Petra Földes – Márta Kőrös-Mikis:

Best Practice in the Application of ICT at the Primary School Level

Observing the use of ICT among children

The aim of research conducted by the National Institute for Public Education (OKI) during the 2005/2006 school year was to investigate the utilisation of ICT and the adaptation of digital teaching methods in the introductory phase of education. We were curious to find out the following: to what extent are primary schools in Hungary able to provide a foundation for digital literacy; how prepared are they to help children acquire the basics of ICT knowledge in creative way with a view toward developing their skills, how familiar are schools with the didactic materials developed by OKI and similar organisations, and if so, what sort of teaching methodologies are used and how?

We employed a complex method of research to answer these questions, the goal of which was to produce case studies for further assessment. ICT is not yet regarded as a typical subject or method of application in Hungarian primary schools and therefore lacks the technical background and teaching content that is currently present at the secondary school level. A representative survey on the situation of ICT in primary grades may provide numerical data concerning hardware-software and personal conditions, but in general, it would only reveal deficiencies. Such an approach would not lead to progressive educational policies or result in further dissemination in terms of popularising the topic. For this reason, we began working with a small, but carefully selected sampling of schools with characteristics that might to some extent demonstrate – albeit not statistically – the current situation of ICT in primary education. The 7 schools we chose are located in both urban and rural communities. One of these is a “leading-edge” institution with more than two decades of ICT tradition in lower grades, but the sampling also includes a school where the subject has only recently been introduced among young school children – as of September 2005 – inspired in part by methodological developments posted on the OKI web-site. In various institutions for handicapped children with multiple learning disabilities, computers have provided a handhold for integration in other areas. Each institution shows ICT usage among primary school children from several aspects, and these reflect the current heterogeneous situation nationwide.

Case studies also involved the analysis of school documents in order to reveal how these have incorporated ICT usage as stipulated by the National Core Curriculum (NAT). We examined the personal and material conditions in schools as well, and by visiting lessons, we were able to observe the developmental application of ICT in the classroom. Educators had the opportunity to express problems and make suggestions in the course of guided interviews with the help of a questionnaire we compiled especially for this purpose. In the interest of defining innovative and adaptable models, we focused primarily on “best experiences” and also recorded personal interviews with a single student who was recommended by a teacher in each school.

Case studies were conducted at the following sites:

School	Location	Educator	Reason for selection
The Primary School for Computer Science	Budapest, 13th District, Gyöngyösi stny.	Mrs. Margit Szendrői-Nagy	“Leading- edge”
Pál Gönczy Elementary School	Hajdúszoboszló	Mrs. Csaba Bacskay	Nurturing talent
Mátyás Hunyadi Elementary School	Istenmezeje	Sándor Fürjes	1st grade “recently launched”
Sándor Kőrösi Csoma Elementary School	Tatabánya	Mrs. Nóra Pányi-Segesdi	Disadvantaged children
György Dózsa Elementary School	Veszprém	Mrs. József Pap	Children requiring special education
Primary School for the Physically Handicapped	Budapest, 14th District	Mrs. Rozália Jánó- Kékesi	Special education
Ilona Andor Primary School of Art	Budapest, 3rd District	Mrs. Péter Nyilasy	“newcomer”

The individual features of each school

1. The Primary School for Computer Science is located in the Angyalföld district of Budapest in the vicinity of a public housing estate. Children here have been acquainted with computers since 1986 in the framework of an elective subject and 1st grade classes specialising in ICT have been launched every year since 1989. Today, computer science training determines the profile of the entire school: pupils in lower grades study informatics in divided classes for one lesson a week, in two lessons a week in higher grades while 7th grade students take four lessons a week. These are supplemented by various study circles and the use of ICT for lessons in other subjects. Following the 8th grade, one class of students is capable of passing the ECDL Start exam, for which they are prepared in an extracurricular course. The ECDL module entitled Visual Culture has also been incorporated in the study material for an additional group of pupils.

The school also deserves to be called a “leading edge” institution because of its facilities. Every classroom has its own computer and there is a “digital equipment cart” (laptop and projector) for each floor of the building. Students in upper grades have the opportunity to gain Internet access in 6 special classrooms and a total of 45 multimedia computers are located in 3 separate computer science labs.

ICT knowledge is an advantage for educators applying for employment at the school and post-graduate training in computer science is an important part of the institutional strategy for the further education of existing faculty members. (The aim is to enable all teachers to pass at least an ECDL Start exam.) Everyone is expected to teach a lesson with supported by the School-net Digital Knowledge Database (SDT) at least once every quarter of a year. The resulting lesson plans are used to establish a school database so that elements of individually planned lessons can be utilised by other colleagues at a later stage.

As the main sponsor, the local government also takes responsibility for the operation and development of the school, which it regards as a top priority. At an institutional level, the mid-term goal of the Quality Supervision Program run by the local municipality is to “…strengthen the use of ICT in the everyday teaching process”, the primary task being to achieve “an advanced level of informatics training.”

2. The Pál Gönczy Elementary School is the largest of 5 primary schools operating in the community of Hajdúszoboszló. Its student body consists of 540 children (270 in lower grades) in three parallel classes for each grade. The school strives to satisfy “consumer demand” and for this reason its post-graduate training plan places a high priority on up-to-date knowledge. At an earlier stage this included informatics training while the focus now is on foreign language skills.

The school functions with 2 specialised informatics classrooms, the larger of which is has exceptionally good features, including 20 multimedia units with internet access. This spacious room is excellent for lessons involving active computer applications for up to an entire class of pupils. Instruction takes place in a network of specialised classrooms (history, mathematics, physics, and language-lab), several of which are also equipped with their own computers. I this way, students in lower grades can use computers during their informatics lessons, in the reading room of the school library, in a separate training room and in the framework of afternoon internet-study sessions.

3. Located in the small settlement of Istenmezeje in Heves County, the Mátyás Hunyadi Elementary School is among the institutions that have recently introduced informatics lessons beginning in the 1^st grade. Half of the 120 pupils attending the school are in primary grades. School director László Simon had already begun to establish computer science training in 1985 using the HT 1080 computers available at the time. Today, all of the 13 educators on the faculty have acquired some form of informatics training, and 4 among them have advanced qualifications to teach informatics. The school places a strong emphasis on the use and teaching of ICT, and this is also reflected in the structure of its curriculum. In accordance with its pedagogical program, pupils in the 1^st and 2^nd grade are “familiarized with the subject of informatics in keeping with the freely developed lesson-time prescribed in framework curricula by the Minister of Education.” This means that even the youngest students in the school are already users on ICT.

The school has used its own resources to finance the installation of its IT equipment, the majority of which was acquired through tenders. It curently operates with 18 multimedia units located in a special informatics lab equipped with internet access, 2 additional units in its day-care centre and 1 in the school library. Computers also assist the work of school administrators and faculty members. The institution takes full advantage of the opportunities provided by its computer lab, which is used for informatics training and other subjects before noon as well as for study-groups during the afternoon hours. Classes use the internet at intervals every Wednesday afternoon, and a 60-hour computer training course is held for parents every school year.

4. The Sándor Kőrösi Csoma Elementary School operates in a former mining settlement near the county seat of Tatabánya. Due to a high rate of unemployment and migration, the area is populated by many socially disadvantaged families. In the past, the school ran special education classes for small groups of students, but in accordance with the current policy of the municipal government, training for disadvantaged children is now integrated. The municipality provides funding for surplus lessons as well as for teachers of handicapped children: there are currently 20 special educators working with 157 pupils in 8 grades. School administrators consciously support the use of IT in the training of elementary school children, which means that students in the 1^st grade already learn informatics in divided groups during 1 lesson each week in accordance with the local applied informatics curriculum. The primary aim of these lessons is to foster the children's development via computer usage; the theme of each lesson is always connected to a specific school subject. (In divided lessons, one group participates in development activities.)

The school has 2 informatics classrooms that function with a total of 25 multimedia units, all of which are used for primary training as well. Recently, some of the replaced Pentium-1 units have also been re-located in classrooms used by grades 1-5 so as to meet the needs of teachers and pupils there. Since the children spend much of their time in the school, and because many of them lack appropriate study conditions at home, it is important that they also be able to use computers in the afternoon and outside of their informatics lessons.

5. In the city of Veszprém, there are 11 primary schools run by the local government and two that are operated by foundations. Among the 310 pupils studying at the György Dózsa Elementary School, 52 officially attend speech-therapy courses designed exclusively for children in need of special education, including those from the entire school district. The work of speech therapists at the school is assisted by an outstanding special-development room equipped with 3 computers as well as tools for physical therapy. In addition, pupils in lower grades are also able to use 15 computers in the school informatics lab along with 3 more located in the library. Computer usage in lower grades is geared towards special development through the application of software specifically designed for this purpose. The majority of faculty members have computer qualifications; 12 teachers have participated in ECDL Start course financed by the Ministry of Education and 22 have home-computers acquired through special tenders.

6. Located in the Zugló district of Budapest, the Primary School for the Physically Handicapped is one of two special institutions in the city that provide education for handicapped children. Since the utilisation of ICT plays a crucial role in meeting the special needs of some students, educators are expected to have appropriate knowledge. All of the 32 faculty members in the school have user experience and 16 have passed the ECDL Start exam as well as acquiring their own computers through tenders announced by the Ministry of Informatics and Communications.

All 18 classrooms in the school are equipped with computers, along with an additional 5 units in both the typewriting and language labs and 8 more for personal use by the students. Students in grades 4-6 become acquainted with computers in the format of so-called typewriting lessons and then begin taking informatics lessons in the 6^th grade, but computer use by both teachers and students occurs on a daily basis thanks to the units that are located in each classroom. The school also runs an extremely popular study circle that focuses on the production of digital films.

7. The Ilona Andor Primary School of Art in Óbuda is still a “newcomer” with regards to informatics training for children at the elementary school level. In spite of this, faculty members are exceptionally qualified in terms of computer knowledge. Over the past two years a total of 25 staff members have participated in two separate in-house computer training courses, and several have passed ECDL exams. Among the 8 educators working with children in lower grades, 6 have taken part in these training programs. At present, the school has not launched informatics training in lower grades. Compulsory informatics lessons for 4^th grade students in accordance with the requirements set by the National Core Curriculum (NAT) – 1 lesson/week – are to be introduced in September of 2006, but even these will only fit into the local curriculum in the framework of “free periods” and only based on parental consent. The school is aware that there is a need for a heavier emphasis on informatics training: “Parents have enrolled their children here because this is an art school, but the first question they ask is whether we offer sports, foreign languages and computer science!”

School officials also clearly recognise the excellent opportunities provided by computer applications: IT is used partly for graphic demonstration in the course of art lessons, but also in light of a very positive experience in connection with a former student. The young girl in question was blind, but she managed to complete her studies in all 8 grades by using a Braille typewriter to take notes during her lessons. At home, these notes were loaded onto a computer, after which she was able to learn the material with the help of reading software. Other positive experiences and the artistic profile of the school served to reinforce the idea that a possible solution for the utilisation of informatics might be to incorporate NAT requirements in the study material for various subjects – in a way similar to the institution in Tatabánya. Such a solution would be especially beneficial since the school already employs teachers who may be able to achieve it, for example by making use of informatics experiments conducted in their previous schools. It was precisely for this reason that we selected the Ilona Andor Primary School from among other “newcomers” in order to present as “best practice” how an institution with an entirely different profile came to recognise the importance of ICT training.

Institutional priorities

It is interesting to note that in the majority of schools under observation there is a correlation between the personality of teachers who engage in best practice, comprising a well-intentioned initiative, and the appearance of informatics as an institutional priority. A question for further research may be whether institutional priorities attract and keep innovative educators or whether their teaching practice has an impact on the prestige of informatics within the given institution i.e. what sort of mutual effect these two factors have on one another. Although the extent of our studies was considerably small, our experience indicates that in the overwhelming majority of cases the development of informatics education was initiated by school directors and then followed by further training for faculty members (e.g. the Primary School for Computer Science in Budapest and the Mátyás Hunyadi Elementary School in Istenmezeje). At the same time, excellent practice conducted by one colleague, as in the case of the schools in Tatabánya and Hajdúszoboszló, significantly raised the sensitivity of the school directors. Increased computer activity among the faculty as a whole, spearheaded by the school director, is more apparent in the former case since it was in these two schools that we observed teachers who specialise in other subjects regularly using computers during their lessons.

We are able to draw intriguing conclusions by examining the pedagogical programs of various schools from the aspect of whether they include informatics training as a priority for students in lower grades. Schools that place a high priority on informatics are those where schools officials consider development in this area to be a personal issue. Consequently, along with the school for informatics in Budapest, training programs at the institutions in Istenmezeje and Tatabánya reflect the strongest emphasis on informatics for students in lower education.

Equipment

All of the schools we visited have an informatics classroom equipped with a multimedia-network and access to the internet, elements which are obviously crucial to informatics training at higher levels. Pupils in lower grades who are not yet taking informatics lessons use this equipment in an organised study group format (Andor Ilona Elementary School and schools in Veszprém and Hajdúszoboszló). Children attending the school for the physically handicapped, the school for computer science and the elementary school in Tatabánya are free to use any available computer equipment. Students at the school in Istenmezeje use IT in the informatics classroom under the supervision of teachers during lessons and study circles, but the day-care centre also has two computers that pupils can utilise freely. Not counting computer labs, among the classrooms provided with computers, only those located in the Primary School for the Physically Handicapped have network and internet access.

Informatics knowledge among educators

Since we regard the use of ICT in the course of acquiring digital literacy to be especially important both within and outside of the lesson framework, the level of user knowledge and experience among educators is a significant factor. It is worth noting that in all of the schools engaging in best practice, including those we have encountered in the course of previous research, the number of teachers with strong qualifications and user knowledge is very high. During our interviews, several school directors mentioned the beneficial impact of official efforts to assist educators in obtaining computer equipment. We estimate the rate of computer usage among the faculties we observed to be as high as 90%, but this does not necessarily mean that the direct application of IT in the teaching process. According to the active teachers we asked, their colleagues primarily use computers for word-processing, surfing the internet and electronic correspondence.

Our special survey revealed that in schools where best practice exists, faculty members typically exhibit an active interest in computer usage, which is generally manifest in their high rate of participation in computer training courses, competitions to obtain hardware, internet usage, correspondence and the skilled application of IT to create exercises for their lessons. This led us to the notion that it may be worth examining the connection between these influences more closely in order to find out what has an impact on what. Are educators motivated by the skill of a few clever colleagues, access to personal computers at home, or opportunities to access IT in their school environment? We should not forget that support from school officials is also an important factor in this process! None of the aforementioned efforts to improve school facilities, to provide home computers for teachers and launch inexpensive post-graduate training courses on or off-site could have been achieved without such support. We suspect that the computer knowledge among faculty members in the schools we visited (especially among educators dealing with children in lower grades) is higher than the national average. The next stage of research, therefore, should focus on the expectations and motivations of both school supervisors and faculty members at “best practice” institutions so as to discover how a given faculty makes the shift towards the application of ICT.

Based on discussions with the colleagues we visited, it can be said that with the exception of a few older staff members, 80-90% of the teachers at the schools we surveyed use computers – but almost NEVER during their lessons! Use of computers in the teaching process is limited to preparing exercises and collecting data on the internet. Regarding computer usage during lessons among the faculty as a whole (along with the computer science school in Budapest), the school in Istenmezeje – which specifically requested assistance from OKI in order to “launch” informatics training for its pupils in elementary grades – seemed to be more of a “leading edge” institution. Surprisingly, despite the fact that this school was still making its first steps towards integrating informatics as a separate subject for young children, it was here that we actually saw colleagues making frequent use of the informatics classroom to teach math and language lessons. Once again, it is worth pointing out the decisive role of the school director: in the case of Istenmezeje, the development of informatics training can be directly attributed to the director himself, who does in fact regard improvement in this area to be one of his most important institutional priorities.

