Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Get a 504 to get a no laptop accommodation, and preferential seating away from video game players.

My kiddo had an IEP once where the in class observation report reported 2 different classes where my kid was watching other students play games on their laptops, not even playing on his own laptop.

Really dumb idea. You do realize the Chromebook is a tool to facilitate learning, right? And most, if not all of the games give students an engaging way to learn content and skills?

And that's why math and ELA proficiency rates are so high since the explosion of edtech? Oh wait...

Pyle MS took back the 1-to-1 devices, went back to carts, and discouraged teachers from using Chromebooks unless it was absolutely necessary/enhanced the lesson. Of course there are still some teachers who don’t get it or are too disorganized to copy paper assignments, but things have really shifted.

Anonymous wrote:Get a 504 to get a no laptop accommodation, and preferential seating away from video game players.

My kiddo had an IEP once where the in class observation report reported 2 different classes where my kid was watching other students play games on their laptops, not even playing on his own laptop.

Really dumb idea. You do realize the Chromebook is a tool to facilitate learning, right? And most, if not all of the games give students an engaging way to learn content and skills?

Teach your kids not to use school laptop for games or lose their privileges and you follow through with the punishments. My son was caught doing this and he's learned it the hard way.

Get a 504 to get a no laptop accommodation, and preferential seating away from video game players.

My kiddo had an IEP once where the in class observation report reported 2 different classes where my kid was watching other students play games on their laptops, not even playing on his own laptop.

Anonymous wrote:Huge problem. HUGE. Please complain to your school and express your interest in moving away from screens. Also can tell your school you support a move to the cart model versus the take home model. This has been proven to be safer for kids with less alone time with their devices. It’s also way less wear and tear on the Chromebooks. Win for all sides. Giving a kid something totally addictive and being like oh just don’t use it that way is not working. Shockingly.

Nothing is going to change.

Survey closes Friday

MCPS Chromebook Use - Share Your Experiences: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdRtklHc1FiBHwfvUFYFrbPC334tqA9mmIvqwbB0TP0u6Tl_A/viewform?usp=header

Huge problem. HUGE. Please complain to your school and express your interest in moving away from screens. Also can tell your school you support a move to the cart model versus the take home model. This has been proven to be safer for kids with less alone time with their devices. It’s also way less wear and tear on the Chromebooks. Win for all sides. Giving a kid something totally addictive and being like oh just don’t use it that way is not working. Shockingly.

You ever heard of a hydra? You kill one site, 2 more pop up within a week...

MCPS cheaped out by dropping GoGuardian in favor of Lightspeed. The latter is straight-up garbage, unfortunately.

Anonymous wrote:All I can say is: Good luck!

You’ve got to work out with your kid. Talk about it and make sure your kid understands your expectations of them and what consequences there will be if they don’t meet them.

We had to implement some consequences and a big way with our middle schooler, which was not pleasant for anyone involved, but it enforced the point and our kid got back on track.

I don’t agree with this. It’s both a kid discipline problem and an MCPS lack of IT skills problem. Teachers have posted that they had better tracking software before to see what kids were doing on their laptops, but then MCPS changed it

I asked my kid’s MS guidance counselor this and she gave me the name/email of the It person for our school to report the websites.

I sent him the IT guy message- never got a response but maybe I should have followed up to make sure he read the email and actually did something about it.


I agree it’s a whack a mole situation but it sounds like it’s a big problem. The lightspeed tracker thing that teachers have to see what kids are doing on their laptops doesn’t seem to work as well as it should and my kid said that kids exchange URLs that aren’t blocked by MCPS all the time. Some kids even pay other kids for “really good” URLs that McPS.

All I can say is: Good luck!

You’ve got to work out with your kid. Talk about it and make sure your kid understands your expectations of them and what consequences there will be if they don’t meet them.

We had to implement some consequences and a big way with our middle schooler, which was not pleasant for anyone involved, but it enforced the point and our kid got back on track.

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone point me to the MCPS contact to report video game sites for blocking?

My kids keep getting new sites from friends as old ones blocked. I would prefer my kids do school work at school and save games for home.

This is a wack-a-mole situation. Chrome books - when one game is blocked, another appears.

MCPS lacks the will and interest to fix its tech problems.

Can anyone point me to the MCPS contact to report video game sites for blocking?

My kids keep getting new sites from friends as old ones blocked. I would prefer my kids do school work at school and save games for home.