Meet our new Leader of Digital Technologies Curriculum Development
Welcome to Mr Harrison who joins us from Lower Hutt. Mr Harrison will be developing a range of new digital technology courses at Westland High School.
Kia Ora Everyone,
My name is Matt Harrison. I am honoured to have joined Westland High School as the new Digital Technologies Curriculum Development Leader. I am passionate about STEM subjects because of their power to realise potential.
I grew up on the coast in the North of England and studied a BA Hons in Digital Media at university, before becoming an IT professional in web development and graphic design. When my older kids started school in the UK, I was inspired to give back, so I left advertising & publishing and retrained as an ICT / Computing teacher. I’ve taught at various schools from Y7-14 in England before moving to Aotearoa New Zealand in 2007.
My family and I have moved to Hokitika from Lower Hutt, Wellington. It’s been my honour to work at Hutt Valley High School, St Bernard’s College and The Mind Lab where we introduced dozens of schools to Virtual Reality, 3D Printing, Robotics & Drones, Animation and Web & Games Coding.
We love the South Island and have travelled down here for holidays and so are really looking forward to living and working in such a neat place. I want to thank the SLT for asking me to develop new courses for the new curriculum, which is now called Digital Technologies Hangarau Matihiko (DTHM). This year we will have a brand new 1213DTHM course for Level 2 and 3 senior students to learn to design 3D models and code webVR apps (Virtual Reality) with Aframe.io using modern software development approaches, such as user centred design and agile project management.
In addition to developing new courses. I am keen to build links with whanau and the wider community. For DTHM projects which will help the students to solve problems and to design & develop authentic solutions. If you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to email me: mattharrison@westlandhigh.school.nz