the handheld device is an "affordable, portable appliance" that's "easier to use, more affordable, and more reliable" than a laptop. He calls the KMTP program "one of the first efforts to merge education and technology into an affordable package that can demonstrate results."
One of KMTP's newest services, project coordinator Mike Abell tells Education World, is the use of handheld computers. "Our goal is to provide portable technology students can use even if they don't have an Internet connection at home or at school," Abell explains.
Using a collapsible portable keyboard that opens up to about the size of a laptop computer's keyboard, migrant students can write short essays and homework assignments on their PDAs, Abell said. The students then use the built-in infrared communications capability to beam their completed assignments to a teacher's PDA. Once teachers have collected all their students' assignments, they can dock their PDAs to a desktop computer and upload all the assignments at once.
The devices also enable students to carry educational content around with them easily. Abell says students can store such resources as a Spanish-English dictionary, e-books, and content from an online course that they download to a school computer and transfer to the device.
Abell says the handheld device is an "affordable, portable appliance" that's "easier to use, more affordable, and more reliable" than a laptop. He calls the KMTP program "one of the first efforts to merge education and technology into an affordable package that can demonstrate results."
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