As far as itslearning users go, Hjellestad School just outside Bergen can almost be regarded a veteran in the municipality. Five years ago this school was the only primary school to participate in the pilot phase before reaching a final decision on which learning platform to use. And five years of trial and error has lead to great results. The school administration and the teachers have now found a way to use itslearning that is working well for all parties.

The school is equipped with 2 - 4 PCs per classroom in addition to the computer room which is adjacent to the classrooms, creating a relatively open-plan solution. The pupils can move between the rooms and use the PCs in groups during the day.

Something for everyone

Naturally, the older pupils tend to user PCs more than the younger ones do. At Hjellestad they have chosen to introduce itslearning to the first graders solely on the big screen in the classroom. In this way they get used to the platform even though they are not actively using it in the first year at school.

The second and third graders use itslearning for juniors, which has colourful pictures and buttons and a simplified editor which they can write in.

At the intermediate level the use of the platform becomes more advanced. It is very popular among the kids, and the teachers have gradually discovered that the greatest advantage is that they are establishing better contact with their pupils through itslearning. "Even though we are not meant to be available to pupils around the clock, the learning platform is a great additional arena for teacher-pupil contact," says Britt Hjortland. "The quality of feedback to pupils has also improved with the use of itslearning," she adds.

Virtual staffroom

From the very outset Britt has had a pragmatic attitude to the introduction of itslearning at the school, and the implementation has taken place gradually and systematically. "Our standpoint is that a learning platform should not be used for everything. It should only be used when and where appropriate" she says.

One area in which itslearning has proven effective is for communication between the staff. "We have actually managed to cut out the weekly morning meeting where a lot of time was wasted on matters that could have been addressed via the Internet. Now we have the staffroom on itslearning where we load all practical information for teachers and the administration."

One positive side effect of the virtual staffroom is that it has increased usage of itslearning among the teachers. "Because everyone has to log in to get important information everyone has become more confident on the platform. This has also helped reduce the threshold for scepticism," explains Britt.

Supports the culture of sharing

Teamwork is important to the teachers at Hjellestad, and itslearning supports and underpins the culture of sharing which is already well-established at the school. "Some teachers are better at new technology than others, and they have been important driving forces in getting their colleagues up to speed on the platform," says the principal. Images, assignments, tests and links to digital learning tools on the Internet comprise some of the resources itslearning makes available to all teachers.

Chris André Lund is one of the driving forces at the school. He has been an enthusiastic itslearning user right from the beginning and has been of great support to his colleagues who perhaps don't share his fascination for technological tools. Over a cup of coffee in the canteen, he and his colleague Rita Wollertsen share the experiences they've had with itslearning.

"The kids think is great fun working on the platform, and they need very little training," says Chris. "It is important, however, that the teacher shows them that he or she is there." Rita supports his opinion and feels that the opening page must be prioritised. "It must be kept up to date. We encourage colleagues to load pictures there, together with important tasks, practical information and even some entertainment. The children need to find something new and exciting when they log in."

Something for everyone

For Rita who also teaches mathematics, itslearning gives her pupils the opportunity to work independently at their own level. "Those who are good performers can get more challenging work, whilst those who are struggling can get extra exercises to practice on."

Chris, who teaches English, uses the audio recorder a lot. With the audio recorder, those pupils who are nervous about reading out aloud in front of the whole class can practice and get feedback from the teacher. "The audio recorder is something that ALL language teachers should be using," says Chris. "It's simply ingenious."

Pupils take the initiative

One of the most important effects of the learning platform is that the pupils are becoming more and more independent. Chris has found this to be the case in social studies lessons where the kids are mostly working on projects. Pupils can create their own projects where they have full control on itslearning: They can invite participants, including the teacher, create folders, documents, tests, etc. and organise group work.
"One example is to ask the pupils to organise a trip in Europe," says Chris. The project groups are defined as "families" that must organise transport, describe the travel route, find hotels and restaurants, calculate costs, etc. "The pupils enjoy the task and quickly realise that itslearning gives them the freedom to organise their work as they see fit."

A practical advantage of working in this way becomes very apparent when a pupil becomes ill and classmates need to access their files. "Without itslearning each pupil would have to save their files in a personal folder on the server which would remain inaccessible to the others," says Chris.

The project tool has become a natural way to work for Chris' pupils. "They create projects spontaneously in itslearning as soon as they are assigned group assignments and they organise their work there," he says.
Photo caption: one of Chris’ pupils works on an English text in itslearning: conjugation of irregular verbs.

Continuous work

The fifth, sixth and seventh graders with whom Chris uses this type of group work, are the pupils that the principal believes the school has come the furthest with in terms of introducing the learning platform. "The juniors are still a little behind," she says, "but we are working continuously to promote good, pedagogical use of itslearning."

Even for a school with several years on the learning platform it doesn't work by itself. But resources like Chris, Rita and other itslearning enthusiasts are an incredible help. "We need beacons like them to lead the way and inspire their colleagues!" says Principal Britt Hjortland with a smile.