Teaching or application? Lessons learned from lessons taught:

We observed the application of informatics in all of the 10 lessons we visited. These were divided as follows:

• 3 “official” informatics lessons (School for Computer Science, 4^th grade; Hajdúszoboszló, 3^rd grade; Tatabánya, 3^rd grade)
• 5 special need skills development lessons (School for the Physically Handicapped and Veszprém)
• 2 specialised subjects (School for Computer Science, mathematics, 1^st grade; Istenmezeje, drawing, 2^nd grade)

(We were unable to observe lessons at the Andor Ilona School of Art since computer activities have not yet been introduced in a lesson format.)

Informatics lessons

The lessons we visited as well as the prevalent teaching methods reflected a modern approach: the computer was “only” a tool used in the course of practical activities dealing with information; it was not an end in itself. All three of the lessons were referred to in their respective timetables as informatics, and in all three cases actual computer usage was preceded by a lengthy presentation phase, including elements involving movement and drama. It is important to mention that the classroom arrangement – especially in Hajdúszoboszló and Tatabánya – was specifically designed to support such activity. The centre of the classroom was occupied by a suitably large, roughly square-shaped space that served to accommodate group games, which the teachers used to prepare students for their computer exercises. In this way, computer usage was integrated with other activities, thus avoiding a situation where an informatics lesson is reduced to an isolated student-machine relationship.

The initiatives in Hajdúszoboszló and Tatabánya are noteworthy because at these two sites informatics appeared as a medium for transmitting pedagogical aims. In Hajdúszoboszló, it provided an important context for nurturing talent and creativity while in Tatabánya it was a significant tool for compensating handicaps. In each case, the informatics lesson acted as a realisation of the local applied informatics curricula, the central aim being to develop intellectual, linguistic and social competencies through the use of ICT. It may have been for this reason that, irregardless of the curricular format, the teachers referred to their lessons as “composition classes” – and this is what they actually were: composition classes assisted by computers in the framework of informatics lessons. In Hajdúszoboszló, differentiation, creative development and the nurturing of talent appear as specific pedagogical goals and results in the course of teaching informatics. The teachers themselves used professional approaches that were very similar, but each school must perform different tasks as a result of their divergent socio-cultural environments, and informatics tools provided excellent solutions in both circumstances.

Informatics applied in other school subjects

We were able to observe the explicit application of information technology – i.e. computer usage in lessons dealing with subjects outside the realm of computer science – in two schools that have already been mentioned earlier in several respects: The Primary School for Computer Science in Budapest and the Mátyás Hunyadi Elementary School in Istenmezeje. Since all classrooms at the school in Budapest are equipped with computers, one or two units can be used at almost any time during lessons whereas the school in Istenmezeje uses its informatics lab to conduct computer-supported lessons in other subjects. At the first site, we visited a mathematics lesson for 1^st graders, and at the second, a drawing lesson for pupils in the 2^nd grade.

In terms of methodology, the situation is entirely different when a classroom is equipped with one or two computers as opposed to one where every student has access to their own unit. All of the teachers we visited saw opportunities for methodological diversity in adapting to the equipment that was available to them. During the mathematics lesson, held by Mrs. Margit Szendrői-Nagy, we witnessed two kinds of computer usage. First, a laptop and a projector were used to give a Power-Point presentation to assist the entire class in reviewing and practicing previously learned material, after which groups of 4 students each continued with more practice and skills development exercises using the “Manó-Math” and “Süni-Math” software (Manó=Gnome, Süni=Porcupine). Meanwhile, the rest of the class engaged in group-work without the aid of computers, each group dealing with a different task. The drawing lesson held by Sándor Fürjes at the school in Istenmezeje made maximum use of multimedia opportunities: after a lively, informative and interactive frontal presentation that served not only to set the mood, but also to help students brush up on their knowledge, the students worked individually to create their own winter landscapes using the drawing program on their computers.

In both of these lessons, interaction related to the operation of computers and software was minimal. The children concentrated on the given exercise, applying computer skills they had already acquired. In practically all of the lessons we visited, the teacher made one or two gestures that took advantage of the children's flexibility and further improved their user knowledge, motivating them to tackle the given task with only a limited amount of instruction and information.

