Learning@SchoolSchool audits
Learning@SchoolSchool audits
In this high energy talk, Ben describes the journey that Wellington High went on to introduce 1 to 1 computing. He outlines the challenges they faced and celebrates the reasons for facing those challenges. Ben's school did not specify the device that students should use, rather they solved the problems that come with students using a range of devices.
Hello I'm Ben Britton, I am here to talk to you about the journey Wellington High School has taken to one to one computing. It started quite a long time ago with a lot of professional development. We got an ICTPD contract for three years, everyone dove into it and learnt a lot of really cool ways to use technology in their classes. When we had finished the PD everyone was raring to go but we didn't have enough Com labs. They could not be had and people were really complaining about this. So we looked at ways to solve the problem. We decided to go to one to one computing, partly to solve that problem but also because the new curriculum really requires you to teach in different ways and ICT allows that. And also our kids are going to grow up in a digital world. We cannot justify not teaching them for that.
So when we talked about going one to one it was quite popular, the staff loved the idea. When we surveyed parents we were intending to have one class to start with, just to test the waters and get used to it. But it was extremely popular and we ended up having four classes in that first year. The next year it was rolled out to all of the year nines.
So the approach that we went for was a bring your own devices thing. We told the parents the requirements but the kids could bring anything they wanted. The students have really flourished under that. At the beginning of the year we had most people using PCs a few people using Macs. Part way through the year some of the kids decided to experiment with Linux. So they would install it. Their friends would see that it was running, and it was actually running faster than the Windows machines. And soon I had a dozen people in the class had all installed Linux and they were working away happily. They had learned how to do that themselves, they were helping each other out with issues. They never once came to me with a linux specific problem.
Some of the challenges we've had is that in that first year the wireless networking was not up to it so we've been going through a system of upgrading and testing out new technologies, and we are getting closer and closer to something that will work and I have very high hopes for 2012. Some of our students have laptops that are on the older side, that don't have very good wireless and sometimes drop out. Some of them having limited battery life, and the students have all found ways around this. They share with friends, they use their machine offline and look at a friend's to see what the work is. They will sit near a powerpoint if they need to. They have become very good at helping each other out and supporting each other with this.
From a teacher's perspective it has opened up huge vistas of teaching. I am using it very regularly for instant feedback. The very thing you can see a clicker system for your whole class to answer a questionnaire for several thousand dollars I can implement that with Google Docs for nothing. I use it a lot for research, a lot for letting them build things, to show off.
My best advice would be, well before you plan to implement it start doing the PD and don't go ahead until your staff is ready for it.
With most teachers it is just a case of showing them one tool that saves them time. As soon as they can use one tool with the class that saves them a bit of time, they're onto it, they're using it, and then they learn another, and then they learn another, and then they learn another. For one maths teacher it was just a series of online worksheets very similar to the old traditional paper ones, but they were online and gave the kids instant feedback. He started using those because they were very similar to something he was familiar with, realised that the kids were much more interested in it. Realised that it saved him time, and now he is going through and doing a lot more.
After that do start small. Starting off with two thirds of our year nine intake was very challenging. Start off with a manageable amount so that you can get some of the systems up and running. It will not test your wireless though, you need to spend the money and get a good system for that.
One of the questions that people always ask me when they talk about a one to one classroom is "but the students can get on Youtube. Aren't they chronically distracted all of the time? Why don't you block it?" Now we used to block Youtube, there is so much good material on Youtube, the teachers were asking for it so we have unblocked it. Yes some students do get distracted but it is a classroom management issue. These same students would have been distracted before. They would have been throwing a dart to someone else, they would have been looking out the window, they would have been graffiting in their book, now they are sitting at their computer, maybe they are making an animation, making something else. I have one student who will always be on Mathletics doing the primary school stuff, he is still doing maths in his maths class - not what I want him to do but he is still doing stuff and he is not distracting anyone else. He is one of these kids who would have been standing on a table beating his chest.
I treat things like that as a classroom management issue not a technical solution. Blocking kids from these things does not teach them anything.
In this high energy talk, Ben describes the journey that Wellington High went on to introduce 1 to 1 computing. He outlines the challenges they faced and celebrates the reasons for facing those challenges. Ben's school did not specify the device that students should use, rather they solved the problems that come with students using a range of devices.
