Alphasmart NEO2 SmartApplet User manual

Fall 2008 Catalog
Keep Until February 2009
New with NEO 2:
lTurn written text
into spoken words
lShare and store
writing with
Google Docs™
lPractice math facts
lTake AR Quizzes
lUse short-answer
questions with
classroom response
Create Writing Excitement
With the Only Laptop Designed for Classrooms

2Visit us online: www.renlearn.com/neocatalog/neo Toll-Free Fax [phone]
“THE NEO 2s HELP THE STUDENTS LEARN
AT HIGHER LEVELS WHILE ASSISTING THE
TEACHER TO CREATE A NON-THREATENING,
TRUSTING, AND SUPPORTIVE CLASSROOM
ENVIRONMENT, WHERE STUDENTS CAN
TAKE RISKS WHEN COMPLETING A WRITING
ASSIGNMENT, FINISHING THEIR HOMEWORK,
OR ANSWERING A QUESTION.”
Brian J. Betze
Berlin Township School District
West Berlin, New Jersey
“THE NEO 2s HELP THE STUDENTS
LEARN AT HIGHER LEVELS WHILE
ASSISTING THE TEACHER TO CREATE
A NON-THREATENING, TRUSTING,
AND SUPPORTIVE CLASSROOM
ENVIRONMENT, WHERE STUDENTS
CAN TAKE RISKS WHEN COMPLETING
A WRITING ASSIGNMENT, FINISHING
THEIR HOMEWORK, OR ANSWERING
A QUESTION.”
Brian J. Betze
Berlin Township School District
West Berlin, New Jersey

3For ordering or funding information, call toll free: [phone],ref. #13004
THE PERFECT TOOL FOR
WRITING PRACTICE NOW DOES
SO MUCH MORE!
Turn the page to learn more.
Bring More Excitement to Writing Practice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p. 6
When students get excited about writing, they write more and become better writers.
Transfer NEO 2 Files Wirelessly to Google Docs™. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p.13
Now students can save their work and access it later from another NEO 2 or any
Web-connected computer.
Practice Math Facts on NEO 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p.13
NEO 2 and MathFacts in a Flash join together for daily math practice.
Take AR Quizzes on NEO 2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p.14
NEO 2 now runs Accelerated Reader Quizzes, helping you boost reading excitement in
your classroom.
Use NEO 2 as a Classroom Response System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p.16
Quiz your class, get immediate feedback wirelessly, and adjust your lessons to focus on what
students need to learn.
Create and Conduct Assessments with NEO 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p.18
Easily create formal, personalized assessments students take on their NEOs and have the software
score them automatically.
Choose Your SmartOption Mobile Lab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p. 20
Find the NEO solution that will best meet the needs of you and your students.
Help Students With Special Needs Succeed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p. 22
Discover how NEOs assist students with special learning or physical challenges.
Maximize Your NEO Implementation with Professional Development. . . . . . . . . . . . p. 24
Bring a custom seminar to your school, learn best practices over the Web, and choose from other
great training options.
Stock up on NEO Accessories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . p. 26
Carrying cases, printers, cables, batteries, and more—all the accessories you need for your NEOs.

4Visit us online: www.renlearn.com/neocatalog/neo Toll-Free Fax [phone]
HELP EVERY STUDENT BECOME AN
ENTHUSIASTIC, SUCCESSFUL WRITER!
If you’re familiar with AlphaSmart/Renaissance
Learning laptops, you know that students
absolutely love writing on them. These laptops
help generate the kind of writing excitement that
educators dream about. No wonder more than half
a million students use them!
Now, a NEO 2 SmartOption Mobile Lab filled with 30
NEO 2 laptops can help you build even greater
excitement for writing while expanding that excitement
into other subjects. You’ll be amazed at how many
ways you can use NEO 2s to bring greater success
throughout your entire curriculum.
FREE WEBINAR!
Are you considering NEO 2s
for your students? This is your
opportunity to see firsthand what
the all-new NEO 2s can really do.
These free Webinars are presented every
Tuesday (10:00 a.m. CT), Wednesday
(3:00 p.m. CT), and Thursday (9:00 a.m. CT).
Register for your free Webinar today at
www.renlearn.com/lp/NEO2webinar

