INDIANAPOLIS — A school in Indianapolis is showing its students that they can have fun and learn without the use of electronic devices.
At the Oaks Academy, students use their imagination and hands to create projects and learn.
School leaders say the Oaks Academy is a Christ-centered classical school that serves a racially and socioeconomically diverse student body.
“This is a time where they can build social interaction work through conflict,” Angie Smith, a First-grade teacher at the school, said.
Smith gave WRTV an inside look at what discovery time looks like. Some students were building a zip line, others were making paper airplanes.
Students were not using computers to get through this assignment.
“If they don’t have time to practice working through conflict and solving problems, they will never learn how to do it,” Smith said.
Technology like computers and Chromebooks are hard to find in these classrooms. School leaders have a reason behind that.
“What we are seeing throughout the field is that children are coming in who are already addicted to technology because of the dopamine rush you get from a quick video, and you don’t have the ability to interact with other children and adults that we would like to see,” Robin Shaw, Head of the Pre-Kindergarten Education Center, said.
During November, the Oaks Academy is conducting the 1 Million Minutes challenge for the entire school.
The goal is to go tech-free and have students spend time doing things like reading or art with their parents.
School leaders tell WRTV that every student is finding a supporter each week of the challenge to help create new tech-free play spaces (playgrounds and a gym).
All funds raised will be matched once they hit one million minutes of tech-free play.
