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Yellowknife students take on tech

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Student "Tech-Spert" Ethan Hannah helped facilitate a session about technology during a Student Summit at St. Patrick High School on May 14. The computer screen in the background is displaying a Google experiment called Paper Planes where users across the world use their mobile phones to create and fold their own paper plane and "throw" into orbit on the screen. Meaghan Richens/NNSL photo

Earlier this week students at Weledeh Catholic School, St. Joseph School and St. Patrick High School took part in a student summit on technology and innovation.

A student at St. Patrick High School uses an Oculus Go VR Headset to take a virtual tour of the International Space Station. Meaghan Richens/NNSL photo.

Students in the Yellowknife Catholic Schools (YCS) technology leadership program called 'TechSperts' helped run sessions for over 700 of their peers, with two days full of tech-based learning activities on Monday and Tuesday.

“They work all year long to build their technology skills and be advocates for technology in their buildings,” explained YCS superintendent Simone Gessler.

“So they support their peers and they support teachers when needed, but really it’s about them learning and leading in the area of technology.”

Part of the TechSperts' role is to build a presentation or workshop around a technology tool to teach others about.

During workshops last week, students used VR headsets to tour inside the International Space Station (ISS), flew drones, used augmented reality to learn about the solar system and learned about coding.

A student at St. Patrick High School uses a MERGE Cube, an augmented reality tool, to learn about our solar system. Meaghan Richens/NNSL photo.

“It’s really about creating, contributing and communicating through the use of technology tools that are valuable in what we do every day, but also what we do in our learning as students and teachers,” said Gessler.

The purpose of the summit is to teach young people who are digital natives new approaches to and uses for technology, beyond the various social media platforms they use in their daily lives she said.

“It’s two days that really look at how we can use technology as a learning tool to be creators, as opposed to consumers of technology.”

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Sasha McBryan, a Grade 7 Teacher at St. Joseph School, uses her cell phone to throw a simulated paper air plane into cyberspace during a Student Summit at St. Patrick High School on May 14. The paper planes take off from around the world, and are stamped with their location - in this image a plane has just taken off from Stockholm, Sweden. Meaghan Richens/NNSL photo
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A student at St. Patrick High School uses a MERGE Cube, an augmented reality tool, to learn about our solar system. Meaghan Richens/NNSL photo.