ICT is a Subject in its own right

Since it was introduced in 1989, ICT has been a subject that has to be taught to all children from age 5 to 14 and beyond. You would probably expect it to have listed all the programs or skills that students should learn and you'd probably expect it to contain Microsoft Office and DOS (remember it was created in 1989).

It's that last item that shows why a list of programs would have been so inappropriate. I can't tell you the number of times I was asked why we don't "teach them to use DOS because that's what they'll use when they leave school". I'm glad we didn't - it would have been a mistake. What we did, from the very beginning, was teach children to use computers to communicate, to handle data, to model and to control - using the most appropriate hardware and software for the task in hand.

If you are a teacher, you'll need to know how to teach ICT. If you're a parent you'll want to know what your children should be learning. And if you're a student you'll want to know what you should be able to do at each stage of your school career. These pages will tell you all you need to know.

Read on below or go to next page previous page or see a film.

Information Technology was still very new when it was introduced as a curriculum subject in 1989. The first ever 'personal' computer (the 'PC') had been produced only nine years earlier to the amazement of a world which thought of computers as massive mainframe machines that ran company payrolls.

Despite this being the first ever attempt at creating an IT curriculum, the working party got it exactly right. They didn't list the programs you should use or the skills you'd need to use them. Instead, they identified a set of core activities (known as 'strands') that computers are used for:

• Communicating information
  (communicating in words, pictures and sounds)
• Handling data
  (gathering, storing and interrogating information)
• Computer modelling
  (using computers to model real and imaginary events)
• Measurement and control
  (using computers to control models and equipment including feedback from sensors)

If you're a teacher and you don't recognise these terms, don't worry. Read on and all will become clear. Also see a set of charts to help you understand how children progress.

Initially, these were referred to as 'The 5 Strands of IT Capability' and if you think about it, every single application of new technology falls into these four categories. With subsequent revisions of the National Curriculum they have been renamed but the core concepts are the same and I believe these original descriptions are a bit clearer and easier to understand.

In those early days communicating information really meant word processing and nothing else. And given that many schools only had one printer even if they had two or three computers this was a leap of faith. Yet the basic capability is still relevant today when the purpose might range from PowerPoint presentations to making videos and posting them on YouTube. Taking one other strand as an example, modelling may have started out as children's adventure games like Flossy the Frog, but the skills and knowledge also apply to exploring and interacting in a virtual world such as Second Life.

There was also a fifth strand:

• applications and effects
  (being aware of the role of new technology in the wider world)

Don't worry if you don't recognise these titles. Their names have changed but the basic concepts are the same. If you're a teacher, these are the titles you'll be familiar with:

• Finding things out
  This is data handling under another name
• Developing ideas and making things happen
  This contains communicating, modelling and control under one umbrella heading
• Exchanging and sharing information
  This covers purpose and audience (previously included in the communicating strand)

There are now two further headings:

• Reviewing, modifying and evaluating work as it progresses
  This covers choosing the best method, improving (editing) and evaluation
• Breadth of study
  This is the 'Applications and Effects' strand expanded to include collaboration and the requirement to use a variety of information types (not just words)

There are five further pages in this section which will explain ICT Capability in easy-to-understand detail. They also show how children progress in their skills and knowledge as they go through school. They'll help you whether you're a teacher, student or parent:

Charts
Communicating
Finding Out
Modelling
Control

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