La Salle Green Hills' PEARL is digital and completely paperless

La Salle Green Hills is the Philippines' pioneer in implementing tablet-based education for its students. Powered by Pressmart's  software named MOCA or Mobile Learning Classroom Application, LSGH chose Samsung tablets to run books, homeworks and quizzes for all its students under the PEARL project. PEARL stands for Personal Learning Device Project. Yes, no more heavy bags to carry daily. Pressmart is and  India-based digital publisher.

Photo courtesy of PV Sivakumar from The Hindu Business Line

How does it work Hosted on a private-cloud, (yes, clouds aren't anymore for rain these days) LSGH's 4,000 Grade 1 to 12 students each use 8.9 inch 470-gram  Android 3.2 Honeycomb powered tablets in school. 

Homework are given wirelessly. They are submitted wirelessly too, so the teachers check using their tablets.

The same tablet-based education is seen to be offered to all of La Salle's 17 chain of schools all throughout the Philippines, with Pressmart and Samsung as partners.

As mentioned to me by a parent, the school issued device cost about Php 20,000+.

I wonder

Are games included in their devices too? Will the device be upgraded regularly? iOS releases almost yearly, and Android follows continuously builds up its OS too. Will a 1st grader's device be useful still four years after it has been issued?

Indeed LSGH has trailblazed its education offering. I hope they will share their lessons and experiences to the whole country, if not the world as regards implementation that we may all benefit.

As a parent, I allow my kids to use PC and tablets. That's their future - touch based and paperless. However, I encourage them to use paper and pencil along with other hand-driven activities and table top works. I would like them to be skillful with their hands, primarily still.