Laptops in the classroom
 

are they allowed in your classes? they are at my school and just about everyone is either playing games, checking email, or instant messaging their friends. there are a few who actually take notes :eek: ;)

I am an Senior at UNLV majoring in Accounting and our accounting department is trying to implement a rule that all accounting students must have a laptop in class to use to take notes, look up things on the interenet (in class), use software for class, etc.
I think it's silly, not only for cost reasons for students, but you're right... no one actually pays attention when they have a laptop to play games with!
Anyways, I just thought that was interesting! Have a great day!

At my undergrad school, all business students are required to have them. My high school requires its students to do so as well. I don't know about my undergrad school, but my high school doesn't allow IM-ing during classes. A girl was suspended a few years back after being caught instant messaging.

ETA: There are people who don't take nots, whether or not they're using a lap top or pen and paper. There's something called doodling.

While I was an undergrad I would bring my laptop to some classes... I actually used it to take notes... In classes that it was handy to do so, it kept me from doodling... I had great issues with that, so typing helped to keep me from doing that...

My sr yr of college i was bringing it to class to take notes but it got bad because i couldnt keep up with t he professors and found i took better notes when i was writing them instead

A girl in one of my classes during my third year took notes on her Palm Pilot. She had one of those rolled up keyboards that you can attach your Palm to, and took notes that way. She was one of those girls who only took a purse to class, so it was convenient for her.

I only saw a handful of laptops during my undergrad, but as I've been visiting law schools EVERYONE has them. They even have plugs for them in the classrooms. When I recently went to sit in on a class I felt very akward that I didn't have a laptop in front of my face.

Their popularity in class depends really on the program/department - for example commerce and most sciences love them and they are everywhere; most humanities are neutral towards them, if they are there fine; however in my program you might see one in a class of 40-50... the technology phase hasn't quite hit the Celtic Studies or Medieval Studies departments...

In my undergrad days ~10 years ago, laptops were a rare sight. Mainly that's because laptops were a lot less common ~10 years ago. I had a classmate who used a laptop to take notes, but that was because he was blind.

I think laptops were more prevalent in the business school. While I was an undergrad, one of the business school buildings was renovated, and they put an ethernet port at every seat in the lecture halls. Now that whole building has wireless.

My husband is in grad school, and he says pretty much everyone brings a laptop... and people can and do surf the web, IM, or play games while in lecture. (He never does, of course! ;) )

That's kinda funny that they want you to have them for accounting. I also go to UNLV but I'm a bio major. I brought my laptop to take notes one day, and i got the dirtiest look from the professor..... I never brought it again. I don't think anyone else in my classes has brought one in.::)

In my MBA program, laptops were allowed (and expected).

Yeah, that happens a lot in class- the whole surfing the web thing. So now the faculty are trying to get classes only in the buildings that do not have wireless access. Unfortantly, that is where all the science rooms are. I had one guy in my class completly crushed one day because he couldn't get on the internet.

They could also restrict access by requiring everyone to have a log in, and block access to accounts while that student's class is in session.

In the A-school, there's wireless everywhere...but since our studios have pimped-out Dells with every design program you can think of, there's not that much of a need for it. In fact, laptops aren't required here...which is a rarity for most A-schools.

at our school, labtops are allowed in classrooms, many people dont use them but i have had some classes where quite a bit of students use labtops. Also, many of the building and classrooms are starting to get wireless connections which should be pretty cool

I've never encountered this. Is it annoying with everyone typing while you are trying to listen to the professor?

Most laptops are equipped with quiet keys.

I've noticed some students just recently bringing laptops to class. Mostly to take notes. However, there are those who just instant message their friends all through lecture.

I took mine to history every day. It really helped a lot... Like was said earlier, I doodled a lot less (though I still daydreamt a little). We only had about 3 people in that class to have them, though. Most of our school is not on wireless yet, or else you have to have the code to get on it (in the business building, at least) so IMing wasn't a problem. One of the guys did sit with his headphones and listen to music the whole time (why the teacher let him, I do not know!)

Re: Laptops in the classroom
 

They were allowed my senior year (thats when we went wireless). I took notes, but during down times I definately imed, emailed, etc etc. oh well. I still learned...and because I was a fast typer, my notes were much better than if I hand wrote them!

I've used my laptop to take notes in some classes.

In my Curriculum Instruction courses we often do smallgroup work, so it's convenient to type the notes for the group and email them to everyone.
One of my Pol Sci professors loves to switch overheads before anyone can get through copying down the info and doesnt review much of what he said, so I type notes there since I type faster than I can write.

Having a laptop is good for providing evidence when I've corrected instructors. :D Instant access to the data you need rocks.
That and there are days where it feels like I'm ADD or something- so having a background IM conversation during class keeps me sane.

It's not the keyboard keys that are annoying...it's women with long-claw like talons that make that "clicky clicky" sound (like a dog on a linoleum floor) which is annoying.

:eek: I went to a laptop middle/high school that didn't allow IM-ing during class... many still did though. They didn't get suspended! Sounds a little harsh. I mean, would anyone get suspended for passing notes in class? :rolleyes: At some point the school got a way to see who was using AIM, and almost an entire class of seventh graders got in trouble. [I don't think they even got detention though. I don't think my school even had detention. "Trouble" is just having the middle school dean come and give a lecture.]