5For ordering or funding information, call toll free: [phone],ref. #13004 5
ONLY NEO 2 IS DESIGNED
SPECIFICALLY FOR CLASSROOMS
While standard laptops are designed primarily
for business, NEO 2 is designed specifically for
use in the classroom. Check out the differences:
NEO 2’s
Advanced
Technology Other Laptops
Provide students with independent writing support
through 387 built-in writing lessons that jump-start students’
imaginations and fuel their writing. YES NO
Provide guided instruction by electronically linking
resources such as outlines, instructions, or Google Docs™*
to individual student assignments. YES NO
Teach students to self-assess their work by electronically
attaching customized rubrics to assignments, and helping
reinforce concepts, rules, and principles in their writing. YES NO
Encourage student collaboration and peer editing with
beaming and seamless connecting with Google Docs™.YES NO
Keep students focused and on task with no distractions from
Web surfing, gaming, instant messaging, and others. YES NO
Conduct on-the-fly assessments with a built-in classroom
response system. YES NO
Differentiate instruction using an integrated formative
assessment feature that is either student- or teacher-paced,
and platform independent. YES NO
Allow students to print wirelessly without the necessity of
a WiFi network connection. YES NO
Help students increase keyboarding speed and accuracy
with a built-in language-based keyboarding curriculum. YES NO
Take advantage of easy classroom management that
helps you send assignments wirelessly to all your students at
once, and receive them when completed. YES NO
Depend on NEO 2’s durable, rugged, yet lightweight design,
with no moving parts to break. YES NO
Make it through an entire school year—up to 700 hours of
use—on just one set of three AA batteries. YES NO
* Coming in 2009

6Visit us online: www.renlearn.com/neocatalog/neo Toll-Free Fax [phone]
NEO LAPTOPS BRING EXCITEMENT
TO WRITING PRACTICE
1Teacher Inputs Writing Assignment.
Using the SmartOption Mobile Lab, the
teacher downloads assignments to every
NEO instantly, providing personalized writing
practice to each student.
Teacher Meets with Students.
Teacher and students review assignments
in one-on-one discussions, further
individualizing writing instruction.
5
With NEO, students simply can’t wait
to tackle their writing projects and
assignments. Even those who once
avoided writing, now look forward
with eager anticipation to writing practice on their
NEOs. Teachers get excited too, because NEO
makes it easy for them to create, collect, edit,
and disseminate their students’ work.
Managing writing practice is now a
joy—with NEO.
“THE NEOs HAVE OPENED UP A WHOLE
NEW SET OF DYNAMICS WITH COOPERATIVE
LEARNING IN THE CLASSROOM.”
Thomas Wilde
William Allen High School
Allentown, Pennsylvania

7For ordering or funding information, call toll free: [phone],ref. #13004 777777
Students Draft Their Assignments.
The students write their initial draft and can
beam documents back and forth between
NEOs for peer editing exercises or
collaborative writing assignments.
Students Edit Assignments.
Students work on revising their
assignments and reviewing those of
their peers. NEOs make editing a
breeze, with full cut/copy/paste
functions, thesaurus, spell check,
word search, and more.
3
2
Students Print Assignments.
Using their NEOs, students print
copies of their assignments for use
in teacher/student discussions.
4

