Established principles of good management still work in the midst of the great technological changes that are happening in classrooms. Forthill Primary school in Dundee, which has been commended by HM Inspectors for its “ICT ethos” , proves how true this is.

The school has 68 computers for the use of 468 P1-P7 pupils and 70 nursery children. Of these, 14 are in the computer suite, two are in the nursery and there are three in each of the classrooms.

Obtaining the hardware is the easy part. Making the best use of it is more demanding and requires teachers who are not only confident and comfortable with the technology, but also prepared to take every opportunity to integrate information and communications technology into the curriculum, no matter what the subject.

As Forthill Primary pupils file into the library and take their seats at the computers, their expertise with the technology is obvious.

The first step in creating a good ICT ethos, explains headteacher Lydia Catto, is creating a good ethos. That means setting ambitious but realistic goals, plenty of praise and creating a positive atmosphere for the pupils and teachers.

It is essential, explains Ms Catto, to generate a whole school policy on ICT and to have all the staff involved in creating and implementing the plans. However, one of the first lessons she learnt when ICT development began at Forthill Primary more than four years ago was that trying to do everything too quickly will not work. Although all the teachers should be involved, they will not all move forward at the same pace and schools must make due allowances for differences in aptitude, interest and experience among the teachers.

Even now, after the school has had three years of training and support from Dundee City Council’s education department plus one year of New Opportunities Fund training, Ms Catto admits: “We’re not there yet and, given the speed at which technology is developing, it’s probably true to say we never will be.”

Nonetheless, a great deal of progress has been made.

In the Primary 7 classroom groups of Anne Hodge’s pupils are rehearsing presentations of work they have been doing - on Japanese origami, creative writing and mathematics, for example - which they are going to deliver in the assembly hall. They have been using PowerPoint software and the colourful slides they have produced, featuring unusual sound effects, scanned images and text, seem very professional.

Each of the slides is presented in turn by members of the group. This guarantees some involvement by every child in the class. They and their teacher are clearly comfortable with the technology and with speaking in public.

“The children are quite laid-back by the time they reach this stage,” says Ms Hodge. “They first meet PowerPoint in Primary 6 and before that they use a simpler package called Textease which they begin in Primary 2. As long as the teacher revises the basics before introducing the more advanced packages, the children don’t find the transition difficult. And as more and more of them have computers at home, it’s growing easier all the time.

“These days you can even do a bit of peer tutoring, letting one pupil carry on helping a group while you move on to the next.”

Not all the children have access to computers at home, says Ms Catto, and the feedback she receives from parents, children and her teachers has shown that the school computers, besides their educational role, are performing a valuable social function. As one girl told her, they ensure that “you don’t feel left out of things if you haven’t got a computer in the house”.

One of the teachers admits she has needed more assistance than most with using computers. “In class I was fine till the kids had a problem; then it would take me too long to solve,” she says.

“When we were training after school I found it all a bit intense. You’d do loads of things then come home with a pile of work.

“Things began to improve when they gave us time out of the classroom to work on ICT, and Dundee brought in a staff tutor to talk to us. She was very approachable, very patient. It is so much easier when somebody shows you.

“I’m a lot more confident now but I’ll probably always feel I’ve a bit to go. There’s always something new coming along.”

Ms Catto points out some of the many examples of children’s work that adorns the classroom walls. There is a colourful multitude of photographs and images the pupils have taken or painted and then scanned into their computers, together with related articles on topics as wide ranging as packed lunches, local history, netball, lollipop ladies, the school’s wildlife garden and the fate of the giant panda.

“Mrs Black has been our school lollipop lady for 29 years and received the MBE in 1998 for services to the community,” reads one of them. “She enjoys her job but doesn’t like the snowy weather, and she is concerned about the volume of traffic, which has increased greatly around our school over the years.”

Some of this topical work in and around the school will be used next month in a collaborative project with several universities in the UK and abroad, says Ms Catto. A number of Forthill Primary’s older children will take part in a video conference with children at the University of Missouri, during which they will deliver a presentation on the school and Dundee.

HOW TO IMPRESS HMI WITH YOUR ICT

* Make information and communications technology part of the school development plan and aim to use it at all stages and in all subjects.

* Give teachers and pupils plenty of praise, support and encouragement.

* Be sure to carry all the staff along with the management, not just the most committed or most computer literate. Be prepared for this to take time: teachers’ confidence and enthusiasm will increase steadily as their ICT skills improve.

* Teachers will need plenty of support to develop their ICT skills, so non class-committed ICT co-ordinators who can help in the preparation of material, learning new techniques or co-operative teaching can be very valuable. At Forthill Primary the ICT co-ordinators are the headteacher and her depute.

* Teachers learn best when they are fresh, rather than after a long day at the chalkface. The Dundee model, which brings supply teachers in and releases staff for training in the morning, is very effective.

* Don’t expect New Opportunities Fund training to provide all the answers. Many teachers find learning from a thick manual quite daunting - “I’m sure it’s all in there if you knew where to look” - and most benefit greatly from one-to-one or small group sessions.

* Mobilise the whole school in developing programmes of study that identify activities and resources for each of the 5-14 curriculum strands and assessment outcomes. This guarantees continuity for the pupils and ensures that teachers know what to teach and how to teach it, right through the school.

* Encourage teachers and children to think up new ways of using ICT in every subject and every topic, from healthy eating to creative writing.

* When all this has been done, don’t assume everything will go smoothly. Use informal as well as formal meetings to canvas feedback from teachers and pupils about progress and whether additional resources are needed.

* Encourage everyone to talk about ICT problems and successes.

* Keep parents informed, using newsletters, leaflets and special days. Most will be amazed at what the pupils and teachers are doing with technology and some may volunteer to help. (The computerised borrowing from Forthill Primary’s library is supervised by parents.) * When the technology and the teachers have changed in a few years’ time, do it all over again.