Part 2:
Teaching With ICT

a. Structuring Lessons

In the case study we are dealing with, the teacher has a fairly regular pattern to his ICT-based sessions. He tends to start with a teacher-led introduction to the topic, outlining the area for coverage in the session. In an hour-long lesson, he will restrict himself to just one topic. From the introduction, he will set pairs or small groups work to do, using printed worksheets, or specific investigations on the World Wide Web. This work is structured, and he monitors progress around the class until he can get them to report back to the whole group on their progress, or summarise their progress in small groups to feed back in the next session.

Again, you might not work in exactly this way, but you probably do have a pattern that you favour as a teacher. Characterise this pattern to yourself now, and consider how the use of ICT as a resource might fit into it.

In our case study over a two-week phase of his programme, the teacher wants the pupils at this phase of their learning to be able to:

• Investigate how birth rate and death rates affect total population.
• Understand how changes in the birth rate and death rate affect the rate of population change.
• Understand the causal effect of contraception on birth rate and population change.

Specifically, this case study will be a useful introduction to the Demographic Transition Model. Below is a summary of how the two weeks are structured to use ICT to meet some of these objectives, specifically those relating to cause and effect, modelling and considering alternatives. Take a look at this summary and then produce your own account, and your own lesson plans, showing how you would use the ICT resources we have been discussing to do the same job on the topics. You might wish to extend or contract the time, and to fit the plans, duration and work around your own experience of working with this type of activity.

Case Study Lesson Structure

Week 1 - Use the WWW to get background and some examples.

• Class introduction and targeted questions - Establish the main purposes and characteristics of population change, with some supplied examples from a hand-out.
  • Whole class discussion on World Population and how it has and is continuing to change.
• Small group work (groups of two/three):
  • Each small group around a single computer
  • The group is asked to find out the current population figures for the world and to find out which parts of the world are growing most rapidly and why.
  • Group copies information into Word document of PowerPoint presentation.
• Class discussion of findings from group investigation.
  • Pupils attempt to describe and explain differences in population change.

Week 2 - Use the spreadsheet to investigate population change.

• Class introduction - whole class discussion to re-cap previous session.
  • Pupils set hypotheses on population change, birth rate and death rate.
  • Worksheet based tasks for previous session to re-cap previous session.
  • Pupils set hypotheses on population change, birth rate and death rate.
• Worksheet based tasks on previous session's small groups:
  • Pupils re-cap hypotheses to test.
  • Each group is provided with data to input into the spreadsheet and test their hypothesis.
  • From the spreadsheet each group can produce graphs to examine the effects of their changes.
  • Groups transfer data/graphs into Word to describe and explain their results.
• Small groups feed back with their findings to a whole class discussion.
  • Further questions and refined hypothesis are identified for investigation.
  • Pupils e-mail their work to other pupils for peer assessment.

b. Managing Learning in the Classroom