videoconferencing at Ashfield Girls' High School

In September 2009 Ashfield Girls’ High School will move into a new state-of-the-art building designed to reflect the changing needs of education in the 21st century. Staff and pupils at the East Belfast school are not waiting until then though to avail of the many innovative learning opportunities created by new technology.  As one of only 12 schools in Northern Ireland designated as an ICT specialist school, Ashfield Girls’ has made huge advances in recent years it to embed ICT into every aspect of teaching and learning.

Sam Robinson, Senior Teacher for e-Learning at Ashfield Girls’ says ICT has made an enormous difference to both staff and pupils. It has encouraged teachers to look at different ways of delivering their classes and opened up new learning opportunities for the pupils, allowing them to study subjects which otherwise would not be available because of the extra cost of employing additional teaching staff to deliver those subjects.

In September 2007, Ashfield Girls used videoconferencing to introduce AS Psychology and Law through the Nelson Thornes Distance Learning Programme and most of the pupils studying these subjects at AS are expected to progress and complete their A2s online by June 2009. These initial online programmes proved so successful that the school is considering introducing other subjects such as Government and Politics from next year. 

As Alex Orr, an AS Law student says, although she found online learning quite strange at first, it quickly became just like an ordinary lesson.

'While it’s a different way of being taught to what I was used to, it’s a good preparation for university life as I have to be more responsible for doing research and reading up on topics as I do not have a teacher supervising me all the time.’

Toni Lindsay, an AS Psychology student, agreed that without teacher supervision in the classroom, they did have to adopt a more responsible attitude to their work.

‘We really need to prepare work for the videoconference each week to be able to participate fully in discussions but I found the subject very interesting and hope to continue with it next year.”  

According to Mr Robinson, the success of the videoconferencing programmes at Ashfield Girls’ is in no small way due to the excellent ‘plug and play’ video conferencing facilities the school has invested in.

“We opted for ‘high end’ Tandberg Maestro video conferencing facilities  from the HP/C2k catalogue. It is very easy to operate and gives very high resolution pictures. In the past video conferencing was always a bit of a technical minefield but the system we have now is so easy to operate that staff and pupils are totally at ease with it.”

He explains: “At the start of the year the students studying the online programmes get text books and a series of activities to complete. They have a weekly online tutorial but in between tutorials they are in regular email and even telephone contact with their tutors. Although each class also has a ‘link’ teacher at Ashfield Girls’, most of the students get on with the work very well themselves.

“We are very pleased with the way the pupils have adapted so well to this way of learning by taking responsibility for their own learning. The system is operated on a daily basis by lower sixth pupils who work well together with minimal supervision.”

Mr Robinson adds that as well as extending the subject options for sixth formers at the school, the online courses are also good preparation for university.

“One of the major challenges students come up against when they go to university is dealing with the limited contact they have with their tutors. Doing a course online gets them used to self-directed study and communicating with their tutors online. It’s also good for students to have on their CVs as it says a lot for their commitment and self motivation to have successful completed an online learning course.”

In addition to the distant learning programmes, the school’s video conferencing equipment is used for a variety of other projects. 

“Video conferencing has created many opportunities for collaborative learning with other schools, both at home and abroad, allowing our pupils to communicate effectively with their peers beyond their normal boundaries,” says Mr Robinson.

“Our Head of English is currently in regular contact with a school in Pittsburgh, USA and the Year 8s are working with their equivalent year group in that school, looking at how they interact with a different audience for their oral and written work.”  

Other international projects include a link with a school in Germany to explore experiences of different communities issues in History.  Ashfield Girls’ also has links with schools in Austria and Norway and visiting staff never fail to be impressed by how teachers in the school have embraced ICT in their classrooms. One recent foreign visitor to the school commented that he had seen the future of education at Ashfield Girls’. Closer to home, the school’s video conferencing facilities are used in a collaborative project with Little Flower High School to explore issues in relation to Learning for Life and Work.

 

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