Heroes Journey

Jim is your strong silent type of hero.
A young man of few words.
But when he wants to, he can wield a gadget.

Learning Tablets

This week at Halinda we have been setting up iPads for some student programs.
Where to start ? As always the most basic switch is the on and off. This is mastered quickly by most willful learners here ! We had to soon find a makeshift hack that focused students attention on preferred learning activities. Once students jump in on tablet learning there is a lot of engagement ready to be channelled with the device. Now we move onto the familiarisation and prolonged engagement hoped for when we introduce an activity to stimulate student attention.

A Touch of Learning

This term is really gearing up. The gear we have for use in some student programs is tablets and educational Apps. Parents are increasingly interested in the use of a student's own tablet (usually an Apple iPad at this point in time, but this year a plethora of devices is coming to the market). The engagement they generate is useful to the teacher in the classroom. To find and focus on a student's learning strengths is a beautiful thing. The right device, be it a DER laptop, a mouse switch, an iPad or pencil, can be a boon to the learning at hand.

Halinda is part of the P.L.A.N

Halinda is now part of The Mt Druitt P.L.A.N.

Halinda School is situated in the Mount Druitt District. We have a cohort of student tech users that range from k-12. Our staff are lifelong learners. We not only participate in Interactive Computer Technologies for education, we have established a record of constantly refining that use of technology for the enhancement of outcomes built on curriculum.

Some schools in the area are developing their journies in ICT and forging links with other learning communities in the Western Sydney Region. Halinda is a part of this.

The Mount Druitt Professional Learning Area Network is a project that is growing. Teachers developing and sharing ideas, building access to the curriculum, increasing engagement in its delivery and linking know-how are working across schools.

Halinda sits on the steering committee of the P.L.A.N. along with lighthouse schools and curriculum innovators. Expect to see more of this professional network of schools working in partnership.

Behaviour & Learning Project Wiki

Halinda is using wikis to develop professional learning.
This wiki helps us further establish a sharing of understandings around the work we do.

Wikis help learners contribute as a team to the collective knowledge of our group. As a resource wikis are updatable (providing realtime peer review of content) and discussable (allowing reflection and generation of ideas).

Halindatech Behaviour and Learning Wiki space

The Tech SSP

Teachers here have been busy providing in-services for other support services beginning their tech journeys. Many are interested in the lessons we provide for our students delivered by tech means across KLAs and grades.

Many are surprised by the type of content an SSP provides in it's courses.

The old Institution view of 'Special Schools' as places built around deficit is more a misconception of the uninitiated.

Our specific special school puts an emphasis on the enabling qualities of technology

and what they do and might provide for the student with a specific need.

Tech comes and goes, teachers learn it, use it and teach it. In our setting more than most we adapt it

.

All teachers in every school in the public network of schools across Australia are daily making learning more accessible to students. This is the context that a child with a learning difficulty, disability, behaviour or mental health problem lives in, a changing world with lots of learning to be done and technological change taking a bit part in that mix. Teachers work to make learning relevant to the individual child.

There are many programs that run simultaneously at our school. Like any busy school. Teachers here run those staple subjects of maths, english and science, tackle social and welfare issues and catering for need, preparing students for transition into the same world that everybody walks in, making the most of what is there.

In-servicing the interested

There are many visitors to our busy tech habitat. Some who have checked us out on the net before arriving. Hello to you, you know who you are ! Reassuring that we must be doing something right when we hear echoes of ourselves coming from people who have never met us but know us virtually through things like this very blog. Such is the connected world.