China introduces tablets in classroom, parents remain worried

Speakers: Li Ningjing, Sam Duckett and Lu Sirui

[Photo: from VCG]

Starting from this semester, seven classes of pupils in Qingdao go to school with Android tablets, which the school hopes will boost students' performance.

The adoption of tablets is an experiment taken by Qingdao Bowen Elementary School, a private school trying hard to compete with its powerful public rivals.

They use a cloud-based software platform to build better classroom experience.

On the students' side, it's just an Android app that can be installed on any tablet. Connect to WiFi, login to the app and it's all set.

On the teachers' side, it's more complicated, because they need to manage a whole room of pupils.

During work hour, the teacher can present multimedia contents to the class, instead of just writing on a board with chalks.

In addition to that, in-class assignments can be distributed on the platform, too, where the teacher can even monitor the students' progress.

When the class ends, the system can automatically generate homework. All students receive different homework, depending on their performance in the class on the day.

According to school faculties, the students using tablet computers are doing better at reading.

Parents, however, remain concerned over the use of tablets in school. 

[The audio clip is from Studio+, produced by CRI. ]