Special need development

Once again, it should be pointed out that the classroom arrangement is also an important factor in the effective application of computers during the teaching process – if we are actually speaking about application and not about using the computer for its own sake. Obviously, the arrangement of the study space should be well-designed to support computer usage while remaining subordinate to pedagogical functions in a broader sense. We have already mentioned classrooms in Hajdúszoboszló and Tatabánya, which both have features that facilitate common activity. Another prime example of a classroom arranged to suit its function is the special need development room at the school in Veszprém. Here, the three available computers are discretely located at the back corners of the room, which radiates a relaxed atmosphere and contains an appropriately large space to accommodate tools of physical therapy. There is no separate computer room because in this case the children complete computer exercises in the framework of lessons that incorporate a variety of activities based on differentiated, individual development plans tailored to fit their needs (from physical exercise to drawing, and from sound-formation to vocabulary building).

As the pupils carried out their tasks, we again observed that they possessed the necessary cleverness to operate both the computers and the software. Hence they were able to focus on the special need development exercises, which was the actual aim of the lesson. Moreover, the work of Mrs. József Pap reflects a pedagogical approach that has made use of computers for the improvement of skills from the very beginning. It is based on her instructions that students at Veszprém University develop therapeutic software, and she has also created a methodology suitable for the production of many similar kinds of software designed for children with normal traits.

Also worthy of attention is the fact that teachers currently dealing with skills improvement are still isolated, working with software ordered and developed through their own personal initiatives, and yet the beneficial impact of computers on their activities is undisputable. Among others, they help to eliminate delicate movements that pupils are not capable of, provide opportunities for instant feedback and the correction of mistakes, break monotony with pleasant signals (images, melodies, “gifts”), and offer possibilities to measure improvement etc. A central initiative would be very important, both in the area of training and further education as well as in the development of teaching aids, so as to make computer-supported skills improvement activities more common.

Computer applications at the Primary School for the Physically Handicapped in Budapest could be observed in the framework of typewriting/machine-assisted writing lessons, a subject developed by the teacher, Mrs. Rozália Janó-Kékesi. Many of the students at this institution suffer from coordination and muscular disorders, or are missing limbs, and so are unable to write manually, which means that computers offer the only opportunity for them to achieve literacy. These pupils operate the computer keyboard with the help of specially designed personal aids – tapping instruments attached to the forehead, to eyeglass frames and stumps, or clamped to the mouth. How the keys are distributed depends on the nature of the given handicap, and it was also Mrs. Kékesi who developed the optimal distribution in each case. Her method has also attracted the interest of the Gusztáv Bárczi Faculty of Teacher Training for Physical Therapy at the Loránd Eötvös University of Sciences. Even so, as in the previously mentioned examples, it is through personal acquaintances and initiative that institutional visits and presentations for the dissemination of the method are organised, in spite of the fact that there is a great need for access to this crucial methodology in all schools that use an inclusive approach to educate handicapped children – and even if there is only one child who requires this type of assistance!

The outstanding features that computers provide in terms of simplifying certain tasks – the power to build confidence, measure achievement and motivate performance as well as the feeling of security inspired by concrete feedback – were clearly apparent in both of the aforementioned institutions.

Methodology

Thinking over the lessons we observed gave us the opportunity to summarise methodological issues arising in the course of computer usage and applications at the lower primary school level in order to focus on the solutions that were applied in best practice.

Space and timeframes

Successful activities were fostered by comfortable spaces; only one activity took place in a “partitioned” classroom (the computer lab at the computer science school in Budapest), but even this room had a central space large enough for games involving movement. The children also moved comfortably in the informatics room at the Istenmezeje school and were easily able to survey and critique each other's “work”. The classrooms for skills improvement were also arranged to serve their intended function, and not exclusively for “sitting behind the computer”. This means that opportunities for interactive multimedia utilisation and subsequent changes in the content of informatics as a subject led to a transformation in the optimal environment for computer-supported activities. As separated cubicles presumably designed for independent work are replaced by more open areas, good practice dictates that instead of small classrooms containing “computer cabinets”, informatics labs are increasingly being located in larger spaces.

