E-learning takes off at Tarawera High

Tarawera High School in Kawerau has implemented a new e-learning programme which will allow more collaboration and see students' learning needs met.

The school's mission is to create partnerships with the community that harness and fulfil the potential and aspirations of rangatahi and whanau.

Due to its focus on opportunities for students and their mission to create partnerships with the community, Tarawera High School has subscribed to and implemented an e-learning programme within their school called Volcanics.

The programme enables Tarawera High to pool resources and collaborate with schools from the central North Island.

Students from this area then have access to subjects offered at Tarawera High, and Tarawera High's students in turn have a wider and more flexible range of subjects to choose from.

The logistics of the Volcanics e-learning are quite simple; teaching and learning are catered for through an online environment. The teachers have scheduled lessons each week which the students sign up to and run for the whole academic year.

Tarawera High has its own Volcanics classroom, where the lessons are taught and broadcast from, and where the students go when they have their scheduled Volcanics class. They sign in and are met with a teacher from the Volcanics cluster. Some of the tools used by e-teachers and e-students are Google Docs, Google Site, Skype, Ultranet, email and video conferencing.

The subject Tarawera is specialising in and offering this year is French - a course which will prepare students for Level 1 French.

Simon Mees, the e-teacher for French, said teaching in the Volcanics programme was "an innovative way of teaching which offers the chance to embrace modern learning and gain new skills in IT within a classroom setting".

Tarawera High has noted a rise in Volcanic enrolments since last year, and enrolments across the board were in such high demand they had to be cut off.
- Supplied by Tarawera High School

Other schools in the Volcanics Cluster:
Coromandel Area School
Forest View High School
Mangakino Area School
Melville High School
Mercury Bay Area School
Murupara Area School
Opotiki College
Paeroa College
Putaruru College
Rangitahi College
Reporoa College
Rotorua Girls' High School
Rotorua School for Young Parents
Ruapehu College
Tauhara College
Te Kura Mana Maori o Whangaparaoa
Thames High School
Tokoroa High School
Tongariro School
Trident High School
Wairarapa College
Whakatane High School