The Royal Hospital School in Suffolk has been announced an Apple-approved Regional Training Centre (RTC) providing teachers and technical staff from schools and colleges all over the region with an opportunity to come together to access expertise, training and best practice to support their use of Apple technology in the classroom.
Apple has been promoting RTCs since 2005 with a focus on pedagogy, for sharing best practice and gaining skills. According to Apple, RTCs exist to introduce planned, effective, digital solutions to schools using Mac and iPad; to train teachers to use Apple’s tools to help enable active and transformative teaching and learning within the classroom.
iPads at Royal Hospital School
Dr Jonathan Allday, Director of Information and Academic Systems at the Royal Hospital School, said: “We are delighted to be announced as an Apple Regional Training Centre. The school has mobile technology well embedded into its teaching and learning; a process that started in 2012 when all of our teachers were provided with an iPad alongside two years of intensive training. By September 2015 every pupil in the school was using an iPad in the classroom and for planning, access to resources and communication. Our recognition as an RTC is a result of this well-planned and considered approach to incorporating technology into our teaching and learning and the enthusiastic support provided by our innovative IT solutions providers, XMA.”
Over the next 12 months the Royal Hospital School Apple Regional Training Centre will provide at least 12 training sessions, kicked off with a recent conference entitled ‘Information Technology at the Heart of Learning’.
Headmaster, Simon Lockyer, adds: “This accreditation is validation of the progress the School has achieved since September 2012. At RHS mobile technology has become a key tool in personalising learning and igniting enthusiasm amongst our pupils. We believe that introducing mobile technology, to our classrooms has a number of distinct practical benefits for pupils but the principal focus is on how they can be used as part of the teachers’ repertoire to enhance teaching and learning.”
