In July 2002, the
history department at Mexborough School received addition money
from the gifted and talent fund to produce a Virtual Tour of
Conisbrough Castle with our Year 9 students.
In preparation for the site visit the students were put through
an enrichment programme on medieval history and an advanced
course on ICT. The classes took place after school and were
taken by Mr Huggins. During this time the students were taught
how to edit film and use digital cameras and cam recorders.
Specialist teachers were brought in to help teach the students
how to use some of the more advanced features of PowerPoint.
Once the students
had been through the enrichment process they were organised into
three groups to work collaboratively during the field trip to
investigate, film, edit and produce a virtual textbook on
specific aspects of Conisbrough Castle. This virtual textbook
was designed to help deliver the National Curriculum course
called ‘Medieval Realms,’ which is taught to our Year 7 students
in the Summer Term.
On the day of the field trip the students went around the castle
with the tour guide before breaking up into their groups, which
looked at defences, everyday life and building and setting
Conisbrough Castle. Each group was equipped with their own
digital cameras and cam recorders and were assigned a member of
staff to help guide them through the site. The students chose
which parts of the site they were going to digitally record and
which aspects of the castle they were going to highlight in
their section of the tour.
Once the field trip was finished in the morning the students
returned to the school were they spent the rest of the afternoon
planning their virtual tour and editing their digital pictures
and film. The students then attended a further five after school
classes to complete their section and to produce observation
sheets for Year 7 students to fill in whilst they were watching
the Virtual Tour of Conisbrough Castle.
It was decided that the best platform for delivering the tour
was PowerPoint as it could be broadcasted through a data
projector by a teacher or played on individual workstations by
students filling in observation sheets. The students used
Windows Movie Maker to help them edit their digital images.
|
What has been the impact? |
 |
The students
have thoroughly enjoyed the enrichment programme, which has
stimulated their interest and understanding of both history and
ICT. It has also helped to develop their planning, literacy,
oracy and presentational skills, whilst at the same time
allowing them to experience some of the processes that teachers
go through when designing and delivering a body of knowledge.
The department now has a Virtual Tour of Conisbrough Castle,
which has just made it through to the finals in the Becta ICT in
Practice Awards in the inclusion category. It is an original
idea, which it is hoped will help to encourage others to develop
similar projects.
As part of the scheme the department is going to send a copy of
the Virtual Tour of Conisbrough Castle to all the history
coordinators in the authority so as to help spread good practice
and encourage similar projects.
The gifted and talented funding has help to create an
infrastructure and body of experience within the school that
will enable the department to produce similar projects. We are
currently considering doing a virtual tour of the First World
War battlefield in France or Magna in Rotherham.
|
Follow up and timescale: |
|
|
Our gifted and
talent students will make a presentation to the Becta judges on
1st October 2002. They will also make a similar presentation to
the school’s governors on 11 October 2002.
Year 7 will have their curriculum enriched with the virtual tour
in June 2003. It is expected that CDs containing the virtual
tour will be sent out to other schools in either November or
December 2002.
Mr Huggins is delivering two Inset courses to Heads of History
and Geography in November to help cascade the good practice that
has been learnt through the project.
If the Virtual Tour of Conisbrough Castle wins in the Inclusion
category then the presentations take place during the national
teaching awards in January 2003.
Finally, the CD with the virtual tour on will be donated to the
Ivanhoe Trust who run Conisbrough Castle so that they can market
the CD and sell it to visitors and other educational
institutions outside of the authority.
If anyone would like a copy of the tour then Mr Huggins will
forward a copy in their e-mail. However, you should be warned
that the file size is 15megs. If you have broadband access it
will take 8 minutes. Any other connection could take several
hours |
Quick
links to 
