Oakey

Location (155km W Brisbane, 30km NW Toowoomba)

Oakey is a small country town located on the eastern Darling Downs in south east Queensland. It is a prosperous area producing cereal grains, dairy herds and beef. Named after the river oaks on a nearby creek, Oakey was established as a service town in 1867 with the coming of the railway line. Today Oakey is home to the Australia's largest Aviation Base and the impressive Flypast Museum of Australian Army Flying. Its major industries include export abattoirs, malting and engineering works. Oakey offers a relaxed country lifestyle in a friendly community with quick access to Toowoomba. Population: 3,400

Oakey State High School

Oakey State High School, is a coeducational secondary school with a stable enrolment of approx 450 students in Years 8 - 12. Established in 1964, It has a proud record of providing a quality educational service to the local community.

Our school caters for the individual needs, abilities and interests of our students. We have a highly qualified and dedicated staff who are focussed on providing a diverse curriculum, that recognises the importance of academic subjects as preparation for tertiary entrance.

In the field of Vocational Education and Training, Oakey State High has set a state benchmark for innovation. It provides a wide range of nationally accredited courses in conjunction with school based apprenticeships, which cater for the broad scope of student's needs and interests.

The students of Oakey State High School have an impressive record of academic, cultural and sporting successes.

Current Teaching Role

I am the only Business Teacher at Oakey State High School and am presently teaching three days per week in this role. I teach Grade 10/11/12 Certificate 1 and II in Information Technology and Certificate I and II in Business. I teach multiple age groups in a computer lab with 22 new computers. Each class has 3 x 70min periods a week.

In my classes I have students completing one or more of the above certificates at the one time. Depending on when they enter my class, they may be at different stages through their certificate course. As many of my students have school based traineeships, they may be absent from my classes for one lesson per week while participating in their work placement.

Students enter my classes with a variety of skills. Some do not have a computer at home and have very few ICT skills. Many surrounding districts still do not have broadband available. I need to support these students in their desire to become proficient in their vocational area of choice as well as extend the students who are adept at ICT use.

Of the cohort of students, we have a population of 60% male and 15% indigenous students. Many of the district students bypass the local high school for private education in Toowoomba. Only 25% of students sit for OP's. The majority of our students study at least one vocational course in years 10, 11 and 12.

Oakey State High School has one technician available for 5 hours a week to service 220 computers for the school. We have an assistant technician available for another 5 hours to help with minor problems. Because of this I need to be proficient in solving any number of access problems that my classes have accessing the network.

Our school is to be MOE'd at the beginning of October. Our present internet speed varies between approx 440kps to as slow as a recent reading last week of 42kps. I have been working with our Teacher/librarian/IT and Education Qld technical staff to rectify this problem. As our school has old cabling that has been installed piecemeal throughout the school buildings, the problem is not easily overcome. At times this has a dramatic effect on my classes access to learning materials online especially in blackboard. I overcome many of these problems by packaging learning materials in Dreamweaver and copying them to the school intranet, online as well as blackboard.

Current Leadership Role

As one of only two staff with the ICT Pedagogical Licence, I am looked to as a staff leader for all information regarding ICT, skill development and teaching pedagogy with ICT. I am an inagural member of our school ICT commitee. I was orchestral in its formation last year to encourage a stronger ICT culture within the school. I am responsible for upkeeping a blackboard environment which can be accessed by all staff. I provide teaching pedagogy updates and links to relevant items of interest to all teachers. As part of my participation in the MOC course this year and as co facilitator for the Curriculum Integration Course, I have access to quality professional development content which I circulate within our staff. I add to the discussion forums and encourage staff to use these forums to express and circulate ideas.

I see my role within the school to encourage teachers to upgrade their skills by completing the ICT Certificate and the ICTPL. I have addressed all staff at a school staff meeting and I am presently working with a small group of staff individually and in small groups, helping them prepare for both these qualifications. I have worked within the school to produce an Occupational Health and Safety unit which all staff can facilitate with their classes using blackboard CMS. In this unit I have made ICT integral to learning and hope by enabling other teachers to facilitate this unit it may transform their ideas and beliefs at using ICT within their teaching practice.

During recuperation from a long illness, I participated in two professional development courses to become an Accredited Facilitator for the ICTPL and completed the Mentoring Online Course. Following MOC, I volunteered to work as co-facilitator with the Curriculum Integration Course, an online course to help teachers obtain their ICT Pedagogical Licence. I have been teamed with a long term facilitator, to learn the skills involved in successful online facilititation. This has been a wonderful learning opportunity working with other keen participants all eager to improve their teaching pedagogy.

At present I am a Smart Classroom Mentor for Darling Downs. It is my role to work with teachers in the surrounding area to improve their skills and pedagogy integrating ICT into their teaching practice. I also have been given the task of creating two webpages that provide links to online and e-learning materials.