Welcome to the EdTech Blog for Oak Grove School District

Welcome to the EdTech Blog. In the course of our job, we have constantly created or come across great teaching materials in order to incorporate technology into your classrooms. We will be posting this information on this blog for your enlightenment. You can subscribe to this blog in order to get all of the updates.

One of the first questions that a lot of teachers have been asking, is why are we starting to use Chromebooks and Google Apps for Education? There are a number of reasons:

1) This is the future. As the internet continues to develop and grow, cloud-based (i.e. stuff stored on the internet instead of a device) is going to become the standard - in many ways, it already has become the standard!

2) Google makes Google Apps for Education free. Being in education, we understand the benefit of stuff being free - especially when it is as powerful as Google Apps! Now, Chromebooks are not free, but they are a LOT cheaper than most devices out there, including laptops, desktops, and even tablets (like iPads). The Chromebooks we are purchasing have a total cost of ownership of less than $300 each - the reason we do not get the cheaper ones is because we want them to be durable enough to withstand student-use in the classroom. If we went cheaper, they wouldn't last a year in the classroom.

3) For almost everything we do in the classroom, at our desks, etc, we use the internet. Chromebooks use a new operating system (OS) called Chrome OS in order to create an experience that is faster, more secure and easier to use than almost any other OS out there - think iOS for Apple devices and Windows 7. This video, called "What is Google Chrome OS?", explains it: