Graphic calculators with an interactive whiteboard

intro

Margaret Ferguson is a mathematics teacher at Hermitage Academy. Today’s lesson starts with a warm-up exercise using graphic calculators to practise mental arithmetic. Following this, Margaret gives a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation on an interactive whiteboard to teach angles and bearings. The pupils come up to the whiteboard to draw and calculate bearings.

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Teacher profile

Margaret has been teaching for nine years. She is currently teaching S1–S6 mathematics and S4 computing. She uses ICT daily in her lessons.

Margaret went on a course about how to use graphic calculators and has since introduced the technology at Hermitage Academy as part of a pilot scheme. She views the calculators as a novel way of using ICT in teaching mental mathematics. She has also attended other ICT courses including a Microsoft Academy PowerPoint programme and Masterclass training.

Margaret says that she developed a lot of her ICT skills by using the technologies in school and in her own time. There is an ICT coordinator at school who is very supportive.

School profile

Hermitage Academy is a secondary school in the Argyll and Bute Authority and is based in the town of Helensburgh. Hermitage Academy is the largest school in Argyll and Bute with a roll of 1500 pupils and approximately 150 teaching and ancillary staff. The school has won two awards: the Motorola Award for Education Industry Links (EIL) in 2002 and the Scottish Enterprise Gold Award in 2004.

At Hermitage Academy there are approximately 90 pupils who have free school lunches and 50 recorded as having special educational needs. There are no pupils with English as their second language.

The school has at least 250 computers, including laptops, and each classroom is provided with a computer facility. There are three general ICT suites, one technical office, three ICT rooms for the business department, one for the maths teachers, one ICT suite in the modern languages section and one in the school library. Part of the deputy headteacher’s remit is to act as ICT coordinator. The local education authority is also available to offer help and advice.