Concerning the aspect of time, it was an intriguing experience to watch how appropriate pedagogical supervision enabled children to maintain their concentration throughout a 45-minute lesson, 15-20 minutes of which provided ample time for them to complete their work with the help of drawing and word-processing software. Experience has shown that primary school children grow tired after more than 15 minutes of computer work, but in the lessons we visited, their activity was playful and motivating. Therefore, methodological variety, dramatic elements and games involving physical movement not only stimulated work from a didactic standpoint, but were also appropriately tailored to meet the children's age-specific needs whereas they would have been overburdened by 45 minutes of continuous computer activity.

Dramatic games

Animated dramatic games added colour to lessons, but they had a significant impact on the development of skills from the standpoint of computer knowledge as well. Such games stimulate the personality as a whole, and in this regard it can be said that they are an excellent tool for developing skills in a variety of “disciplines” – not to mention social competency. For example, in the memory game entitled “What would you bring…?” – played by the class in Hajdúszoboszló – the children were each asked to name one or two important objects that they would take with them on a long journey, but before doing so, everyone had to repeat what their classmates had mentioned. This exercise develops attention and memory, but in terms of informatics, it also helps to practice the concepts of matching and ordering while giving the class an opportunity to listen to one another and become acquainted. A different exercise involved groups of children positioning themselves to form a sculpture which their classmates then tried to identify. When two students put their hands and legs together in the shape of a rhombus to form the Renault logo, the class faced a true “challenge” in trying to find the solution. In this case, the creativity of their classmates led the students to learn something about prior experience and the connection between symbols and their meaning.

When pairs of children were asked to put images in the correct order during the informatics (composition) lesson at the school in Tatabánya, we observed a very useful game that actually connects to several different areas of knowledge. Once the pictures were in the right order, each pair acted out the two-character story told by the images. At a later stage, one of the stories was illustrated using the computer, and since the children were personally involved, they were presumably capable of concentrating on the computer-generated drawings and text more than they would have if the story had been dictated for them to copy, or if they had been given an unprepared composition exercise.

Work organisation

Depending on the physical conditions, questions arise concerning how many children should work at a single computer unit and how exercises should be organised when pupils are working individually, in pairs or in groups. All of the teachers we asked held strong opinions in connection with these issues and regarded organising tasks as an important part of the work process.

Individual work is conducive to developing independence and creativity, but it requires that the children be provided with a well-defined task and certain points of reference, and then be allowed to freely complete the exercise. The teacher has requirements as well:

1. The given exercise should focus on developing a specific skill and should be able to “teach” children the desired study material.
2. Any problems that might arise should be anticipated beforehand since the teacher is under serious pressure to assist everyone simultaneously when the children are working individually.

This kind of work organisation was apparent during informatics lessons at the computer science school in Budapest and in Istenmezeje and Hajdúszoboszló, meaning that the necessary elements were present: a framework exercise, clearly defined skills to be developed and utilised, individual assistance from the teacher and common critique of the completed work.

Teachers who use informatics for the personal development of pupils strongly support utilising the computer for pair-work. We witnessed examples of this at the school for socially disadvantaged children in Tatabánya and in Veszprém during lessons for children in need of special education. In each case, one child was working with the computer while the other acted as an “observer” and assistant. This work method divides the given task so that each child has less to pay attention to, and in this way, both pupils are capable of creating a “perfect” product. At the same time, their cooperative skills, tolerance and sense of critique are further developed.

Group-work could be observed during a mathematics lesson at the computer science school in Budapest and also in Hajdúszoboszló. The use of computers in this context presents another well-known problem: each child should have a specified task and a distinct role within the group, and all participants should be active and able to cooperate well with each other. Due to the inherent physical conditions of computer work, however, the effectiveness of cooperation in groups of more than 3 participants is questionable. Our experienced in both locations showed that group activities took place based on the principle of dominance, and that all participants did not benefit from the exercise as much as they did in the case of individual or pair-work, at least in terms of computer usage. Nevertheless, a perceived “lack of equipment” does not necessarily mean that we should avoid making use of the computers available in the classroom – it simply means that closer attention must be given to the composition of the group, the number of pupils involved and the instructions they receive.

