Discussions

Name and Title: Chryssanthe Sotiriou , High School EFL Coordinator

School, Library, or Organization Name: Doukas School

 Co-Presenter Name(s): Dimitrios Primalis

 Country from Which You Will Present: Greece

Language in Which You Will Present: English

 Target Audience (such as primary school teachers, high school administrators, students, etc.):

 Primary , secondary School teachers, high school administrators

 Short Session Description (one line): Introducing and integrating learning technology

 effectively into your syllabus ,promoting sense of sharing experiences.

Full Session Description (one paragraph minimum):

In a rapidly changing world, students need to develop new skills to meet the challenges stemming from globalization and the advances in the field of technology. The conventional curriculum approach and teaching practices simply cannot incorporate digital literacy and other 21^st century skills in order to empower students with global competence. In 2009, at Doukas school, we adopted the 1:1 approach (one tablet pc : one student) introducing it into the 4^th grade of primary school (9 year old pupils) and 1^st year of high school (12 year old students) aiming at developing 21^st century skills and promoting collaboration and communication with students and educators from the national and international community. The project gradually involved a student population of more than 1,000 in 9 grades.

1:1 and the use of interactive coursebooks –instead of hard copy ones- are the ideal vehicle to facilitate learning in the 21^st century enabling students and teachers to open a “window on the world” in their class; transcend the boundaries and mentality of the traditional classroom and promote global awareness. Accessing data; fighting plagiarism; promoting critical thinking; contacting other teacher and learner communities; discussing global issues; learners creating and presenting their own ideas and opinions are all integral parts of the 1:1 approach which encourages a holistic approach to learning. However, integrating and applying this innovative project on a school wide scale requires careful planning and preparation so that it can be embraced by all the stakeholders – teachers, students, and parents. For successfully implementing such a challenging and wide scale project, Doukas, which is a Microsoft Mentor school, was awarded twice for innovation in education and became a case study for Microsoft.

In our presentation, we will share our experience showing the steps we followed, the difficulties that arose and how we dealt with them so that educators from all over the globe can benefit. In specific, we will give a 10 step practical outline that can guide educators who want to integrate learning technologies into the school syllabus without repercussions involving teachers, students and parents; how to encourage innovation among teaching staff and finally how to exploit the student tablet pc in everyday practice through project based learning and the use of platforms such as www.edmodo.com and Skype to develop 21^st century competences. Samples from learner’s work will be displayed. At the last part of the presentation, we will invite the participants to contribute with their experience and ideas.

Websites / URLs Associated with Your Session:

www.schoolofthefuture.gr