Decent ICT teachers already way ahead of curriculum

Welcoming Michael Gove’s plans to overhaul the school ICT curriculum, president of the Girls’ Schools Association (‘GSA’) has said that any decent ICT teacher is already way ahead of the ICT curriculum in terms of day to day classroom practice.

‘a poor teacher will follow the curriculum doggedly’

Computer science graduate Louise Robinson, who took over as president of the GSA this, said:
“It’s great that the education secretary has identified how inappropriate the curriculum is to contemporary life. However, up and down the country skilled teachers and their pupils are already way ahead of the basic curriculum. Good ICT teaching depends on inspirational, creative teachers as much as it does on a lively curriculum. A poor teacher will follow the curriculum doggedly. An excellent ICT teacher doesn’t confine her lessons to how to use Microsoft Office, whatever the curriculum says. It’s actually fairly commonplace these days for pupils to be designing their own websites and apps. As well as re-designing the curriculum, we need to make sure we have forward-thinking people to interpret and teach it.”

‘lessons that engage and excite whilst giving transferrable skills’

Mrs Robinson went on to say:
“When Mr Gove redesigns the curriculum, I would urge him to get the right balance between detail and broad skills set. We need to think about the transferrable skills inherent in learning ICT, not just the obvious practical applications. I know from personal experience how quickly programming languages become obsolete.

“It’s highly likely that, whatever programming language is taught in school, it will have had its day by the time a student is in employment, but in many ways that doesn’t matter – what matters is that our young people are engaged in lessons that excite them whilst giving them a variety of skills they can draw on in different environments, not just ICT. For example, at my own school, we spend more time developing websites with Year 7 and 8 girls than we do teaching spreadsheets. Instead of data logging, we do movie creation. But it takes enlightened teaching staff to do this.”

The GSA represents the UK’s independent girls’ schools. The pioneering computer science work of GSA member The Abbey School was acknowledged by Michael Gove in his keynote speech on the future of ICT teaching in schools. Education secretary Mr Gove highlighted the fact that The Abbey is already using 3D technologies for teaching Biology, showing 3D images of the heart pumping blood through valves, and manipulating, rotating and tilting the heart in real time. Teachers have noticed how much difference it has made to the girls’ understanding.

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