Ratoath teachers to represent Ireland at Microsoft competition

Ratoath College and its MyStudyMate Project will represent County Meath VEC, Ireland and Europe in the Worldwide Microsoft Innovative Teachers’ Competition in Cape Town, South Africa, next week. After being successful at the European Microsoft Innovative Teaching Forum in Berlin last February, the MyStudyMate project co-ordinators Ursula Hynes and David Walsh are now putting last-minute touches to the project, working closely with a new set of transition year students. Microsoft has chosen a select group of educators from all over the world to participate in the company’s annual Worldwide Innovative Teachers Forum (IEF), a showcase of the best teacher-created projects that incorporate 21st century skills and effective uses of education technology. What could be called a 21st century teachers’ fair, the Worldwide Innovative Teachers Forum is being hosted in Cape Town during the last week of October. Previous destinations included Brazil and Hong Kong. The transition year students at Ratoath College designed what they describe as the new and exciting website, www.mystudymate.ie, in November 2009. This year, a new set of transition year students are looking after the project, which involves students learning how to build and develop a website which shares learning experiences and which provides students with innovative revision material. It creates a new online community, based on shared learning and challenges students to present lessons and so take ownership of their own learning.