What next?
Carol assumes that the more people there are using the Toolbox, the more likely it will develop, especially if teachers want more content to enable them to go further with their students.
"As students get better at Food Technology there will be a need to increase the breadth, and in some cases the depth, of knowledge in the Toolbox. If everyone were doing Food Technology from Year 7-13 then some students would be able to handle for more complexity in the Toolbox, or extra topics areas could be covered in the senior school," she says. "As seniors gain more Food Technology knowledge they will push the boundaries with their own research and the teachers will learn along with them. This will cause the Toolbox for that school to grow of its own accord. Of course each school, as they develop links with certain food industries, will also find the need to expand the knowledge to match the type of projects their students are doing. However, there is a danger with these sorts of things that the knowledge required at each level gets harder and harder. There will be a need at some point for nominal levels to be set, but that is not possible until the Toolbox has been used, tested and its performance evaluated in a number of schools – a project for the future."
Carol and Diana both comment that someone who isn't really teaching Food Technology is less likely to pick up the Toolbox, so ideally there should be some professional development attached to starting with it. They feel that the human link helps make a connection more than a computer or paper, and that the Toolbox is only meaningful when teachers use it in their own classroom.
Diana thinks a section on resources could be a useful addition to the Toolbox. It is much simpler for a teacher to choose what to check when they know that a textbook, or section of a resource, has been particularly recommended. She has drafted a document with information on resources but, until she decides if it will actually be useful or even be used, will leave it at that stage.
Diana decided to take a break from teaching at the end of 2007, and is presently doing contract work in Technology education.
