Videoconferencing with a Glasgow designer

Some of Ian Stuart’s pupils at Islay High School are taking part in the Fantasy Design project (www.fantasydesign.org), promoting basic skills in design. Schools across Scandinavia and northern Europe are involved and receive visits from professional designers. Because of the remoteness of Islay, which is a small island off the west coast of Scotland, Ian and his pupils have instead been videoconferencing with a designer from The Lighthouse in Glasgow. 

In this session, two first-year pupils and two senior pupils videoconference with designer Tassy Thompson.

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Teacher profile

Ian Stuart is principal teacher of technology at Islay High School. He studied at Glasgow University and Strathclyde University. He first worked as an electronics technician and then moved into computer service engineering. He has been teaching for nine years and Islay High School is the second school at which he has taught.

He teaches technological studies, craft and design, product design and practical craft skills. He uses ICT a lot in technological studies, when it is appropriate to the lesson. He sometimes records pupils’ work with a digital stills camera and uses a video camera to record and review practical skills with pupils.

Ian is extremely keen to promote the use of videoconferencing at the school and has a number of ambitious projects lined up. These projects are linked with the feeder primary schools on Islay and Jura, to improve primary/secondary transition, and with an engineering company in another design project. 

Islay High School is on the edge of Bowmore on the island of Islay, which is off the west coast of Scotland. 256 pupils from Islay and the neighbouring island of Jura attend the school. 26 pupils have free school lunches, nine are recorded as having special educational needs and six pupils speak English as a second language. The average length of teacher service is around 15 years. 

The school has 96 computers with an ISDN connection. There is no dedicated ICT room and the ICT coordinator post is a part-time one. Staff can do distance learning European Computer Driving Licence (ECDL) course and Microsoft Academy training is available within the school.