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 sessions. He tends to start with a teacher-led introduction to the session, outlining the area for coverage in the session. In an hour-long lesson, he might restrict himself to just one single geographical, historical or industrial/commercial focus. From the introduction, he will set pairs or small groups work to do, using either printed worksheets, a section of a CD-ROM 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.

The teacher wants to use ICT over something like a three week period (out of a total of eight weeks for the area of work), spending two hours a week with it. First let's recall the main learning objectives the teacher has for his pupils in this area:

• Describe the main forms of industrial activity in the Swansea Bay area
• Distinguish between
  • the urban and rural
  • the coastal and the valley
  • the industrial and the commercial in the Swansea Bay area
• Place their investigation and comment in the period between the two World Wars
• Relate their findings to their own and their communities' situations in terms of work
• Explain some of the similarities and differences between the period under consideration and the current period

Below is a summary of how the three separate weeks are structured to use ICT to meet some of these objectives. You will see that they are proposed as three distinct stand-alone sets of work. This is because the teacher needs to be flexible in when he can gain access to the ICT, and needs to be able to move the sessions around in consultation with other users of ICT in his school.

Take a look at the 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 this area of work. 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 or a similar area of work.

Case Study Lesson Structure
Three Weeks of ICT Use set into an Eight Week Programme

Week 1 - Use the Internet to describe the main forms of industrial activity in the Swansea Bay area.

• Class introduction and targeted questions - define key terms - industry, steel making, mining, transport (types), commerce, manufacture, etc.
• Set class into groups of three - each group with blank map of Swansea Bay area with ten industrial activities/companies listed at bottom. Task - to use the Internet to locate the ten names on the map.
• For each of names - give outline of industrial activity.
• For relevant names/industries - indicate whether and where these still exist, and why not if they have ceased to exist.
• When all maps and tasks are complete, feedback and discussion with whole group.

Week 2 - Use a CD-ROM Encyclopædia to gather and share background information to help distinguish between the urban and rural, the coastal and the valley, and the industrial and the commercial in the Swansea Bay area.

• Class introduction - define six key terms and apply to current-day Swansea Bay area.
• Pairs using ICT - Use search facilities in Geography and History sections of Encarta or similar CD-ROM product to provide examples of terms in Europe and UK.
• Pairs continue - Apply definitions and examples to Swansea Bay area using work from week one and other background material.
• Each pair prepares single side of A4 on word processor to explain urban/rural or coastal/valley or industrial/commercial - bullet point summary covering nature of work, lifestyle, changes within the period studied for presentation to group.
• Presentation of all materials to give all pupils same base from which to work.

Week 3 - Use email to send and receive communication to experts and peers on specific findings in the area of work - focus on own community.

• Class introduction.
• Pupils set to pairs/threes by home locality.
• On basis of home locality, pupils characterise area - nature of industry, working conditions, living conditions plus changes within the period under investigation - into descriptive word-processed document.
• Document sent as e-mail (with request to respond) to either:
  • Nominated 'expert' from local historical or media organisation.
  • Peer within home locality area.
  • Peer in other school area.
• E-mail reply received from nominee for comparison.
• Feedback of replies to whole group.

b. Managing Learning in the Classroom