In semester one this year, two P-12 Colleges within the Townsville Diocese took the opportunity to deliver learning and teaching a little differently!

Columba Catholic College in Charters Towers partnered with St Anthony’s Catholic College to teach Physics to a combined group of Year 11 and 12 students from both colleges using a blended learning approach.

The students from Columba were taught by Mr Heath Armstrong, a senior maths and science teacher at St Anthony’s.  Heath went above and beyond to plan, teach and assess the 14 students across both campuses.  

The teaching was delivered using an asynchronous method-- this means that the students at both schools were not completing the physics lessons at the same time.  The asynchronous method meant that Heath needed to be very creative in his use of technology to ensure that all students, across both colleges, were able to engage in the learning process in a meaningful way. Heath used a combination of screen recording software, and voice and video recording of live scientific demonstrations to engage the students.

The students at both colleges were able to engage with Mr Armstrong ‘live’ in zoom sessions and a face-to-face gathering to complete science experiments held in Term 2.  Students at both Colleges report that their favourite aspect of learning in this blended way was the constant access to recorded lessons and demonstrations that they could use for revision and assessment preparation.

This learning experience would not have been possible without the hard work of both college leadership teams and Mr Armstrong.  We thank Heath for his dedication to learning and teaching students across the Townsville Diocese.