Hello I'm Ben Britton, I am here to talk to you about the journey Wellington High School has taken to one to one computing. It started quite a long time ago with a lot of professional development. We got an ICTPD contract for three years, everyone dove into it and learnt a lot of really cool ways to use technology in their classes. When we had finished the PD everyone was raring to go but we didn't have enough Com labs. They could not be had and people were really complaining about this. So we looked at ways to solve the problem. We decided to go to one to one computing, partly to solve that problem but also because the new curriculum really requires you to teach in different ways and ICT allows that. And also our kids are going to grow up in a digital world. We cannot justify not teaching them for that.
So when we talked about going one to one it was quite popular, the staff loved the idea. When we surveyed parents we were intending to have one class to start with, just to test the waters and get used to it. But it was extremely popular and we ended up having four classes in that first year. The next year it was rolled out to all of the year nines.
So the approach that we went for was a bring your own devices thing. We told the parents the requirements but the kids could bring anything they wanted. The students have really flourished under that. At the beginning of the year we had most people using PCs a few people using Macs. Part way through the year some of the kids decided to experiment with Linux. So they would install it. Their friends would see that it was running, and it was actually running faster than the Windows machines. And soon I had a dozen people in the class had all installed Linux and they were working away happily. They had learned how to do that themselves, they were helping each other out with issues. They never once came to me with a linux specific problem.
Some of the challenges we've had is that in that first year the wireless networking was not up to it so we've been going through a system of upgrading and testing out new technologies, and we are getting closer and closer to something that will work and I have very high hopes for 2012. Some of our students have laptops that are on the older side, that don't have very good wireless and sometimes drop out. Some of them having limited battery life, and the students have all found ways around this. They share with friends, they use their machine offline and look at a friend's to see what the work is. They will sit near a powerpoint if they need to. They have become very good at helping each other out and supporting each other with this.
From a teacher's perspective it has opened up huge vistas of teaching. I am using it very regularly for instant feedback. The very thing you can see a clicker system for your whole class to answer a questionnaire for several thousand dollars I can implement that with Google Docs for nothing. I use it a lot for research, a lot for letting them build things, to show off.
My best advice would be, well before you plan to implement it start doing the PD and don't go ahead until your staff is ready for it.
With most teachers it is just a case of showing them one tool that saves them time. As soon as they can use one tool with the class that saves them a bit of time, they're onto it, they're using it, and then they learn another, and then they learn another, and then they learn another. For one maths teacher it was just a series of online worksheets very similar to the old traditional paper ones, but they were online and gave the kids instant feedback. He started using those because they were very similar to something he was familiar with, realised that the kids were much more interested in it. Realised that it saved him time, and now he is going through and doing a lot more.
After that do start small. Starting off with two thirds of our year nine intake was very challenging. Start off with a manageable amount so that you can get some of the systems up and running. It will not test your wireless though, you need to spend the money and get a good system for that.
One of the questions that people always ask me when they talk about a one to one classroom is "but the students can get on Youtube. Aren't they chronically distracted all of the time? Why don't you block it?" Now we used to block Youtube, there is so much good material on Youtube, the teachers were asking for it so we have unblocked it. Yes some students do get distracted but it is a classroom management issue. These same students would have been distracted before. They would have been throwing a dart to someone else, they would have been looking out the window, they would have been graffiting in their book, now they are sitting at their computer, maybe they are making an animation, making something else. I have one student who will always be on Mathletics doing the primary school stuff, he is still doing maths in his maths class - not what I want him to do but he is still doing stuff and he is not distracting anyone else. He is one of these kids who would have been standing on a table beating his chest.
I treat things like that as a classroom management issue not a technical solution. Blocking kids from these things does not teach them anything.
In this high energy talk, Ben describes the journey that Wellington High went on to introduce 1 to 1 computing. He outlines the challenges they faced and celebrates the reasons for facing those challenges. Ben's school did not specify the device that students should use, rather they solved the problems that come with students using a range of devices.
