Early days in Fife with Microcomputers
I remember being a pioneer of computing in schools in the early 80s...trying to do educational things with Sinclair Spectrums, BBC Microcomputers and of course cassette tape drives! - fun days. There was a huge demand for 'night school' lessons for adults around 1984/5 and I offered the first class of its type in Fife. From one advert we had 93 people turn up! This resulted in me running classes 4 nights a week all year! They came in with their computers, Spectrums, Dragons, Commodores, etc etc and TVs of course and I somehow turned my limited knowledge of BASIC into a lesson for all these dialects <nostalgic sighs>. I went on to head up the Computing Studies Department in a large Secondary school, pioneering O-Grade (as was) Standard Grade and Higher. I was also at that time (1989) doing an M.Ed at a local university. This resulted in the need for a dissertation, so I undertook an investigation into the courses and provision on offer across the whole county (Fife) at that time.
Kevin Thompson, May 2008
