Katherine

I was unwell for a couple of days in Katherine so we didn't do much but we went to the largest classroom in the world. The Katherine School of the Air goes out to children in area of 800,000 square kilometres. They are Northern Territory children who can't get to a normal school. There are some NT kids living in Bali, Papua New Guinea, Africa and the Philippines who do school of the air too. There are about 250 students aged between 4 and 15. They can do up to grade 9 this way. The school has been running for 43 years and used to use just a crackly radio, but now they have satellite internet and can see their teacher on the screen. The kids use a digital camera, microphone, scanner, and a graphics tablet to send their work electronically to their teacher. They have a tutor at home, mostly their Mum, and they do work that they post off to Katherine. When they do art work they get all the paints and papers and glitter or whatever posted to them because they can't just go down to the shop. Sometimes the kids have to take time off to muster cattle or go fishing. The kids get together a couple of times a year and do school in a classroom in Katherine and have a camp and do learn to swim. The kids were on holidays so we didn't get to see any lessons but we saw a DVD and a lady told us all about it.