[Year 12 IPM] ITA ("IPM 2007") summary

[Geoff Moss]

Hear! Hear! Jane

Having entered teaching IT in the same way, and also forced to self-train in 
the State system, I concur with your arguments.

We also forget the "client" - the student.  This is not a course to cater 
for the "geeks" as you call it.  It is a study that students may enter 
without any prior studies in IT - there are no pre-requisites.  As such we 
need to provide a course that can cater for those without prior IT 
knowledge.

This year I have two IPM classes bulging at the sides.  Against the State 
trend I have had over 50% increase in enrolments.  One class has 25 enrolled 
students and I only have 21 PCs in the room.  (So far we have managed 
through absences - and we expect, though it is not appearing at this stage, 
some drop off in class numbers.)  The other class is full.

Among these students I have a mature adult student (who has 5 children) and 
a number of students from overseas in the last few years who have had little 
or no PC skills training.  As these students are struggling to learn the 
basics of file management and the use of basic programs I would find it 
difficult to try to introduce the range of multimedia programs that are 
suggested by some of our list members.

I respect their wish to use, and application of, a range of multimedia 
applications - in fact I am envious of some - but I have to be aware of my 
client base and cater for the needs of all students.  My experienced IT 
students appreciate that we must enable all students to be able to 
participate and to participate with success with the same software and, 
thus, do not expect to use multimedia that they may have used in school or 
at home in previous years.

Let us remember the large differences in skills and abilities that students 
may bring into the classroom where prior skills and knowledge is not 
prescribed.

Surely, we can be inventive enough to devise a course to cater for the range 
of skills and abilities we have in our classrooms with the new course.

As a group we need to work positively with the new study design, recognise 
it is catering for a wide range of students over the state, and develop 
courses that will excite our students.

Excel and Access can even be made exciting if we are introducing students to 
new skills and functions within the application and demonstrate a range of 
uses we can make of the applications.  Challenging exercises and skills 
applications can develop and maintain interest.

IF WE HAVE THE ENDEAVOUR WE WILL SUCCEED!

Geoff Moss
RMIT



> Speaking for myself, I am an old "typing and shorthand teacher" who got 
> sucked into IPM when no one else wanted to take it.  I have no computer 
> training, other than what I did at teacher's college (which was over 25 
> years ago).  When I came back to teaching in '93 (after 6 years family 
> leave) my typewriters had been replaced with computers.  I didn't even 
> know how the right way to put a floppy disk into the drive.  Just about 
> all my computer knowledge has been self taught since then, as I am in the 
> government system and you know how much training they provide!
>
> Computers are not my passion, however I feel that I have done a pretty 
> good job over the past ten years.  Every year I have had at least 1 
> student get a 40+ and last year there were 4.  I often tell my students 
> that they may know more about computers, but I know more about the course.
>
> My point is, any new course needs to cater for a diverse range of 
> students, teachers and resources.   We shouldn't be writing courses that 
> are only going to appeal to the "geeks" because we will lose half our 
> students. And unless the Department is going to provide some decent 
> training, at little or no cost to schools, I don't believe its fair on 
> teachers to start prescribing new/cutting edge software.   Multimedia is 
> probably "sexier" but databases and spreadsheets, (although they may be 
> "boring" to some), are still used extensively in business.  Finally, the 
> prescribed software shouldn't require vast amounts of money (which most 
> schools don't have) to pay for site licences.   At our school we only have 
> Photoshop on the 10 Art pod computers due to the high costs involved.    I 
> guess thats one of the joys of teaching in the state system.
>
> I think the writers of the new course have done a pretty good job in 
> trying to balance all of the above factors.  However, I will have to go 
> and learn how to use Visual Basic before next year!  (which in my opinion, 
> should have stayed in the Systems course)
>
> Janet Bane
> Patterson River SC.