Education Technology at HD Beijing

These days, there is nothing more exciting than the incorporation of technology in education.

At HD Beijing the use of technology in the classroom is not for the purposes of bombarding our students with information but to enhance their learning experiences and develop them into responsible digital citizens. Technology is incorporated into our curriculum through dedicated technology lessons and through integrated technology within homeroom lessons.

Our Upper Primary students (Grades 3, 4, and 5) have a dedicated ICT (Information and Communication Technology) lesson which primarily focuses on digital literacy skills.

Digital literacy is the ability to use ICT to search for, evaluate, create, and communicate information. It utilises both technical skills and conceptual knowledge. Within these lessons, students learn thetechniques necessary to keep themselves safe online, conduct internet research and practice proper digital etiquette. The mastery of these skills will ensure students are effective communicators within any online space.

Besides the digital citizen aspect of ICT, much of the ICT curriculum focuses on creating digital artifacts in which students can share information with their peers.

Over the course of the last year, they have taken the form of 2D and 3D animations, coding, video and sound editing, the making of presentations, desktop publishing and robotics. 

Some examples of student work were the Grade 3s creating hilarious cooking shows utilizing a green screen and the Grade 4s creating digital stories through the medium of stop-motion animation. Our students are extremely talented and creative and it is always amazing to see them bring those innovative ideas into the digital artifacts that they create in their ICT lessons.

The technology infrastructure at HD Beijing is quite extensive with both teachers and students having access to a wealth of digital resources. Teachers have access to MacBooks, interactive whiteboards and cloud services that make planning and collaboration easy. 

Students enjoy using the amazing apps on our classroom iPads as well as our younger Prep learners joining in for coding classes using programmable robots. Many teachers have also shared that using technology in the classroom allows them to accommodate their students’ unique learning styles by enhancing the experience of the learning.

Recently our Grade 5 learners enriched their learning experience when they incorporated virtual reality into their lesson.

Our learners expressed that using the virtual reality experiences was not only fun but also made the concepts they were learning more tangible. The use of technology in the classroom allows for students to take more responsibility and ownership in how they learn. It is also a great way to keep our students motivated.

At HD Beijing we all understand that the use of technology is not a replacement for good quality teaching, but when paired with innovative and reflective educators, technology can be an amazing resource.