Blue+Mountain

Blue Mountain College ERO in School this term so focus has shifted slightly in preparation. L@S Conference been main thing to kick of the contract this year. In school visits underway Teachers are looking forward to the Cluster Day All staff have identify one ICT PD goal as part of their appraisal process - often the needs identified are low level and to increase confidence Some PD goals will be supported by the facilitator and some with own staff support. New laptops in place
 * Milestone 5**

Blue Mountain - most of the way through a report writing cycle with junior class reports being generated from classroom manager and there have been many positive comments from staff - There is definitely a feeling that we are a community of computer users helping each other - Hugely increased number of people using ICT, modifying their teaching programme to split classes and set different groups different tasks - Use of multimedia increased. Teacher use datasticks, data projectors, cameras routinely in prgrammes - Staff used the new Maths PAT for the first time and logged on to NZCER to input scores and generate comprehensive reports on individuals and the class as a whole. - The wide use of Asttle linked to Atol contract  - Use of the What Next page with Asstle - Blog from one of our teachers has encouraged other teachers to use the Internet - Staff computer use is becoming invisible – we take it for granted - Digital learning objects used teaching area of a triangle, and fractions/percentages and decimals - The word “Rubric” inspired a whole lot of people to go look on the net!
 * Milestone 6**

Blue Mountain Animations in year 7 are going well. Students demonstrating good group skills. Planning skills being used as well. Great animations in year 11 geography One on one time with the facilitator have been excellent and fun. PD is encouraging some staff to use their laptops more often
 * Milestone 7**

We have some teachers doing new things with students eg Animations (year 11, PowerPoint’s – instead of paper based presentations) Good to have time to look at useful stuff and explore Student demonstrate a high level of ICT expertise especially in PowerPoint and Word. (eg animation, special effects and layout)

Year 12 economics and year 11 ICT using podcsts for research. (Economics are to listen to opinions on xxx . ICT for information about rugby players.)

Continual frustration with network especially when saving / accessing large files like PowerPoint. There is never enough working laptops

Not enough laptops on the library and never being able to get access to sufficient computers Some wonderful compositions re being made in Garage Band Learning to use Audacity, a free download for editing music tracks.

Found lots of interesting sites for y10 maths One teacher learned to use the blogsite and kept in touch while on sabbatical. Some students presenting their data using the electronic whiteboard

Blue Mountain College BMC Pluses
 * Milestone 8**

Some teachers have made massive improvements this year Students using data projectors and iBooks to present seminars in English. Junior (y9) students have the confidence to embark on projects using a skills set or interest (boys in Y9 creating quite elaborate movies using Appleworks Paint and iMovie) Music teacher used audacity to put together a collation of music for the Lip Sync competition where they made the national finals Surprised at how quickly the report writing on CM has become part of the ordinary framework of the school There is an interest from Departments to have profile sheets created to fit with their subject (maths and special needs already have profiles) There is a demand for equipment – all the ICT equipment that we have is being used – even the older video camera School magazine created and to a print ready stage by teacher/librarian and a group of students (software used, Publisher and Photoshop Elements) The quality of documents (letters, notices etc) circulating in the school and going out to the public has improved The new workroom which has wireless access and network plugs is a popular place to work Teachers are taking up commercial options for faster internet access at home. Those that can nearly all have Broadband but three relatively isolated teachers have satellite broadband ICT has become normalised within the school MyClasses is being used more. Many kids are immersed in ICT Teacher are building digital portfolios Data projectors are widely used Staff are starting to become owners of toys – digital cameras, phones that do tricks, mp3 players The iBook (pod) is used frequently. There is wireless access nearly everywhere in the school. The music festival was archived to DVD too. The video camera was used to provide evidence for moderation for NCEA Students have moved from the traditional print based unit standards and are working towards standards that have movies as outcomes

Minus Money is not provided by the government for the equipment that the teachers want! Keeping the iBooks functional is an issue ICT has increased teacher workload. There is more work to do with a computer at home and with good internet connections People use email when a face to face meeting would work! Need for a decent website Hard for all classes to get access to the computer room People find Macs totally frustrating Schoolzone blocking sites We have more issues to think about with students and security Lack of data projectors Some rooms too bright for data projectors

Interesting ICT is normalised at BMC There are RSI implications with laptops With our focus on ICT and Distance learning we are going to have to work on student self-management in 2007

Blue Mountain College •	Seeing the presenter using (modelling) the use of the data projector for a different purpose at nearly every session •	Video conferencing with the teachers outside the cluster •	The use of the video conference equipment has almost been normalized as a meeting method for the principals from the schools •	Interesting that Staff on leave have all taken up opportunities to find out more about ICT in education as part of their study •	Staff are supporting each other – facilitated by the new workroom – through incidental ICT help sessions •	Teachers and students use laptops routinely •	The quality of the films being made is improving •	Year 10 ICT may put and entry in the Fairgo Awards as a collaborative effort between English and ICT classes •	People are starting to use myclasses online environment routinely •	Have managed to put in a bit more technology which has really helped many teachers take the big step forward. Eg Year 13 Geo, teacher took digital photos to prepare students for field trip and then required them to take digital cameras to help present their results. •	Schoolzone problems!! •	Use of data projectors has spread (Technology department used the data projector to discus report formats at their last meeting) •	New teachers – especially if they are older, need to be brought up to speed, with things we take for granted like asTTle.
 * Milestone 10**

Blue Mountain College
 * Milestone 11**

•	Activities using ICT are appearing to have more focus, and as teachers are becoming more confident, their expectations for students are higher. •	The students were using an online resources such as dictionaries •	The data projectors are being well used. Now that they are in individual teachers classroom they are being embedded in class programmes. For example – teaching a new writing genre, the writing can be modeled as a class activity and the discussion of writing also modeled. When the student (the next week) were reviewing each others writing, they were able to use the same form of discussion that was used to talk about each others writing •	asTTLe information is being used to guide the teaching of information skills to year 10. •	Data projectors are routinely used by staff presenting information to other staff members. We have a range of ways of sharing information including, saving on a shared drive, sharing by way of a MyClasses (online) pages or emailing to staff. •	Otago wide meetings are starting to take place using the VC. The ICT teachers meetings with the Technology advisor have been very good. •	Staff are supporting each other – facilitated by the new workroom – through incidental ICT help sessions. This peer tutoring of expert knowledge of applications such as asTTle has been very useful to build up the skill levels in departments. Another area where discussion has facilitated is using the numeracy project materials. As the teachers involved find or use resources they share what they have found with the others involved. •	Laptop pod is being used in study period as well as in formal classes •	The quality of the films being made continues to improve. The new video cameras have been used for some interesting projects within the school. •	An entry was sent away to the Fairgo ad awards. •	Staff continue to use MyClasses online environment routinely •	Social studies projects are using movies from Youtube as source material to view and comment on. •	The non renewal of the Microsoft for Apple Computers agreement has been very bad for us. •	New teachers, old and young – are supported by their peers in their departments. •	The Mathletics competition for years 9 to 7 used excel to keep scores (formulae already in spreadsheet), and collate house points, a data projector to keep the students up to date with the scores, included a data projector round in PowerPoint. The PowerPoint used scanned images that where manipulated in Photoshop.