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Dept for Education and Employment

Answer

Mr. Clappison: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what steps he is taking to improve the teaching of information technology in schools following the annual report of the Chief Inspector of Schools; and if he will make a statement. [92748] Mr. Charles Clarke: We are taking significant and unprecedented steps to improve the teaching of information technology in schools. We were appalled at the completely inadequate state of such preparation that had been made both in ITT and for serving teachers before May 1997. We have made available through the New Opportunities Fund (NOF) £230 million to provide serving teachers and school library staff in the UK with training in the effective use of ICT in schools. There will be strong pedagogical content in the training to ensure that ICT is used effectively to enhance the learning experience. This will bring serving teachers up to the same standard as teachers emerging into the profession whose training will have followed, in part, the Initial Teacher Training Curriculum for ICT in Subject Teaching which was introduced in September 1998. To underpin the training we are making available over £300 million to increase the number of computers in schools, so teachers can have access to them. The availability of computers must go hand in hand with the training. In addition we recently made £23 million available for the purchase of 9,500 multimedia portables for teachers so that they can learn about IT in their own time. Finally, teachers will be able to access the virtual teachers centre (www.vtc.ngfl.gov.uk) being developed by the Government and schools will have the benefit of being able to get better value for the purchase of computers and equipment following our managed services programme launched on 21 July.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

92748; 336 c181W

Session

1998-99

Subjects

Curriculum ICT Standards Schools

Contains statistics

Yes