> Students have been using laptops in schools for nearly 20 years.
Typically, in a high school / college context, where study habits have already formed to some extent. My kids' middle school gave everyone a laptop, and it's been constant whack-a-mole for the teachers (YouTube, Fortnite, Reddit, etc.). I wish they'd get rid of them.
I work in the space -- the kind of computer use has changed dramatically. Probably as an accident because of the expense/availability/space required/etc., it used to be the case that to use a computer you'd have to have some sort of pre-existing justification for it. This has, for all intents and purposes, almost completely flipped. In a great many school/districts kids either have access to an individual computer or readily available shared carts, and more often than not teachers and kids will spring to it almost reflexively. And, while there are many positives this can bring, so too it brings a lot of negatives. I think it's less the fact that they are using them but rather that their use isn't being dictated by some sort of pedagogical justification but rather because it's become the default.
Students have been using laptops in schools for nearly 20 years.