BENTONVILLE (KFSM) - Brookelyn Bates, 8, is a third grader at R.E. Baker Elementary. This school year she has a laptop to work on all of her subjects.
“I look forward to coming to class,” she said. She’s one of 25 students in Mrs. Nanci Krapf’s class.
“I think the laptops are cool because we can research on them and we can do our math on them instead of having to write them down,” Bates said. “It’s way more fun without writing it on paper or using a book.”
The Bentonville Public Schools Foundation, which is part of the Bentonville School District, awarded about $600,000 to provide 24 classrooms with the technology. Each cart has 30 laptops and each laptop costs between $25,000-$30,000, according to the school district.
R.E. Baker Elementary is a year round school. Its students are in their second week of class.
Mrs. Krapf said she had to apply for the grant and was “ecstatic “when she found out she was a recipient.
“It was a lot of work putting the grant together but when I heard it, I actually did a cartwheel in front of all of my students in the gymnasium that day,” she said. “It was a big surprise and I’m very excited.”
She said they use a project learning format to use the technology as a tool.
“It makes lesson planning very exciting too because you can really differentiate from all of your learners and everyone can be working on their own levels,” Krapf said.
Every teacher has to attend a summer training.
“We call it a one-to-one classroom and the engagement level is high,” Krapf said. “It’s much different with them than without them.”
There are a total of 67 classrooms with a laptop for each student, according to the school district.