Tech Talk Tuesdays

When: Tuesday, March 20th, 4-5pm, Melbourne Australia (gmt+11)

About the session: LEEP stands for Lodgers’ E-learning Extension and is a special program offered to high achieving students at Berwick Lodge Primary School. This program has three main goals:

1. To provide an enrichment program for highly able or gifted students which will compliment the classroom curriculum.
2. To enable students to become ICT leaders in their classroom, modelling and supporting their peers and teachers to utilise ICT skills to enhance learning. The ICT activities will involve using web 2.0 tools, multimedia, and the Internet to establish global links and collaboration. The students in LEEP will be at the cutting edge of ICT at Berwick Lodge and, by teaching others what they have learnt; they will strengthen their own understandings.
3. To utilise ICT to enhance student learning in all areas of the curriculum. ICT will provide participants with the means to personalise their learning, by providing access to information, resources and experts from all over the world.

The students who participate in the program have lessons in advanced ICT skills and are supported to develop the social and interpersonal skills necessary for leadership and peer mentoring. They are expected to model exceptional behaviour and ethical use of the computers and ICT equipment. The students have been nominated by their teachers as potential leaders and have excellent results in their previous reports. It is important that they maintain these academic and behaviour standards.
This is the fourth year of the program and it is gathering momentum as the students develop confidence and have experience in the role. Teachers are becoming more comfortable and adept at utilizing the ICT student experts in their room. Change in ICT practise is becoming more evident as the teachers trust the students to help and lead with new ICT initiatives.
About our presenter:- Lois Smethurst has been a Primary Teacher for more than twenty years and a Leading Teacher in ICT for the last 10. Her qualifications include Masters of Information Technology in Education, Intel Master Trainer, Peer Coach in ICT and Graduate Diploma in Computing. Lois works at Berwick Lodge Primary School in Victoria Australia.
Lois has been presented with the Victoria Information Technology Award for “Most Outstanding Use of Technology in a Government School” and the Gippsland Learning Technology award for “Best Use of Learning Technologies in a Primary School.” In 2004 and 2005 she was a member of the “ICT Achievers” writing team for integrating ICT, Digital Learning Objects and Kahootz.
Her interests are education in ICT rich environments for teachers and students, web2.0 tools and technologies, global collaboration and constructivist learning. Her current role is in e_Learning extension for highly able students and whole school leadership in ICT. Lois has been working on a number of projects since starting at BerwickLodge Primary School, but in particular, developing a school wide blogging culture, global connections using Skype and using digital technologies to enhance learning through oral language. Students at BLPS were the only Australian school to participate in a recent Flatclassrooms Global Debate – Eracism.

Here is the link to the recording. Please note that this session will be recorded.