Even a single computer can be used for a frontal approach in the classroom (a more frequent solution is to make a presentation using an “equipment cart” with a laptop and a projector) as in the case of the mathematics lesson at the computer science school in Budapest and in Istenmezeje and Hajdúszoboszló. At the last two sites, the teacher took full advantage of multimedia opportunities, using digital images, sound and even cartoon films to create an atmosphere for the lesson. (The instructor at the school for the physically handicapped also uses the computer on a regular basis to play relaxing music for the children while they practice typewriting.) In place of traditional forms of explanation by the teacher, frontal presentations provide many opportunities to motivate students – this method of presentation requires only that a suitable amount of freedom be available to answer and discuss spontaneous questions from the pupils.

The acquisition of user-knowledge

We made no secret of the fact that the aim of our visits was to observe digital applications in teaching practice, and for this reason our colleagues were prepared to present us with this kind of activity during their lessons. At the same time, it was surely not by accident that we saw no direct informatics training, not even during informatics lessons! In spite of this, all of the teachers consciously chose enjoyable exercises and activities that enabled the children to learn a new element of user-knowledge with the help of instructors at the appropriate time within the lesson process! This approach seemed to be an effective way of transmitting new computer skills, especially if we take into account that the children we visited were very clever in handling computers, and that their existing skills were presumably acquired through the same teaching approach. It would be highly useful to publish a teacher's handbook containing examples of this approach along with methodological recommendations so that a the widest possible range of educators could be exposed to best practice in this area.

Reflections from children

In the course of our research, we asked one or two children at each site about their computer habits, about the difference between “computer usage” at home and at school, and about the mutual impact that these activities had on one another. The majority of interviews revealed that children are happy to use the skills development software provided to them by teachers (or downloaded from the Internet) at home as well, making use of the skills they have already learned at school. Some pupils also use software copied for them or given to them as gifts by friends and relatives.

In light of the above, it is obvious that the use of computers is strongly determined by the home environment, and it is precisely for this reason that the influence of the school should be recognised and emphasised. The children's “partners” at home include their parents, older siblings, cousins and friends – in other words, anyone in their immediate environment can serve as a role-model in terms of computer usage. In addition to what they have learned at school, the children also learn computer functions that other individuals have shown them how to use, which means that each child's image of computers varies greatly. Based on our interviews, we suspect that computer habits are largely determined by the socio-cultural environment. It would be worth launching more in-depth research with regards to the connection between computer habits and social strata. It is likely that such research would assist in the development of teaching material that is more suited to parental needs, producing a structure in which the knowledge children have acquired at school has a greater impact on their computer usage at home.

Children easily recognise the “essence” of computer usage – and this was made clear not only by our interviews, but also by what we saw during lessons. It may not be surprising that a 4^th grade pupil at the school for computer science in Budapest, a pupil who has been regularly exposed to computers for the last 4 years, mentions several ideas and applications on a spontaneous basis. We have included some of this student's comments here in order to illustrate that informatics training among children not only develops their knowledge, but also their point of view:

Summary

When observing best practice in the course of informatics training for primary school children, it was striking to see how (explicitly or inexplicitly) computer-application came to be the central focus of lessons as opposed to the actual subject of informatics – even during informatics lessons! In schools where teachers engage in best practice, even their colleagues possess reliable user-knowledge and use computers on a regular basis in the course of their daily work – but not in the classroom. The work of colleagues actively using computers in the teaching process reflects an overall trend based on methodological experience gained through professional workshops or through personal initiative, in some cases supported by more than 10-15 years of practice. At present, enough general experience is available to make collecting and organising it worthwhile, and the data accumulated through our research at participating schools can contribute to this process as well. Based on further analysis of our results and experiences, and in the interest of improving the quality of informatics training and computer application at the primary school level, we intend to draft a separate proposal to the Ministry of Education in order to facilitate further development and decision-making with regards to education policy in the future.