Frankston High School is located on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula. Spread across two campuses, VCE and Years 7-10, Frankston High School has approximately 1650 students. The School has four computer labs, several computer pods containing 8-10 desktop computers and over 600 Notebook computers.

Starting in 1995, Frankston High School has implemented the largest Notebook program in a government school in Australia. Years 8 to 10 undertake Notebook classes as well as over 150 Year 7 students participating in a Tablet PC program. The challenge facing Mr. Travis Smith, Frankston’s Director of Computing, was the impact of this technology on teaching and learning for the students.

“Tablet PCs are revolutionising teaching across the school’s curriculum. Our students have high levels of engagement, pay more attention in class and as a result retain the information they have learnt.”

Utilising Heulab virtual software, and other Tablet PC specific software, these students write stories and create illustrations or animations to bring their stories to life. In mathematic classes, students use Microsoft OneNote to create an electronic lever arch folder to organise information and problem solve electronically. In other subjects, such as Japanese, the classroom learning experience has been transformed.

With research demonstrating that employers look for staff that can multi-task, organise, collaborate, take initiative and work effectively in a team environment, Travis believes that the students of Frankston High School are learning skills that will set them up for life. “Through our Tablet PC program, the students are effectively and efficiently learning the survival skills required of employees of the future. And all this is happening as part of the education process!”

Travis explains, “One of the major issues in teaching Japanese, unlike other languages, is the script. With French or German, words can be developed from characters on the English keyboard. With Japanese, the characters cannot be so easily keyed in. Our students use their Tablet PCs to write Japanese and keep it electronically for future reference.”

The interaction between students and teachers is also high as a result of the school’s curriculum. “Every Notebook student and all teachers have wireless access to the internet as well as a dedicated email address. The internet and email accounts are filtered and we reinforce the need to be sensible and responsible. We also offer instant messaging that is only available during specific classes. This enables two separate classrooms to communicate with each other on projects without being in the same room.”

Travis believes that Frankston High School keeps the content relevant to the students of today. “We live in a small world that is rapidly changing as a result of technologies such as internet, email, pod casts. We have created more information in the last 20 years than mankind has generated over the last 2,000 years. We prepare our students to deal with change and how to filter information in order to be successful in this dynamic environment.”

With such a technologically advanced learning environment, Travis is responsible for the curriculum, the professional development of staff, the management of technology and technical staff. He also is responsible for the results of the Tablet PC program.

“We are very happy with the results of the program. The level of engagement of our students cannot be disputed. We have also noticed that students are mentoring and coaching one another unprompted. Feedback from the parents is that they love the program. They are blown away by what the children are doing and what they are capable of.”

Travis says that he could not have such a successful program without the support of Computelec. “The service provided to us by Computelec is second to none. 95% of our Notebooks are fixed on the same day at the school by a Computelec technician.”

To Frankston High School, it is critical that the repairs are completed as efficiently as possible, as Travis explains: “Our curriculum has been established so that every student uses their Notebooks or Tablet PCs throughout their classes. The very success of this program rides on the support and service we receive from Computelec. If we have one student attending class without their computer, they can be left behind and miss out on essential information.”

Travis hopes that through the success of the Tablet PC program at Frankston High School, other schools will be inspired to integrate technology into their classrooms. “Our classes are interactive between student to student and student to teacher. Our program is relevant to the students of today and they learn and use information as they never have before. As a result of the success of this program, we will be rolling out The Tablet PC program to all future Year 7 Notebook students that attend Frankston High School.”