I wrote in the Summer about my plans for ICT. Now I have been in the school for half a term I have a better knowledge of what is happening and where I would like to go. Currently we have 1 ICT slot a week per class and this is ‘when ICT happens’. This might be using the netbooks or it might be in the suite, but generally ICT is supposed to be in those time slots. But…lots of teachers have been happy to get netbooks as and when to do a bit extra. This might be creating a story in 2Create a Super Story or researching online, so the shift is happening towards a more cross-curricular approach.I know most people did this a while ago, but that’s where we are.
So my job is now to guide the staff and to plan appropriately for the ICT across the school. They seem keen, they just need ideas and support to get going. So how do I start?
I envisage planning a range of generic lesson plans that meet NC objectives and marry up with the level descriptors so that teachers can pick and choose the ICT that they want to do that half term. These eventually would be linked to our ICT assessment (not yet written) so it would be easy to assess where the children are. If they fancy doing 4 weeks of presentations, that’s fine, but better yet, they could do 4 sessions of presentations in the same week. I say generic plans because I think that most areas of ICT can be achieved in whatever topic. If I plan 4 sessions of using presentation software (not just PPT) then they should be able to pick this up and use it in Tudors, Victorians, Plants or Space. There are some things that will fit better with certain subjects – Google maps when studying the local area – but these can be used as and when.These add-ons could also be listed so teachers can pick and choose as they wish.
Generic also helps when a fancy new piece of software or web2 tech comes along later. If I write a plan for ‘making an e-book’ then the teachers could have a go at using MyEBook.com, 2CASS or Zooburst.com. It would all depend on their focus. They could use our help guides and adapt.
I would then link all of these plans on our website so that the teachers could click on a topic (e.g. presentations or databases) or a NC objective and the plans would come up.
Does this seem like a good way to go?
Things I want to avoid:
*Everything being taught in 6 week blocks – some things take 2 sessions and others need a couple here and a couple later
*Being software dependant – yes I will teach powerpoint, but more importantly I will plan how to ‘make a good presentation’
I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas on this. It is a huge task, but one that also has huge potential.
I think you are totally right to go the ‘generic’ route. Give children the skills they need so they can adapt them to meet their own learning needs in the future. At the end of a session that introduces a new skill/piece of software, I think it’s worth asking children to think about how/where else they could use what you’ve just taught them. Last year I found it really useful to begin the year by doing simple tasks that focussed on basic skills such as the difference between save/save as, creating new folders, copy/cut/paste and undo etc. This way the children were set up with that basic knowledge for whatever ICT work we did following that and it saved SO much time and faffing. Not to mention ‘lost’ work!
I also totally hear you on the topic of 6 week blocks. Life and ICT do not always fit easily into this time frame. When I was doing my ‘fake facts’ project at the start of the year, I basically cleared almost a whole day for us to focus on it and get it done. It worked much better this way. Just before half term, I also ran a podcasting week (under the disguise of literacy) because I wanted to do an intensive intro and for every child to have created a (fairly!) polished podcast after only a few lessons rather than for it to take 6 weeks to finish by which time they’d forget why they started it! Now they’ve seen the relatively quick turnaround time, I get children coming to me with podcast ideas and scripts they’ve written at home.
I re-planned my schools ICT curriculum last year with some success and some failures! I planned lots of blocks of 2/3 week stuff- the usual stuff mainly but condensed. So 6 weeks of powerpoint became 3 etc. This gave time for more ‘innovative’ planning as well. Some teachers really took to it, some didn’t hens the failures. One of the big success though was our ‘ICT project’. I gave 4/5 weeks for each year group to do a project. This gave the kids freedom to do what they wanted, in any style they wanted using the skills they had learnt that year. For example, my year 5 project was to make a piece of digital media to explain to the year 2s all about the junior school. The kids made a whole range of things from powerpoints, to posters even some games on scratch! Was a really good opportunity for the kids and really pushed my level 5s. Be happy to share with you other things we have done.
Jamie Meredith
Freegrounds Junior School
KS2 coordinator
It is so difficult when you have a two pronged attack of skills and uses. Hopefully, we are now getting to the point where most children have the skills to use the harware & much of the software. It is then down to staff to use ICT withing the curriculum as a matter of course rather than ‘on special occasions’. This obviously has an impact on resources though. Tricky! I think the most important thing is for you to fire everryone up so that they are champing at the bit!!