Future Focussed Learning

Our children are entering a world that is looking for abilities far different from the traditional. We want them to be able to collect, synthesise and analyse information and then work collaboratively with others to apply that knowledge. They need to learn how to learn and to respond to the constantly changing technologies and social and global changes in the world.

Parent Information Evening

In term 4 each year we hold a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) parent information evening. All year 2 parents and caregivers who are moving to Year 3 the following year are invited to come to this evening. Any other interested families including those new to Sunnyhills in year 3-6 are also welcome to attend. The time and date of the evening will be advertised early in term 4 each year.

Current Session times for 2021:

Scheduled sessions have now ended for the start of the year. If your child would like to bring a device to school please let their classroom teacher know so they can organise a BYOD agreement and setting up the device for you.

We recommend a Chromebook for students who are

bringing a device to school in year 3-6.

What to look for in a device:

• Light Weight

• Great battery

• Tough casing

• Auto-update life of 3 years or more (details here for Chromebooks)

Why a Chromebook?

• Easy login process for students

• Chromebooks work seamlessly in the Google Environment

• Cloud-based storage

• Automatically complete software updates without disruption

• Light-weight and great battery life

• Less on-device distractions

• Easy to powerwash - reset to factory settings if there is an error

• Don't currently require anti-virus software

Bring Your Own Device allows students to have one-to-one time on a device that is set up to their specifications for their learning. This has many benefits, including:

• enabling students to take increasing responsibility for their own learning

• empowering students to learn at a pace and place as well as a way which suits them

• teaches students how to discern what tool will best help with their learning

• encouraging and enabling teachers to more easily implement personalised learning

• prepares students for a future where they are likely to be working in an environment with increasing amounts of technology and IT/collaborative/cloud based tools.

How does Google Workspace for Education (previously, Google Suite, GAFE) work?

The Google Workspace for Education (GSuite) offers apps for email, calendar, blogs, documents, presentations and website creation as well as Google Drive, which is a way of organising all of the work done on these apps. The use of these apps is free and can be used in ‘the cloud’ - a collaborative environment where others can access and work on documents together in real time. Google Workspace allows students to access their work from school, home, the local library - anywhere with an internet connection.

What is Hapara Teacher Dashboard?

Hapara Teacher Dashboard is an interface which brings together the tools of Google Workspace in an overview style so that teachers can access, set tasks, mark and comment on work completed in Google Workspace. It gives teachers the ability to oversee an entire class of work, like they would a class set of exercise books. It also allows teachers and senior school staff the ability to oversee all the activity of any student account. This gives the ability to do a range of things, including, but not limited to: changing passwords if students forget them or suspending an account if the Student Responsibility Agreement is breached. You can read more about Teacher Dashboard here: https://hapara.com/products/g-suite/

We hold a BYOD information evening for parents and caregivers towards the end of each year. Confirmation on of the date and time will be sent out to year 2 parents at the start of term 4, the date and time will also be put in our community calendar.