8Visit us online: www.renlearn.com/neocatalog/neo Toll-Free Fax [phone]
Now you can incorporate NEO 2
laptops throughout your school—
and beyond—for across-the-
curriculum improvement by your
students. Here are just a few
of the many ways you can use
NEO 2s to accelerate learning.
Administrator’s Office
Close the digital gap with one affordable
solution—NEO 2.
Home Room
Teachers send daily announcements
to students’ NEO 2s. After reading the
announcements, students retrieve their
writing assignments from Google Docs™
to work on revisions.
Library
NEO 2 is ideal for use in
literature response and reader’s
workshop activities. In addition, NEO
2 runs Accelerated Reader Quizzes
which eliminates waiting lines at the
computer and lowers your overall
cost of implementing AR.
Keyboarding
Students log on to their KeyWords
accounts to practice improving
their keyboarding and
writing skills.
Science
Students use their NEO 2s
to record observations during a science
experiment. Afterward, they take an AccelTest
quiz on their NEO 2s and submit their
answers wirelessly to the teacher’s
computer for automatic grading.
Outside
NEO 2 is durable, weighs just
2 lbs., and runs up to 700 hours
on just three AA batteries. All of
these make it ideal for students
to use anytime, anywhere—
even outside.
Resource Center
Students visit the resource center for a
variety of writing assignments. NEO’s
new Text2Speech* SmartApplet and
optional Co:Writer®SmartApplet
help struggling writers improve the
quantity and quality of their writing.
*Available early 2009.
IT Personnel
NEO 2s are easy to use and
require no IT support, so
your IT staff can focus on
other key tasks.
ONLY NEO 2 IS DESIGNED FOR USE
ALL DAY, EVERY DAY—ACROSS THE
CURRICULUM

9For ordering or funding information, call toll free: [phone],ref. #13004 9
Math
NEO 2’s built-in
AccelTest, 2Know! Toolbar, and
compatibility with MathFacts in
a Flash support direct instruction
and determine if students are
understanding objectives
being taught.
Social Studies
Copy and paste content from
a Web site and send it to
NEO 2s. Students use the content and
the built-in Timeline Rubric to create a
timeline of a historical event. Later, the
teacher can project a map and use the
2Know! Toolbar to ensure
students understood the
geography lesson.
English/
Language Arts
Teachers send a Write On!
lesson to students’
NEO 2s. Students work on
the assignment and save their
drafts to Google Docs™for
remote access.
NEO LAPTOPS
AND RESPONSE
TO INTERVENTION
Now you can also use NEOs
for your Response to
Intervention approach
Response to Intervention (RTI) is designed to
ensure all students receive high-quality instruction
and those who are struggling receive the help
needed to succeed. Through progress monitoring
and data-driven decision making, an RTI
framework establishes a system of interventions
matched to student needs that are closely
monitored to determine which students are being
helped and which need more intensive support.
NEO laptops fit well into a Response-to-
Intervention framework because they provide the
personalized practice and progress monitoring
students and educators need to benefit from the
key ideals of RTI:
lEvidence-based programs to support
high-quality instruction
lTargeted interventions to help struggling
students catch up to their peers
lProgress-monitoring information to drive
data-driven decision making
lSupport—including family involvement—to
make sure every student experiences
success
Due to reauthorization of the Individuals with
Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), states are
permitted to use 15% of special education funds,
in addition to Title I funds, to support schoolwide
RTI plans.
NEO laptops, customer support, and ongoing
professional development opportunities mesh
with—and enhance—the goals of RTI and help
you excel in your RTI initiatives.

10 Visit us online: www.renlearn.com/neocatalog/neo Toll-Free Fax [phone]
MathFacts in a Flash
capability lets students
practice mental math skills
at their own pace.
Google Docs™*
seamless connecting
allows students and
teachers to access, edit,
and share documents—
wirelessly!
Extraordinary battery
life allows students to
write for up to 700 hours
on a single set of
AA batteries.
Full-size keyboard
enables proper keyboard
training for students
of all ages.
NEO 1 and NEO 2
NEO 2 only
Text2Speech*
SmartApplet helps
students of all abilities
succeed in classes across
the curriculum.
* Available early 2009.
Note: A Renaissance Receiver is required to use NEO 2’s wireless functions.
THE PERFECT CLASSROOM TOOL
While NEO 1s are the perfect solution for writing
and keyboarding, NEO 2s bring the benefits of
one-to-one computing into virtually any subject.