The Lesson Plans in the Online Teaching Resources are the “Teacher’s Guide” with everything that the teacher may need for each lesson (Task). They are constantly updated based on your feedback and the changes in technology and trends in Computing and ICT teaching. So, do not download everything at the beginning of the academic year.
In order for a teacher to have access to the Online Teaching Resources, the school must have adopted our ICT series. We have to verify the adoption and the existence of the teacher in the school before giving access to the specific teacher. This may take a couple of days, and for this reason, during teacher registration on the platform, we need full and correct teacher and school details (including the school code). After the verification, the teacher will have full access to everything that we have available for them.
Use the Online Guide (PDF) on the platform to see how you can register as a BinaryAcademy teacher.
If you are thinking of using our ICT series, it is logical to want to be sure about the material that you will get. We can provide you with all the teaching resources for some lessons of different grades to get an exact idea on the teaching support material that we provide to you. Our agent can also provide you with sample Student’s Books and the Scope & Sequence of all the grades.
Each level includes several different resources, so it is mainly up to the teacher how much time will be spent on each lesson or module. The minimum required time is one academic hour per lesson in the computer lab for Digital Kids and two academic hours per lesson for Digital Teens (preferably back-to-back for maximum efficiency) without any required time for tests or exams. This means that the primary students will need about 30 hours and secondary students 60 hours per year to complete the respective material. Even with lost time due to celebrations and holidays, you will have enough time to complete the course covering a diverse selection of tools and technologies in each grade. The minimum required time per lesson for eSkills or Digital World is similar. However, eSkills or Digital World contains fewer modules per grade, so the total number of lab hours is less than Digital Kids or Digital Teens.
With the online teaching resources and the editable Activity Worksheets, the above required time can be easily increased if the school requires so. Students can also get extra homework for more practice on PCs or tablets at home. The existing material can easily provide work for two academic hours per week in primary grades and three academic hours per weeks in secondary grades. It is up to you. How fast you want to go, the level of Computing and ICT competence of your class, how many hours you need to cover in the classroom, the computer lab or with project work at home, how many teaching weeks you have available in your school and anything else you may think of. The series are very flexible, and the printed and online material is enough for all needs.
We can provide your school or institution with a detailed pacing chart for your specific needs.
Working at home is not required (and we do not expect all students to have an available computer at home), but if the teacher knows that the students are able to access a computer (PC or tablet), they can practice a lot with the textbook material or the extra downloadable activities. Students can use open source and free applications on a Windows PC or an Android or iOS tablet at home which will also help them work with different environments and tools and maximise the effectiveness of our curriculum.
Teachers are responsible for grading the students’ assignments and projects. The lesson plans contain any information needed for each lesson and its components like the Activity Worksheets.
The answers to the Activity Worksheets are included in the Online Teaching Resources.
Contact us for the different ways of implementing Binary ICT Skills in your college or university. We can share our experience from similar institutions and provide you with ideas and suggestions.
We train teachers and master trainers on how to use our educational materials in K-12 and higher education. Our trainers have considerable training experience in regions like Latin America, the Middle East and Asia.
Our goal is to improve teachers’ practice in all areas of their work. An educational institution is a learning organisation, a place where everyone needs to continue learning throughout life. So teachers should continue to learn more about the subjects they teach and learn more about how to teach those subjects. By combining our material with emergent views in pedagogy, curriculum, and class organisation, the training sessions are designed for the professional development of the teachers.
We know that there are Computing and ICT teachers, especially newly graduated teachers without any previous experience, who lack the required teaching skills although they are technology experts. For this reason, we have prepared teaching courses that can help these teachers or even experienced ones that are looking for new ideas.
The Teacher Training has two main parts:
PART 1
The first part addresses the overall structure of the student and teacher materials of the Computing and ICT series published by Binary Logic: Digital Kids, Digital Teens, eSkills, Digital World and Binary ICT Skills. It also explains the components, instructional style, lesson pedagogy, and other suggestions as to how the materials can be used effectively.
PART 2
The second, and perhaps more important part, provides teacher training for those who may have deep knowledge and skill in computers and technology, such as IT people — but are less familiar with the art of teaching students in a school environment. Practical tips, best practices and helpful advice are provided on classroom management, student behaviour management while in the computer lab; time allocation; lesson planning; managing assignments; and assessment strategies. It will also benefit those teachers who may have experience with teaching elementary students, but not secondary…and vice versa.
At the end of the training course, the teachers get a Teaching Computing & ICT Certificate from BinaryAcademy.
BinaryAcademy teacher training is about the teaching methodology we suggest and the effective use of our curriculum components by the teachers. We assume that an ICT teacher at least knows how to work with Microsoft Office and Adobe tools.
Unfortunately, there are no specific formal requirements for a Computing and ICT teacher. A CS degree plus a pedagogical background would be perfect, but we have seen that some teachers without university degrees have performed much better in the classroom than others. Do not forget that a Computing and ICT teacher has to be a teacher above everything else. Even if someone is an IT expert, they cannot overcome simple problems without proper teaching skills. This is what we want to “fix” with the BinaryAcademy teacher training course by improving their teaching skills.