e-Learning @ St Marys Senior High School
St Marys Senior High School is widely recognised and respected as a Technology leader and innovative centre for utilising technology to support and enhance teaching and learning. At St Marys Senior ICT is seamlessly integrated throughout the diverse curriculum and school communication systems. We have been nominated and awarded several regional and state awards in recognition of our ICT pursuits at whole school, individual teacher and student levels. Specifically our awards to date are:
2009
Digital Story Awards State Winner Recipient: Kirstin Yabut: Year 12 Student
2008
NSWDET Excellence in the Integration of Information and Communication Technologies Award Recipient: Loreta Kocovska: Head Teacher ICT (1 of 7 NSW recipients)
2007
: St Marys Senior High School was award a highly commended “Regional Director’s Award for Innovative Use of ICT in Learning for Connected Classrooms”.
2006
: St Marys Senior HS was awarded a highly commended “Regional Director’s Award for Innovative use of ICT in Learning”.
The school utilises
Moodle, a Course Management System (CMS) that teachers use to develop effective online learning courses to support a social constructionist framework of education. At St Marys Senior teachers collaboratively work together to construct curriculum specific resources suited to delivery via the Moodle environment. Important course content is uploaded to the site for student access anytime anywhere. Common teaching and learning resources posted on Moodle include course assessment booklets, lesson notes, syllabus documentation, hotlinks to useful websites, virtual lesson experiences eg. virtual gallery tours, as well as many interactive mediums, such as quizzes and on-line forums between teachers and students and peer tutors. Subject discussions are implemented through the forum facility and our SRC use Moodle as a communication medium for the student body, raising debate, ideas and issues for and about students and school events. Moodle is used to deliver online newsletters to parents, staff and students including weekly bulletins and facilitates school community and parent members to be actively engaged in school matters eg; P&C and the School Council post their minutes on Moodle.
“IT4QT” – Information Technology for Quality Teaching!
The most recent example of promotion of ICT teaching and learning practices has been the schools “IT4QT” project. The “IT4QT” project incorporates Moodle & IWB (Interactive Whiteboard) technologies. The majority of teachers have participated in approximately 20 hours face-to-face after school Moodle & IWB training. There are approximately 20 IWB’s installed and used across the school. The success of these technologies has resulted in the enhancement of student learning outcomes through the promotion and integration of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT).
Staff are regularly invited to share our ICT success with other schools, most recently Loreta Kocovska (Head Teacher ICT) presented the project at the Western Sydney Regional Principals conference and at national level presented the project at the ACE (Australian College of Educators) Digital Fair Conference 2009, in Victoria.
There are four computer labs in the technology centre, one lab in the Technology and Applied Studies (TAS) block, one incorporated into the student learning centre, computer terminals in the school library and in the various faculty areas. One of the technology centre labs has been set up as a connected classroom. This allows lessons to be presented simultaneously and shared remotely with other regional, national and international schools. Most recently our Year 12 Society and Culture students participated in a
connected classroom live, real time video link and forum with New York students in the United States of America.
All computers are IBM or compatible PCs installed with the MS XP operating system, the MS Office suite of applications and Adobe CS3 suite. PCs are connected to a star topology Novell Local Area Network (LAN) incorporating a fibre optic back-bone with access to the internet for secure email and browsing via the NSW Department of Education and Training (DET) Portal. This allows filtered access to the Word Wide Web (Web) and a monitored personal email account that is available for use both at school and at home. There are Wireless Access Point (WAP) across the school and students are encourage to bring their own laptops.
Student Printing is available and is administered using pCounter software to reduce wastage. There is a small fee of $10.00 per student per 300 pages. Colour printing is available to students in consultation with the library staff and incurs an extra cost.
Students that demonstrate an aptitude and wish to assist other students with the use of technology are appointed every year as student technology leaders.
Our 2009 Technology leaders are Alex Cann, Brendan Molloy and Kirstin K Yabut. They are rostered to the computer labs during breaks and before school to assist their peers.
These examples clearly demonstrate our ongoing commitment to teaching excellence in a digital age where technology enhances teaching and learning, encourages student engagement and opens opportunities for new and exciting learning opportunities.
Some Web Links (URLs) that you may wish to bookmark and store as favourites: