Handhelds help turn kids into marine biologists

By Stephanie Olsen, Staff Writer, CNET News.com Published: March 10, 2007

On a clear day in March, a group of 10-year-olds were playing marine scientists from a lookout point in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, at a spot known for its views of humpback whales.

The fourth-graders, out on a special school project with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, started at 9 a.m. observing the behaviors of 79,000-pound humpbacks from the shore. They would record, sometimes frantically when four of five whales popped up, what they saw with a handheld wireless device called an Indigo, which looks like a Palm Pilot.

For example, one kid would call out whale behavior like "breach," which is an out-of-water leap, followed by a back flop that's typically meant to jettison barnacles off the whale's body. And another child would punch "B" into the device. "We switched every 30 minutes, but I liked doing the whale watching, yelling 'breach, breach, breach,' and my other friend just liked doing the typing," said Josiah, a 10-year-old at Kealakehe Elementary School. NOAA scientists taught the students how to identify up to 10 different whale behaviors, along with the individual markings on a whale's fluke. All of the data collected until 2 p.m. that day went to help NOAA's program to track the health and population of humpbacks, and will be included in its 2007 Whale Survey. Their field trip will also be the subject of an upcoming documentary on Animal Planet hosted by Philippe and Alexandra Cousteau, the grandchildren of ecologist Jacques Cousteau.

The work was partially thanks to a handheld device that's beginning to gain some traction in schools across the country. Florida-based LearningSoft, which developed the Indigo devices, has run pilot tests of the technology in the last year, placing them in schools in Hawaii and Georgia. (The kids in Hawaii were the first to test the devices.) The product also began selling commercially in January, and schools in California, Indiana, Ohio and Arkansas have adopted the technology. A major school district in California is expected to buy the technology soon.

LearningSoft's parent company, the Jacoby Group, also set up a nonprofit foundation this week called Every Hand, with the goal of widening adoption of Indigo to every K-12 student in the U.S. Indigos are essentially wireless handheld computers that are networked to a laptop, which is typically set up in the classroom and controlled by a teacher. (In the case of the whale field trip, the laptop traveled with the group.) From a central computer, an instructor can send discussion topics, quiz questions or assignments to each student's handheld. When kids respond on the Indigo, the data is sent wirelessly to the PC so that the teacher can assess immediately how students comprehend the curricula, either by an individual student or in aggregate. The device can act as an assessment tool, electronic book reader, Web browser, podcast player and word processor. "It's more like a Swiss Army knife than a computer," said David Cole, founder of LearningSoft.

Indigo in the classroom

The devices are just one option in a range of new technologies aimed at schools. For example, the nonprofit One Laptop Per Child project recently said it might sell versions of its kid-friendly laptops in the U.S., reversing its previous position of distributing them to only the poorest nations. But despite growing awareness of one-to-one computing programs in U.S. schools, most K-12 classrooms have limited access to computer resources. American schoolkids spend about 25 minutes a week on average on the computer, according to LearningSoft. "It's surprising how few computer resources are available in schools," LearningSoft CEO David Cole said.

LearningSoft started producing education assessment tools on the Web in 1999, but the technology didn't take off because of limited computing resources in the classroom. So the company re-examined the market and began looking at technologies to get around inherent limitations of computer availability. Low-cost handheld computers were an obvious workaround, he said. In 2006, LearningSoft built and launched a tiny computer that costs about $100 per student.

LearningSoft complements the system with standard educational and textbook publisher materials, so teachers have prepared lesson plans or discussion topics. Teachers might assign students to listen to podcasts of a foreign language or news event, for example. But most teachers like to use the device in a "sponge activity." They will ask students an essay question, and when the kids respond, they will use the technology to disseminate all of the answers to each child. That way, the students can see how their peers answered and open up the discussion further.

Amy Mulvehill, a 7th-grade teacher of honors language arts at Carrollton Junior High in Carrollton, Ga., said she primarily uses the Indigo system for reading discussion about an hour each week. Her class, for example, just finished reading The Giver, and Mulvehill asked the students what they think happens after the last chapter. Using the word processor in Indigo, the students wrote their responses. Mulvehill then sent all of the responses to each student (names were attached), and then each student could see how their classmates responded via the digital device.


"This allows each student a voice. Before a lot of kids wouldn't speak up," she said. The students particularly like using the Indigo because it's much like technology they might use at home, such as a GameBoy. "Having those little computers, it makes them more interested," she said. Daniel, a 13-year-old in Mulvehill's class, said that the device offers a more fluid approach to talking to classmates. "When your teacher's up there, everyone's yelling at her and the discussion is shallow. With this, you get to talk to people and connect," he said of the ability to see responses from his classmates about the book The Giver.

Caitlin, a 12-year-old in the same class, said she likes the device because it's quicker to type answers than writing on paper. Plus, she doesn't have to listen to the teacher read answers out loud. "It just helps you learn more, helps you with your typing skills, and it's easier to get your ideas out."


Some of the Hawaiian students see the devices as more of an environmental cause. Josiah said he liked the devices because they don't waste paper. "You're just typing things in, you don't have to have this giant stack of paper and send it all. You don't have to pass it," he said. "There's a great chance of saving paper when we use these little Indigos." That ultimately means less trash in the ocean, he said. "People shouldn't throw trash into the ocean so it doesn't risk killing any whale or dolphin."