Ten Tablets, One Projector, No Internet: Planning Equitable ICT Use
A basic school in a hill district has received 10 tablets and one projector from a donor. The school has 55 Grade 7 students, two 45-minute computer periods per week, intermittent electricity (about four hours per day), and no internet. The principal wants every student to use a tablet every week and to complete an online “digital citizenship” quiz. The tablets have offline capability and a preloaded dictionary, a camera and a note-taking app. Only two teachers have basic ICT training. One tablet is already cracked. The district education office asks the school to report learning outcomes, not just device use.
1. Design a four-week rotation plan for the 10 tablets and one projector that gives equitable access and meets a learning objective in Grade 7 English or Science. Explain the grouping and time allocation.
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The constraint is 55 students, 10 tablets and no internet. Pairing every student is impossible in one period, so the plan should use station rotation across the four weeks rather than pretend that whole-class tablet use is feasible.
Learning objective (Grade 7 English): students will plan, draft and present a short descriptive paragraph about their local environment, using new vocabulary and clear sequence.
Grouping: form 11 groups of five. Each group has a number and a rotating station card. Stations: (A) tablet station with two tablets for the group, used in pairs for 10 minutes each; (B) projector station for whole-group viewing of a teacher-prepared slide with a model paragraph; (C) paper planning station; (D) dictionary and vocabulary station using two tablets and paper dictionaries.
Time allocation within a 45-minute period: 10 minutes per station, plus 5 minutes for instructions and exit ticket. Over two periods per week, each group experiences two stations. Across four weeks (eight periods), every group receives at least four tablet turns and two projector turns. The cracked tablet is kept as a teacher device or spare-parts unit, not issued to students.
Electricity: charge all tablets during the four hours of power and keep a printed backup of the projector slide. If power fails, the lesson continues with paper and the tablet’s offline dictionary. The plan is equitable because every group has a named turn and the teacher records attendance at the tablet station.
2. How would you handle offline content, digital safety, and the broken tablet? What would you tell the principal about the online quiz?
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Offline content: preload or create short texts, vocabulary lists and model paragraphs in the note-taking app. Use the camera for a local-environment photo essay, but only with consent and without identifying individuals. Keep a printed backup of all instructions. The dictionary is useful for vocabulary, but students should also practise guessing from context.
Digital safety: teach three rules before any device use: do not photograph people without permission; do not share names, addresses or phone numbers; handle the device with clean, dry hands and carry it with two hands. Set a passcode known to the teacher, keep a sign-out sheet, and store tablets in a locked cupboard. Discuss why an online quiz would ask for personal information and how to recognise unsafe requests.
Broken tablet: label it clearly, remove it from student circulation, and report it to the donor or school management committee. Do not give it to a group as a ‘spare’ if the screen is unstable. If repair is impossible, use it only for teacher demonstration or keep it for parts.
The online quiz: without internet, an online quiz cannot be completed reliably. I would tell the principal that the learning objective can be assessed offline through a paper or tablet-based quiz, and that claiming an ‘online’ quiz without connectivity would produce unreliable evidence. I would propose a short offline digital-citizenship quiz and a practical scenario task instead.
3. What evidence would you collect to show learning outcomes rather than device use, and how would you use it?
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Device use evidence - minutes logged, number of tablets used - does not show learning. I would collect: a pre-test and post-test on the target vocabulary and paragraph structure; two work samples per student (a plan and a final paragraph); an observation checklist for speaking and collaboration at the tablet station; and a short exit ticket after each week. I would also keep a simple log of which groups used which station, but only to check equity, not as a learning measure.
The evidence would be used formatively. If the post-test shows that students can use the new vocabulary but cannot sequence ideas, the next cycle focuses on paragraph order. If the tablet group performs no better than the paper group, that is useful evidence that the device is not the active ingredient; the teaching task is. I would report to the district education office with anonymised pre/post results, samples of student work and a brief note on how the data changed the next lesson. This answers the demand for learning outcomes and avoids presenting device counts as achievement.