One of the reasons we believe our students are able to perform so highly using digital tools (belying their very low socio-economic status) is the careful scaffolding of ICT skills we provide for them in their first year of primary school. For one year we are very intentional in our approach to the integration of ICT to ensure that our students are confident in the digital environment we require our 21st century students to work in. Our approach for students in the following years is very different from this....
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2. Foundations for eLearning @ Pt England School
We have established a programme for
our Year 0/1 students to begin their
eLearning experience in a supportive
and non-threatening environment.
We accept that most of our Decile 1 children
arrive at school with no computer experience,
but because they live in a digital age, we do not
want to delay their introduction to eLearning.
To facilitate this we have co-constructed an
approach which has been highly successful for
Pt England students and has been adopted by
many junior classes around the country.
3. To ensure that Pt England students are
confident and successful in a 21st century digital
learning environment we have developed an
approach in Year 1 which will lay a strong
foundation for successful eLearning through
their subsequent years at PES.
We have:
identified a ‘Mother Tongue’ software programme
for all our Year 1 students to use (Kid Pix)
identified a set of essential foundation skills
employed a university student as part-time ICT
teacher aide to work alongside the Year 1
students in their classes
provided appropriate computers in the classroom
to enable this
4. The ‘Mother Tongue’ Concept
This term was taken from what we have learned about students’
acquisition of English - that students who are fluent or literate in their
Mother Tongue find it easier to learn a second language than those
whose first language is a form of ‘Pidgin’.
This is clearly the case with students coming late to the digital
environment. If they learn foundation skills within the security of one
software programme, they transfer their skills much more quickly to
other programmes than students who have had a smorgasbord as their
first computing experience.
At Pt England School we have identified Kid Pix as our ‘Mother
Tongue’ software because it not only is simple and inviting to use, but it
also allows our students to become confident sisomo creators. They
can learn to create content with sight, sound and motion all within the
one programme.
5. Hyperstudio
Web 2 I Can Animate
Kid
Garage Band iMovie
Pix
Photoshop Keynote
Pixelmator
6. Kid Pix - Foundations for eLearning - Skills Check
Set One Set Two Set Three Set Four Set Five
Mouse and Paint skills Initial Drawing skills File Management skills Multimedia skills
Options, Text, Keyboard Shortcuts
Choose from option Open Kid Pix from Open slide show from
Mouse control
Click to select Click to select pencil bar Apple Menu/Dock Picker
Mouse Control
Choose Save from File Pick a picture from
Select correct size of
Use mouse to point Scroll through options
menu own folder
pencil
Mouse Control
Draw pattern freely on
Select bucket to paint Select Text tool Type name of file Pick a transition
screen
Mouse Control
Activate Text box on Select correct network
Make ends meet so
Select colour to paint Pick a sound/jingle
screen (by clicking) folder to save to
paint doesn’t ‘leak’
Mouse Control
Click on screen to pour Colour using variety of Type own name
Record a sound
paint correctly
shades / patterns
Use Shift for capital
Drawing straight lines
Paint within lines Adjust slide length
Select line tool letter
Drawing straight lines
Select correct size
Select undo button Command Z to undo Save the show
from options
Drawing straight lines
Choose appropriate Save as a Quicktime
Use Shift key for Command Q to Quit
colours movie
straight lines
7. Pt England School students are creators of
content, not merely consumers...
At Pt England School we
have a school-wide ban on
the use of commercial clip-
art. Children who create
their own work from the
time they begin school have
been found to develop into
much more metacognitive
and confident adopters of
eLearning than those who
are taught to plagiarise
at a young age.
“If children are encouraged to use Image:
Sue Brown
commercial graphics, many will never feel For this reason we discourage the
Tahatai Coast School
satisfied with their own work.” use of the stamp feature in Kid Pix.
8. The role of the ICT teacher’s aide
Two people are employed by the school to work with students as
part of the eLearning team:
The eLearning support teacher is a full-time position. This teacher
works with Years 2-6 classes in the eLearning centre supporting the
eLearning that is happening in the classrooms. The tasks the students
do when they go to these lessons are closely linked with the
eLearning the classroom teacher has planned
The ICT teacher’s aide position is part-time and is funded by the PES
board of trustees to give each of the Year 0/1 classes one hour of
support a week. The intent of this funding is to ensue that each
student acquires the foundation ICT skills we have identified as being
essential for their future success in eLearning. Where possible this
will align with the classroom programme, but time constraints mean
that priority will be given to monitoring the progress of the students
through the sets of foundation skills.
These teachers are both members of the eLearning team and meet with the eLearning team leader
9. ICT teacher’s aide lesson design
Students spend 10 minutes with the TA.
Probably 2 students at a time. While they are acquiring
Early
confidence and very basic skills this time would be equally
Stages
shared between a ‘warm -up’ activity colouring a simple
picture and drawing a component of the eLearning task the
class teacher has designed.
We are acknowledging the balance
here between:
1.the importance of scaffolding and
monitoring the students as they
acquire confidence and important
foundation skills
2.providing a 21st century eLearning
environment where students
expect their activities to lead to
outcomes which can be shared as
digital learning objects
10. Foundations for eLearning
@ Pt England School
Summary of Year 0/1skill sets:
Gain initial confidence Type name onto a finished
with the hardware graphic to gain confidence
with text management
Colour pictures to gain
confidence with simple Save files onto the
draw tools network to develop
independence
Draw and colour simple
graphics to extend draw create a slide show to gain
skills confidence with
multimedia
11. PES eLearning Team 2009
eLearning Support Teacher
Andrea Tele’a
Music Teacher
Max Jacobsen
Technician
Ashleigh Burt
ICT teacher aide
Courtney Brown
Team Leader
Dorothy Burt
