Tech crews evolve and multiply

WAYNE ERB reports from an e-learning conference with students at its centre

Thomas Mitchell stands on stage in his Wellington College blazer before a large audience of teenagers and adults, his laptop before him loaded with a PowerPoint presentation.

Last to speak at the Tech Crew Hui, Thomas does not appear fazed that he follows several industry professionals and is speaking before the biggest audience of his young life.

In fact, he says later, it's not his first public speaking assignment on the topic of e-learning, and despite being just 15, he designs websites for real clients during his weekends.

The Tech Crew Hui is a conference with a difference in that it is run by students for students. The three-year-old event is creating a sense of community among talented secondary students and their younger brethren – primary students attended for the first time this year.

It also provides students with information on career pathways ("infinite possibility" is its slogan) and lets them share their own stories of innovation.

The event was hosted last month by Wellington College and attracted student groups from around New Zealand. The full day included speakers from the digital business sector, visits to tertiary institutions and student presentations.

Members of the Wellington College Tech Crew student group organised the conference with support from Wellington City Council, the Ministry of Education and corporate backers.

Deputy principal Mike Pallin says the point of the day was captured by speakers who encouraged students to push the boundaries and be prepared to make mistakes on the path to innovation.

He says the Wellington College Tech Crew has run for several years and is modelled on the original Tech Angels at Wellington Girls' College, which provides opportunities for girls to extend their expertise while tutoring teachers in the use of computer technology.

Mike says such groups now operate in most of the schools represented at the Tech Crew Hui and it's a model he endorses after watching the students in his own college.

"They say one of the best ways of learning is teaching someone else. These students are so enthusiastic about doing this, it's great professional development for them."

Ministry of Education e-Learning Capability project leader Neil Melhuish says a New Zealand Council for Educational Research paper shows e-learning has a key role in developing new kinds of curriculum and pedagogy when effectively integrated into the learning environment.

"And in a sense the Tech Crew Hui and the Tech Angels project that it grew out of is a good example of that working in practice," he says.

He adds that philosophies underlying the hui include community involvement and inclusion and providing leadership opportunities for the students who were actively involved in planning and running the day. All this closely reflects the vision and principles of the New Zealand Curriculum, he says.

"The opportunity for students to participate in a professional-quality conference with leading national keynote speakers and youth perspectives on achieving success and leadership is great. It reflects the high expectations and student empowerment that the curriculum embodies," he says.

The empowerment of students could have no better illustration than when young people from six schools made presentations to their peers inside the college auditorium.

That included the current crop of Wellington Girls' College Tech Angels, who have organised a drop-in centre at their school library so they are more accessible to students and staff.

"We're working hard to integrate technology with school life," said one student.

The Tech Angels have added a book review blog for the school library and are creating a website on the school's history.

Students from Taradale High School in Hawke's Bay shared their story of developing online teaching resources for the school's maths department. Other student topics ranged from developing new student groups to the use of open-source software in schools.

A vision of angels

One of the latest Tech Angel groups to form brings together blind and low vision students from around the country.

They're enrolled in the Blind and Low Vision Education Network New Zealand (Blennz) while attending classes in mainstream schools.

Speaking at the Tech Crew Hui were members Ryan Keen of Burnside High School in Christchurch and Kyal Little from Newlands College in Wellington. They spoke about the importance of teachers addressing accessibility issues for vision-impaired computer users.

"The worldwide community that is the internet works around the concept that everyone helps each other and that's very important," said Ryan.

Kyal explained the range of software he uses to compose music, a favourite activity at school.

The pair also talked about getting around incompatibility between screen-reading software and the programming language used to develop websites for school projects.

Speaking later, both students stress the support they've got from teachers – Ryan's teacher welcomed the knowledge on web accessibility he could share with classmates, and Kyal's teachers have guided him in developing the visual element of websites.

The Blennz Tech Angels are developing online forums for blind and low vision students and their teachers to share ICT knowledge, especially assistive technology.

Resource teacher of vision Mark Tweedale helps the group coordinate and expects other teachers will want to draw on their expertise.

"The students will be teaching us because they are using the equipment every day and know it best. If we have problems to solve for other students around the country we'll turn to the people who know."

He says the group aims to connect all visual resource centres around the country to the online forum, so everyone involved in blind and low vision education can access Tech Angel expertise.

Students create software

The Wellington College Tech Crew were heavily involved in running the conference, with members using technology skills to video-record the day, design logos and market the event.

Thomas Mitchell programmed the guest registration website and says aside from practical learning, he and other students found the event useful for hearing about the guest speakers' career pathways.

"Technology is moving so incredibly fast and a conference like that can help students keep ahead," he says.

Students at Wellington College find further ways to learn: coaching teachers and even creating their own software.

Thomas presented his educational wiki (a website that users develop collaboratively), that he developed out of school hours with fellow students Patrick Hunn and Sonla Pham.

The wiki creates a learning environment that students and teachers can add to through online forums, quizzes, a homework area and a 'virtual book bag' for shared resources.

English teacher Eliza Avery is trialling the wiki with her classes and suggests improvements, while keeping in mind that Thomas is a Year 11 student and his in-class learning and assessments need due priority.

The project coincides with her own interest in wikis which grew from related professional development.

She says there is a real push to incorporate ICT into student learning in meaningful ways that engage and push students to analyse and synthesise information, thus developing higherlevel thinking skills.

"The students have a much greater sense of ownership over information that they help create, and they also often go in directions that I, as a teacher, wouldn't have predicted."

She says student contributions to the wiki can be stimulating and even when they are not, that provides an opportunity for students to critique their own and their peers' work.

Fellow teacher James Edgecombe says the wiki is easier to use than others he tried and that comes from the students thinking specifically about its educational purpose.

"Too often I've been in ICT presentations where the starting point was a technical one – here is a new flashy programme, now teachers can go away and think about how you might use that. These boys are starting with the classroom, and gearing their products towards the sorts of things you want to do."

Related weblinks

Video of the conference presentations: www.r2.co.nz/20080529/

A New Zealand Council for Educational Research report examines what the Tech Angels project teaches us about digital age learners:

www.nzcer.org.nz/default.php?products_id=1735