School's innovative use of technology hailed

PETER MEECHAM/The Press

WEB ENTHUSIAST: Nick Cooke, 6, of Fendalton Open Air School, works on his class's blog site. Parents are able to monitor and comment on what the class is doing.

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Young children at a Christchurch primary school are blogging their school day as it happens, allowing parents to keep a close eye on classroom progress.

Fendalton Open Air School has won international praise for its innovative use of technology.

Principal Paul Sibson said the children used blogs, photo-sharing and YouTube, which fed onto the school website during the day.

"The real trick with it is getting the parent feedback on it," Sibson said.

"The children are putting their learning online and then the parents are commenting back on it to help them move forward.

"They love it when they see someone else putting a comment back to them. And that's how you learn through feedback."

The children could "not necessarily" have a conversation with their parents and every comment on a child's blog was vetted by their teacher.

"From the parent's point of view, they can go and see what's been going on in school. Then, rather than at the end of the day question `what did you do today' and [get] the grunted response or nothing, they can actually go and see what's going on."

Sibson used a blog to communicate with the school's board of trustees.

This week three Christchurch principals were visiting the school to learn more about the programme.

The school had a digital safety procedure and parents had to sign an agreement about digital safety before their children started.

Google's head office in the United States was so impressed by the school it featured Fendalton on its global blog highlighting excellence in applications of technology in the classroom.

"Simply put, it's a remarkable use of technology by a school in New Zealand, which has been noticed around the world," a Google spokeswoman said.

Auckland University professor John Hattie said the programme encouraged feedback which his research suggested was the most important factor for student achievement.

"It's OK for the kids to say what they like; it's OK for the kids to make errors," Hattie said.

"The teacher has to be very aware of building that kind of trust and building that kind of environment because then they can get information from the kids.

"It's a hard shift. It's an attitude shift a mind shift.

"Teachers need to see themselves as change agents; they need to see themselves as the agents of change in the classroom and to do that they have to really listen to kids."

- © Fairfax NZ News