Schools online

Wellington College

www.wellington-college.school.nz

Wellington College teacher James Edgecombe (pictured) uses the internet in his classroom to illustrate lessons: "through the data projector in my room, we link to relevant news clips or look up biographies of people mentioned in texts."

James has also set up a wiki-page (a forum) where students can discuss projects: "It's hard to encourage students to participate. But if one student submits his thoughts others soon add to it."

He says that students would be foolish to ignore the resources on the net: "When I was at school we researched for formal essays using newspaper clips. Now students have access to every major newspaper with the click of a button."

James doesn't think the internet replaces good teaching and learning - it just amplifies it: "Good students have always shared work and given each other feedback. But now they can share an essay with thousands of students nationwide."

Te Aro School

www.tearo.school.nz

Like many schools, classrooms at Te Aro School in Wellington (years 0 to 8) are equipped with interactive whiteboards. Principal Bryce Coleman says that teachers can project a site - via a laptop - on to the whiteboard or download lessons on to a memory stick and plug them directly into the whiteboard: "the internet's often used to illustrate a point during a lesson".

Bryce says that the main benefit of the net is that information is easier to access and is more current: "For example when an encyclopaedia was published, the information was almost immediately out of date."

Homework at Te Aro School usually consists of literacy for the junior school and larger projects for the intermediate school: "We've found both the BBC Schools site and the TKI portal to be wonderful online resources."

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Report by Luke Harrison