Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein)
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471. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if there is now greater use of online platforms in a wider range of subjects and lessons; the additional subjects and lessons available online since 2011; if teachers are now using live web casts; the status of the digital school resource; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [17480/15]

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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In the recently completed census conducted at the end of 2013 the use of online tools and/or applications to support teaching and learning was the ICT use most frequently reported to be used regularly. Over half of post-primary principals and over one third of primary and special school principals reported that their schools regularly used content and resources on the local school server to support teaching and learning, while approximately one quarter of primary schools, one fifth of post-primary schools and just 12% of special schools used an external virtual learning environment to support teaching and learning regularly.

The use of a 'live' video two-way link to share one or more subjects with students in another school was reported by just under 1% of primary schools and by 2.4% of post primary schools and by 2.6% of special schools.

Scoilnet.ie is the Department of Education's education portal. It is actively used by Irish primary and post-primary teachers. In 2013 1.66m visits were recorded.

The Scoilnet.ie content model is expanding to become more open. It has evolved into a "repository", ie, a space where teacher-produced resources can be added by any registered teacher in Ireland. Instead of being a passive, consumption-only website, Scoilnet.ie is now encouraging and supporting teachers to share and contribute to the site by uploading their own teaching and learning resources within the "Resource Finder". In addition the website has adopted the use of Creative Commons licensing so that, where possible, uploaded resources can be made available as Open Educational Resources (OER).

The Department's support services use a variety of models for the purpose of delivering training including blended learning and online support.