tjprofile

Title: Master of Science and Art in Geography and History from the University of Aarhus in 1976.

Profession: Upper-secondary Teacher, Web Master, Organizer of ICT Courses.

Place of Work: Langkaer Gymnasium and HF, Kileparken, DK-8381 Tilst.

Web Site: http://www.langkaer.dk

Background

I was born and bred on a typical Danish dairy farm. I passed my A-levels (Academic high school diploma) at Aarhus Cathedral School, which is more than 800 years old and one of the oldest schools in Denmark .

After graduating from the University of Aarhus in 1976 I chose a career as an upper-secondary teacher, teaching Geography and History to students preparing for their A-levels (university entrance exam) in the Danish gymnasium.I have been at my present school since 1980 and apart from being a teacher of Geography and History I am also the school Web Master, responsible for our Web Site and involved in organizing ICT courses for both students and teachers.

Teaching my two subjects is both exciting and rewarding. Classroom work is varied and innovative, characterized by project work and the use of ICT. Langkaer Gymnasium and HF is appointed as a European ENIS school, which means that we are a model school, in the lead as regards integration of ICT in
teaching and communication.

In Denmark we have many oral exams as well as written exams and they are both compulsory parts of the final exam. All exams are censored by the teacher himself and an external examiner/censor, who assess and grade the performance together. They must agree on the grades awarded. All teachers are external examiners/censors and go to other schools to censor our colleagues? oral exams. This gives us a unique opportunity to exchange
ideas and new material and develop our own teaching.

I also write text books for upper-secondary Geography. I was co-author and editor of one of the most widely used basic books since 1992 in upper secondary teaching of Geography, Nature, Culture, Man, (1992), and have since been in a small group of developers of Internet-based teaching materials, mainly GIS-based.
At a European level I have participated in the development of a number of projects e.g. COURSE, Colleagues Using Remote Sensing in Education, http://www.geografforlaget.dk/course
At present we work at combining this kind of work with the introduction of GIS in Denmark by GO GIS Denmark, http://www.gogis.dk where ?Net books? can be found on e.g. Floods in Norway, Exercises on Copenhagen City Denmark and Sea Ice near Greenland.

Internationally I have been lucky enough to participate in Space Camp in Alabama, USA, together with all the remarkable teachers of the year from all over the USA both in 1999 and 2000. It was an exceptional experience and gave me an extensive and exciting network. It has even been possible for me to have American colleagues visit my school and participate in classroom activities.I have also had a Zulu colleague from South Africa staying and teaching together with me for 5 weeks, which was an inspiring experience for all. He was here
as part of the development of democracy in South Africa.

In connection with developing GIS courses in Denmark I have participated in study trips to California and the Mid-Western United States. I have never participated in conferences like the WCCE2001 before and found it highly inspiring and the personal contacts a great experience and encouragement, that I hope will continue for a long time.

This has inspired me to take parts of a Master?s degree in Mutimedia and Education at the University of Aarhus and lately begin post-graduate GIS studies at the University of Aalborg, Master of Technology Management in GIS (Geographical Information System).

I am the web master of our school and a member of a small activist ICT group, who have created and organized our in-service training when the school was wired in 1997 and all teachers connected to our server from home. This training concept was so successful that it has been the model for other schools and we
have been invited to run courses at a number of schools.

Also the County of Aarhus has supplied all teachers with computers and arranged advanced subject-based internet courses to integrate the internet and the First Class system in classroom teaching. The courses are run entirely as distance learning courses. I am the course organizer of the Geography course.
This course concept and the courses themselves have just been sold to the County of Copenhagen.