As part of the Broken Bay ‘Inspire’ Professional Learning initiative, teachers at Our Lady Star of the Sea, Terrigal are working with ‘learning coaches’ to transform learning in a 1:1 iPad environment. ‘Inspire’ provides schools with resources to design and implement school-based professional learning that focuses on promoting pedagogical innovation.
The pedagogical innovation at Terrigal centres on using the 1:1 devices to build learner agency across the school community. The opportunity to use the technology to increase students’ access to powerful learning experiences is already evident only a few weeks into the program. Already teachers, students and parents are co-designing and participating in learning that would not have been possible without the personal devices.
It is the thoughtfully planned and rigorous professional learning that has assisted teachers to embrace the 1:1 environment. Through ‘Inspire’, Terrigal has provided three classroom teachers allocations to serve as ‘learning coaches’. This approach is modelled on the highly effective literacy coach model that has been embedded in the diocese for a number of years. These ‘learning coaches’ work with their colleagues to co-plan and co-teach lessons that make meaningful and transformative use of the technology. This coaching model is having a profound impact on the learning culture of the school and is supporting teachers who are expert in their craft, but new to the technology to reimagine their practice in exciting ways. In addition to these coaches, students have been enlisted to provide professional learning for teachers in the new technology. Students are agents of their learning as they co-design the lessons and support their teachers to maximise the potential of the devices.
We look forward to continued system learning from the Terrigal Inspire initiative.