Hurstville Public School has run a Bring your Own Device (BYOD) program for a number of years for Stage 3 students.
Schools in Australia are currently in the middle of a huge curriculum change as we move from syllabus documents provided by each individual state, to an Australian Curriculum. New South Wales has added the changes that have been implemented by our Department of Education so we have the NSW Syllabus for the Australian Curriculum. There are many changes in the new documents but the one that is most notable is the switch from Information Technology and computer use as a separate component to other learning outcomes, to the integration of Information Communication Technology (ICT) into every facet of learning. ICT is now an objective that must be met across every Learning Area and not only must students be able to use technology in these areas but it must be used in a way that promotes 21st Century Learning including: problem solving, communication, collaborating, critical and creative thinking and analysing. Within any learning environment, there are many differing contexts to take into consideration. Web-based learning must have dynamic properties and be active, flexible and adaptive, which is exactly what our new curriculum is asking us to do.
The school recognises the need to prepare our students for a rapidly-changing world, where technology plays a large role in our personal, social and professional lives. Our findings from student consultations have revealed that all of our students want to access devices available to support learning activities in the classroom. Our findings from parent surveys have revealed that all parents feel that technology is important to their child's learning.
The success of this program relies on several factors and we hope that student access to technology, student responsibility and access to the relevant tools (in this case iPad Applications), parental and staff understanding will improve the educational outcomes for our HPS students. We hope to strengthen the link between home and school with the introduction of strategies such as BYOD.
Please find further information including the BYOD Information Package, App list and Student User Agreement below.
2022 BYOD PACKAGE and STUDENT USER AGREEMENT