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  7. Innovative curriculum delivery in NSW Access Network schools

Innovative curriculum delivery in NSW Access Network schools

Innovative curriculum delivery in NSW Access Network schools

Team Members

Assoc Prof Philip Roberts
Dr Jenny Dean
Natalie Downes
Michael Barbour (Touro University USA)

Partners

  • NSW State Access Leadership Team
  • Riverina Access Network

Project Timeline: 2019-2023.

The NSW Access Network schools program offers a shared curriculum for senior secondary students across clusters of isolated schools throughout the state. Schools  up to 300km apart share teachers in specialist subjects by co-timetabling subjects. Specialist teachers are physically situated at one of the network schools and teach students using a combination of live video conference lessons and structured learning activities via a learning management system. This means that students do not need to move away to access specialist subjects that cannot be provided to small numbers of students in individual remote schools (Harriman, Daly, Dione-Rogers, Wong, & Knight 2016; NSW DE, 2020).

In this study, we aim to explore how Access Network schools in NSW are delivering school education using technology to enable students who are offsite to access education. We draw on the teachers’ experiences,  international literature about online teaching and learning, and the NSW model of ‘What Works Best’ (CESE, 2020) in school education.

The purpose of this project is to understand which areas teachers feel are successful in distance learning and which areas require more development. This will provide a basis to create professional development programs for teachers and to inform curriculum development in these schools.

Teachers in Access Network schools will be invited to participate in a survey and semi-structured interviews.

The understanding gained through this study will inform future practice, professional development for teachers in NSW Access Network schools, and inform  curriculum delivery in these schools.

Publications

  • Downes, N., & Roberts, P. (2020). Offline distance education (already happening all around Australia) can be highly successful. EduResearch Matters.  https://www.aare.edu.au/blog/?p=5473
  • Roberts, P., & Downes, N. (2020). Online schooling and distance ed? Don’t be afraid, we’ve been doing and improving it for 100 years. EduResearch Matters. https://www.aare.edu.au/blog/?p=5305
  • Downes, N., Roberts, P., & Barbour, M. (2020). Defying distance, ameliorating access: school education for remote Australian students. Education in the North: the journal of Scottish education, 27(2), 248-255.

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For further information on this project, please contact us.