| T: | OK, and then full stop. Now once you type this t, unless someone has wiped the information that address should be in the list. So put in the t and we’ll see what we’ve got. Here we go. Funnily enough, it’s the one right on the top. Now to get to that, if you use your down arrow, that will then highlight that on the left and now press enter, and it saves us a whole lot of typing. And then it’s taking us to a site on Russell. Now I know for a fact that in here is the answer to the question, so, do you fancy reading out aloud or read quietly to yourself and we’ll have a look at it when we get to it? | |
| L: | Do I have to read it to you or…? | |
| T: | Oh, you can read it to yourself if you like, it’s really to find the information. Now this site, working with the Internet, you can tell within… [a small diversion occurs involving learners in a nearby room] OK, now, talking about Internet sites, we were looking over here on the scroll bar, this one tells me that this page is gonna be quite big. There’s gonna be quite a lot of information on this site, so just give you an idea, the answer is about, half way down, OK, so, scroll down and I’ll just tell you to stop. Oo, oo, off we go, all sorts of writing. I’ve actually been to Russell once. Screamed through about, 40 mile an hour. |
There was only one other interchange in this session where the teacher endeavoured to have the learner undertake an explicit reading task:
| T: | What do you think the name of that boat is? Let’s have a look, make it big so you can read the name of that boat. That’s the beggar, oops, here we go, here we go… | |
| L: | a | |
| T: | OK | |
| L: | e, l, l … Belle | |
| T: | That’s exactly what it is actually, and that would say, Bay Belle, yeah, belle as in belle of the ball, girl type stuff. |
The second session involving computers was an office/retail Training Opportunities course which took place in a room where each learner had access to their own computer. Much of the observation period involved learners working independently on a series of tasks off a worksheet using Microsoft software, with the teacher roving to check their work or helping learners with issues arising in their work. At times the whole class gathered in a separate teaching space in the same room where the teacher covered specific numeracy topics (decimals, division). At other times she taught a small group who had difficulties with specific topics while the rest of the class worked independently on their computers. In this way, the teacher was able to focus her teaching on specific students’ needs, while the computer-based tasks provided other learners with work independent of the teacher. The third site involving computers was in an integrated class teaching business skills.
Even though we only saw three teachers actually teaching with computers, all except two of the 15 teachers observed said they were able to access computers for their learners. Seven of these locations involved moving into a nearby computer suite (which they usually shared with other teachers and required advance booking), while the remainder had computers available in the rooms where they were teaching.