This term in Big Ideas, the Year 7s have been getting to grips with the technology that they will come to use on a daily basis at Holy Cross College. We presented them with the big question, ‘Is I.T. a friend or foe?’ Over the nine week term, the students will be investigating how I.T. and technology can help them, but also how it may cause issues or problems for them. This is in connection with a whole school transition programme and a digital citizenship imperative.
To start the term, students were asked to invite their grandparents in. We had a good response with several grandparents, aunts, uncles and even a few parents coming in to talk to the year group. Students had spent some time devising questions to ask the visitors. The aim was to find out what older generations thought of technology. Some of the students were quite shocked and surprised by some of the things they found out.
We used the feedback from out visitors to identify what older generations thought to be the main issues around technology. These were:
- Younger generations aren’t as fit and healthy as we used to be, because they don’t play outside as much.
- Technology and the internet can be unsafe, in terms of people hacking information and keeping passwords safe.
- There is lots of information available on the Internet, how do you know what to trust?
With this feedback in mind, we spent the next three weeks investigating each of these issues, with a different teacher leading the weekly sessions. The big question, ‘Is I.T. a friend or foe?’ was broken down into smaller questions that would be easier to answer. Keep in mind that we are working with a new cohort of sevens, who are not used the Big Ideas model so we are also stepping into the model slowly with them.
In the first week, we asked the students: How can I.T. be a friend or foe when I am researching and doing my homework? Students were given a list of tasks to do, those which must be done, those which should be done, and those which could be done. We know this as 'Must, Should, Could'. These tasks increased in difficulty. Students completed these tasks at their own pace, by scanning QR codes to access the different tasks they needed to complete. This work progressed alongside a Humanities assessment, in which students were being asked to analyse the reliability of the sources they found online. The Humanities assessment asked them to answer a question about why the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb was so important. This work was submitted electronically, using Edmodo.
In the second week, we asked the students: How can I.T. help me to make friends or foes? The focus of this week was staying safe online and safe social networking. Once again, the students completed self-paced work, as the must, should, could activities were set up within an iTunesU course. Students brought their work for checking to the teachers, and were able to move their faces up a progress board so we could see who was at each stage of the task.
This week we will be asking: How can I.T. affect my health and fitness? Students will be asked to complete activities on their iPad, such as reading an iBook, playing an electronic game and they will be asked to complete activities without the use of technology, such as skipping and reading a book. They will review how the activities make them feel through a video diary, which will be used to create an iMovie.
The students will be asked to review all of the work carried out over the weeks for their final assessment, which will be marked for English. For their final assessment, students will be asked to evaluate how I.T. can be their friend or their foe, by creating a persuasive piece of writing to be presented either as an iMovie or a keynote. There will be differentiation in terms of using language such as 'evaluate'. But at the end, we hope all students will have some relevant reflection on the question friend or foe.
At this point, we have begun to scope and sequence the skills we would like our students to have by the end of Middle School. In Year 7, we want to focus on helping them understand the inquiry model. Another focus is on the time spent teaching year seven to work as a part of a team alongside critical skills in learning how to pace themselves in terms of their own accountability to their class mates and to the task. A lot of work has to go into maintaining some structure in the first term of Year 7, as they get to learn slowly how Middle School works.
Miss Laura Wallace
Year 7 Innovator
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