1. Recommendations to Students & Parents
At home, laptops are used in the living room (not bedrooms)
Computer use should stop at least an hour before bedtime
Discourage multi-tasking
Save games, hobbies and chatting for a treat once homework is done
Ask students to show parents what they are
up to in Smart
Not all homework will be on the laptop
We will promote the resources at
www.commonsensemedia.org

2. Recommendations to Students & Parents
Students under 13 will not be expected or encouraged to have an account on
Youtube or Facebook.
However, many already do, and we assume this is with parental consent
Parents should either be facebook “friends” and/or have the account password.
Every post to facebook should pass the “what would Mum say?” test.
Teachers should not “friend”
students with their personal
facebook accounts. We recommend
using a second or “professional”
account that will not expose
personal details.

3. Recommendations to Students & Parents
Students should use Firefox for their school work and Chrome for personal.
This avoids account mix-ups with gmail and google docs.
Taskbar icons

4. Research and web resources
Some parents were concerned that we would “send kids to google” every lesson.
There may be times when this is fine, but often we will want to scaffold or guide
their research. Here are some strategies:
• Have a focused question or outcome that they are researching
• Provide some search terms to seed the search
• Provide links to appropriate sites to get them started (see example below)
• Scaffold a series of links to make a ‘Jog’ (eg http://bit.ly/xewWte)
• Embed Youtube videos so students aren’t distracted by comments and links to
other videos.
• Challenge them on how they know that information is correct or unbiased
Find a tutorial on how to create and use Jogs here:
http://sc.lg.esf.edu.hk/course/view.php?id=686#section-5

5. Capabilities of the Machine
Laptops will log in to our network.
• Students can access printers, network folders, homework folders and z: drive
They can connect to our classroom data projectors
Can take SD cards from our video cameras
Full Microsoft Office including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, OneNote
Webcam and microphone. Video can be recorded with Movie Maker
Other software:
• Google Earth (the latest version has some amazing features)
• Audacity (audio editing)
• Movie maker (video editing)
• Google Sketchup (to create 3D models)
• Geogebra (for Maths)
• Skype
• Jing (for simple screen recording)

6. Policies
Students will be encouraged to personalise the outside of the laptops
Students have full control of their laptops, so they can install new software and
modify them. You should expect wallpaper images to be suitable and appropriate
Any games must be age appropraite – check here: http://www.pegi.info
You are not expected to solve technical issues in the classroom.
If they can’t figure it out, you decide whether they should go up to room 335
immediately or wait until the next break.
Students must fully charge their laptops each night. There should be no need for
power cords in your class. Help students conserve juice by sleeping the laptops
when not in use.
Students never ever share passwords with anyone
Laptops are stored in locked lockers when not being used or carried (eg during PE
or assemblies)

7. Guidelines
There is no expectation regarding the amount of use per class.
Laptops should be used when they are the most appropriate tool for the job.
It would be rare for laptops to be used for an entire period, and there will be
periods when they are not used at all. You’re in charge.
It would be great PR though if you could find some uses for them during the first
week or two that they are used in Year 8. We want to get students into good
habits, break the ice with teachers and want parents to see that they are being
used.
Here are some ideas to get you thinking:
Posting to a forum in Smart, worksheets completed in MS Word or Google docs and
submitted to a dropbox, a questionnaire involving parent responses, a collaborative
google presentation, collecting images on a topic, presenting work in a google
site, creating a flyer/invitation/certificate in publisher, adding to a glossary in
Smart, annotating images or diagrams, using stills and narration to make a
movie, you could use the forum on your course to send homework out (including
hyperlinks).