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Essay / Essay on Using a Laptop - 2103
Over the past decade, using a laptop has become very common in classrooms, especially those in a university . This has become popular among students who prefer to type their notes rather than writing them with a pen or pencil. But as the use of laptops increases, so do studies on its actual effects on users. Many people claim that using a laptop in class only creates distractions and hinders learning. They claim that students will multitask on their laptops, diverting their attention from the course itself. Instead of taking notes all the time, they will play games or interact on social networking sites. Others support the opposing side, creating a debate that has taken popular media by storm and continues to be debated every day. Michael Oliveira intervenes in this debate with his article “Student use of laptops in class lowers grades: Canadian study.” His article states that using a laptop in class has negative effects on students. His article discusses how using a laptop in a classroom affects not only the user, but their peers as well. The overall effect of this technology will be a lower grade for students. To support his claim, he refers to a Canadian study that tested the effects of using a laptop during a university course. According to Oliveira's article, the results of this study support the claim that using a laptop in class has a negative effect on both users and their peers; just lower your grade from a B to a B-. This is because students do things on their laptops that are unrelated to the academic environment, such as going on social media, playing games, and watching movies. Oliveira also mentions that according to the researcher, the students did not expect the laptop...... middle of paper ......Rrie B. Fried's study. Seen, his results clearly support what Oliveira claims, but limitations must always be considered. The specific setting of the study and the idea of having many self-reported results can really hurt the validity of the results, as well as their application. But from what was shown in the study, it can be concluded that having laptops in the classroom will definitely not benefit a student in many ways. There seem to be many more negatives than positives, and Michael Oliveira can safely assert the claims he made in his article. Laptops don't seem like the best thing to have in a learning environment because of all the distractions they present to the user and to the people around them. Despite this, the debate will continue until more research is conducted on this controversial topic..