Hello I'm Ben Britton, I am here to talk to you about the journey Wellington High School has taken to one to one computing. It started quite a long time ago with a lot of professional development. We got an ICTPD contract for three years, everyone dove into it and learnt a lot of really cool ways to use technology in their classes. When we had finished the PD everyone was raring to go but we didn't have enough Com labs. They could not be had and people were really complaining about this. So we looked at ways to solve the problem. We decided to go to one to one computing, partly to solve that problem but also because the new curriculum really requires you to teach in different ways and ICT allows that. And also our kids are going to grow up in a digital world. We cannot justify not teaching them for that.
So when we talked about going one to one it was quite popular, the staff loved the idea. When we surveyed parents we were intending to have one class to start with, just to test the waters and get used to it. But it was extremely popular and we ended up having four classes in that first year. The next year it was rolled out to all of the year nines.
So the approach that we went for was a bring your own devices thing. We told the parents the requirements but the kids could bring anything they wanted. The students have really flourished under that. At the beginning of the year we had most people using PCs a few people using Macs. Part way through the year some of the kids decided to experiment with Linux. So they would install it. Their friends would see that it was running, and it was actually running faster than the Windows machines. And soon I had a dozen people in the class had all installed Linux and they were working away happily. They had learned how to do that themselves, they were helping each other out with issues. They never once came to me with a linux specific problem.
Some of the challenges we've had is that in that first year the wireless networking was not up to it so we've been going through a system of upgrading and testing out new technologies, and we are getting closer and closer to something that will work and I have very high hopes for 2012. Some of our students have laptops that are on the older side, that don't have very good wireless and sometimes drop out. Some of them having limited battery life, and the students have all found ways around this. They share with friends, they use their machine offline and look at a friend's to see what the work is. They will sit near a powerpoint if they need to. They have become very good at helping each other out and supporting each other with this.
From a teacher's perspective it has opened up huge vistas of teaching. I am using it very regularly for instant feedback. The very thing you can see a clicker system for your whole class to answer a questionnaire for several thousand dollars I can implement that with Google Docs for nothing. I use it a lot for research, a lot for letting them build things, to show off.
My best advice would be, well before you plan to implement it start doing the PD and don't go ahead until your staff is ready for it.
With most teachers it is just a case of showing them one tool that saves them time. As soon as they can use one tool with the class that saves them a bit of time, they're onto it, they're using it, and then they learn another, and then they learn another, and then they learn another. For one maths teacher it was just a series of online worksheets very similar to the old traditional paper ones, but they were online and gave the kids instant feedback. He started using those because they were very similar to something he was familiar with, realised that the kids were much more interested in it. Realised that it saved him time, and now he is going through and doing a lot more.
After that do start small. Starting off with two thirds of our year nine intake was very challenging. Start off with a manageable amount so that you can get some of the systems up and running. It will not test your wireless though, you need to spend the money and get a good system for that.
One of the questions that people always ask me when they talk about a one to one classroom is "but the students can get on Youtube. Aren't they chronically distracted all of the time? Why don't you block it?" Now we used to block Youtube, there is so much good material on Youtube, the teachers were asking for it so we have unblocked it. Yes some students do get distracted but it is a classroom management issue. These same students would have been distracted before. They would have been throwing a dart to someone else, they would have been looking out the window, they would have been graffiting in their book, now they are sitting at their computer, maybe they are making an animation, making something else. I have one student who will always be on Mathletics doing the primary school stuff, he is still doing maths in his maths class - not what I want him to do but he is still doing stuff and he is not distracting anyone else. He is one of these kids who would have been standing on a table beating his chest.
I treat things like that as a classroom management issue not a technical solution. Blocking kids from these things does not teach them anything.
Learning@SchoolSchool audits
Andrew Taylor comes from a device-rich learning environment in an Australian school. He challenges us to consider whether our focus is on the device or the pedagogy. He asks, "How does pedagogy impact on the device and what responsibility does the teacher have for reflecting on their practice?" The key, Andrew found, was developing a common language of practice.
Anne Kenneally is a 2012 CORE Education eFellow. She tells us about what she learned during her time as an eFellow and how she discovered the strength of letting learners lead the learning.
Claire Amos, Director of elearning at Epsom Girls Grammar, outlines ten tips for encouraging students to take the lead in a bring your own device approach.
