Case studies The Cornwallis School

John Plunkett, Science Teacher

The Cornwallis School is based in Maidstone, Kent. It is a mixed secondary school teaching students aged 11 to 18. The school has 1,541 pupils.

Background

We embarked on Webit, hoping that the competition could motivate pupils to find out the science behind inventions - using colourful, dynamic and interactive technology to communicate with their peers. The resulting site could be a platform for demonstrating their talents and abilities. Teachers could identify novel methods for motivating and empowering their pupils, as well as picking up new skills in the use of the Internet.

This appealing project could also answer some interesting questions:

• What influential discoveries are transforming the world around us?
• How does the Internet work?
• How do we use innovative ways to share information?

Our Webit project

Firstly we identified the skills and techniques needed to pull together a small website.

Next, a group of 25 pupils in a year 9 science class were introduced to the project and eagerly agreed to apply their imaginations and energy to the challenge.

Pupils were given an opportunity to identify a ‘big idea’ that was becoming ever more influential in their lives. It was not long before a music-related theme was suggested. The chosen subjects were the technology behind CDs, CD burners, MP3 music compression software and the distribution of compressed music via the Internet.

To organise the pupils and to give each one a chance to participate, web pages were broken up into tables and matrices, with 25 sub-sections. Each pupil was responsible for a section. Some pupils worked on original art, some on digital video, some on Flash animations and some on text.

In order to give immediate reward and to help pupils visualise how their work would appear on the Web, a secure section of the school website was used to temporarily house their site.

Our chosen themes required images of CD players, MP3 players and laser devices. I introduced two digital still cameras and one digital video camera to the class. The video camera had been given to the school as part of a BECTa scheme to promote digital video in education. We also received a desktop Apple iMac from BECTa with which to edit movie sequences and export them in a compressed format for the web.

Pupils appeared to have a greater desire to understand the subject matter of our project if asked to draw mechanisms and components. They increasingly asked questions and sought information from the Internet to visualise the structure of the music devices they were drawing. Pupils moved from drawing in a freehand style to utilising the palette of ellipses, circles and rectangles in the toolkit of the drawing software. A valuable progression in skill level.

The third week of our efforts to prepare a website for Webit included that very concerning date, Friday the 13th. Surely all our preceding smooth progress would come shuddering to a halt. What preparation could be made to protect us from the inevitable gremlins?

The combination of distrust and superstition prompted me into action. I obtained a "Patch cable" that allows quick transfer of data from one computer to another and was now armed with a backup facility that would insulate the pupils from the inevitable. I decided I would copy all the pupils' work onto my own laptop. However, I would take one small risk: just one more lesson!

Third period, Monday. We logged-in to our tablet PCs.

"My work is missing!" one pupil after another exclaimed the same astonishing remark.

It seems our very helpful technical staff had upgraded our operating system and software suite. We now had superior animation programmes, picture-editing programmes and web-page design programmes. But, we did not have our own graphical work. Disaster.

They learned a hard lesson. They'll remember that day for some time to come. But what was the reaction going to be? Would they now reject technology and go back to reliable old paper and paint?

I need not have worried. As is so often evident with the young people I have the pleasure to work with, when given independent responsibility and a challenging context, attitudes quickly become positive.

Some of our leading characters reminded us that we would soon be in front of Channel 4 cameras. What would we have to show them?

One or two pioneers quickly revealed the existence of new tools in our software. Artwork that had taken two hours to produce in the first week was now appearing at a much quicker pace, with improvements. One team of young ladies now rejected ‘risky’ drawing activities and turned their attentions to obtaining good website links.

As a result of the visit from the camera crew, our project was accelerated to such a degree that we had now put together a couple of web pages. In one session, I projected the pages onto a large screen and was surprisingly greeted with groans of disappointment. Up to that point I had been pleased that we were getting close to submission, but luckily I let them have a chance to comment and have realised that they are moving the standard up another level; they won't be happy to submit a mediocre offering.

That is the trouble when you are among winners. They keep striving to improve.

What we got out of Webit

Webit was a fun and motivating way for pupils to understand the science behind inventions, whilst at the same time improving their IT skills.

Tips and advice

Make regular back-ups of your work!