Al Diyafah High School, Dubai

AVerVision VP-1 brings an added level of excitement to science class

Al Diyafah High School was founded in September 1982 by Mrs Winnie D’Cunha. It started as a nursery with only two children in a small villa located at Diyafah Street, Satwa, Dubai - that’s how it got its name. The founder’s main objective was to draw out the best in each child’s spirit, mind and body. Today, the school has children from Nursery to Year 11. The school has science laboratories, a computer laboratory, an audio-visual room, arts and crafts room, a music room, tennis facilities, basketball courts and other facilities to enrich both physical and mental activity.

Embracing the 21st century classroom

Al Diyafah High School is one of the oldest schools in Dubai, and it proudly proclaims a commitment to excellence. Over the last three years, the school has exhibited a major change in its attitude toward embracing new technology for use in the educational field. They have invested in teaching resources such as multimedia projectors, interactive boards and learning response systems. When the school heard they would have the opportunity to try the AVerVision visualizer (document camera), they could not wait to start using the equipment; and, being no strangers to technology, the teachers and students took to the equipment straightaway.

Science projects come to life with the VP-1

In one class, the children had a lesson on skeletal systems that started with a typical classroom discussion on vertebrates and invertebrates. The children were busy writing points of comparison and differences in their notebooks, when suddenly one of their models was shown on the interactive board via an AVerVision visualizer (document camera). In an instant, there was a rush of students to the front of the class, all wanting to adjust the image and use the function keys of the VP-1. They froze the image, changed the brightness, zoomed in and out, etc.; it was amazing to see how easy it was for the children to operate the VP-1, and to see the joy they received from using it in class. At a later point in the lesson, they connected the visualizer (document camera) to a laptop and found they were able to switch between camera and PC inputs with ease.

The VP-1 is an all-around hit

It was a novel experience for the children to see their own work projected in class via the visualizer (document camera), commented one observer. Arafat, a student whose project was shown to the class during the skeletal system lesson, was absolutely thrilled by the experience, going as far as to call the VP-1 “a cool gadget!” As for the teachers, they particularly liked the zoom and freeze features found on the VP-1.

Ms. Radha, the head of the primary school commented that in addition to the visualizer's (document camera's) usefulness in displaying students’ everyday work, the VP-1 could also be very useful during demonstrations in science classes. In the end, it seemed as though Al Diyafah High School was quite pleased with their experience using the VP-1 from AVer, making reference to the belief that in order to properly prepare today’s schoolchildren for the future, classrooms need to be equipped with the latest educational tools, like AVerVision visualizers (document cameras).

“It was a very enlightening and enriching experience using the visualizer, and it is a good collaboration between the teacher and the students.”
- Ms. Lakshmi, Teacher, Al Diyafah High School


AVer would like to thank Al Diyafah High School and ALMOE Digital Solutions L.L.C for providing this case study.