Do you know what technology your pupils have access to at home? Do they have internet enabled mobile devices? Would they be willing, able and allowed to bring them into school every day? If you are thinking about BYOD or BYOT then these are questions you need to know the answer to. The Your Own […]
Why Podcast? Over the next few weeks I am going to be working with groups of primary school pupils to try and improve their speaking and listening skills. One way of helping with this is to record them and play back the recordings so that they can hear and analyse themselves. There are lots of podcasting […]
One of the problems with publishing videos on your blog is making sure that the video can be seen from all platforms. If you publish a video directly from an iPad it may not play automatically on a PC and vice versa. One way around this problem is to publish your videos via a third […]
Actually, this is far more than an iPad app. Class Dojo is a website based classroom tool that helps teachers improve the behaviour in their classrooms. Many teachers use a reward points system, Class Dojo is one of those systems with bells on. Once you have registered you can set up your class or classes. […]
2Simple have done it again! They have produced an early years record keeping app that will run on iPhones, iPads and Android devices. It is called 2Build a Profile and is described as: “A simple and fun way to log children’s achievements against the EYFS profile. Every child has an individual portfolio of achievements. Take photos […]
It’s that time of year again. Each year the RSPB organise the Big Garden Birdwatch and the Big Schools’ Birdwatch. There is very little food around for birds at this time of year and putting some food out can have incredible results. So why not visit the website for ideas, get a bit of food […]
I have recently visited a number of primary schools where their ICT System was obviously not “fit for purpose”. Rather than being an aid to learning it was a huge hindrance. So I thought it would be useful to put together a check list of questions that you could use to help decide if your […]
I’ve recently been asked by a number of teachers “what shall I do on my blog?” So this gives me an excuse to do list on a blog! Make a list! People love lists, pupils love lists, so make a list of something that is relevant to your class. But don’t make it too long […]
Back in 2010 the BBC showed a short series called “The Classroom Experiment” where Professor Dylan Williams took over a year 8 class to test out some simple ideas that he believes could improve the quality of education. One of these ideas was to ban hands up when the teacher asks a question and instead […]
Congratulations to Morley Newlands Primary School who have been rewarded for all their hard work and care with a very pleasing Ofsted report with “good and sometimes outstanding”. Well done! You can read about the report on the Head Teacher’s new blog.
Comic Strip is an app which provides a simple way of producing a comic strip! Comic strips have so many possible uses and advantages including: they are motivating they are a great alternative way of telling a story – see the example below they are visual so visual learners can benefit from using them especially […]
If you upload videos to YouTube before embedding them in your WordPress blog you may want to remove the related videos that display automatically when you get to the end of the video. This can be done by typing ?rel=0 directly after the URL eg http://YouTube.be/M_f4u4rWXHA?rel=0
In primary schools I find that spreadsheets are often glossed over, staff often aren’t aware of the power of spreadsheets in modelling and performing repetitive calculations and they can’t think of appropriate examples. Likewise, food security is an issue that is hardly touched on, it is seen as a difficult concept and a political one. […]
Morfo may seem a strange iPad app to use in the classroom but we have had some fun using it to improve writing and reading confidence. Morfo allows you to take an image of a face, preferably a face-on portrait, which you then line up the position and size of the different parts of the […]
I regularly use an iPad to blog, both for my own blogs and for blogs with teachers and pupils. I also use Windows Live Writer on a PC, and web browsers on both PCs and Apples. As I mostly use blogs based on WordPress I use the WordPress app on the iPad. Since it was […]
Naace and Mathletics are organising the “Four Nations Maths Challenge 2012” to run on the 13-14 November. This is a free competition which will involve the largest online UK Maths event. Over the two days schools from England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales will compete to reach the top of the Maths leaderboard. The aim […]
At last it is here. Mathletics can be downloaded and run on the iPad. I will be giving it a good test run tomorrow with some pupils and will let you know how it goes, in the meantime aMathletics mad friend has been testing it out and there are no negatives so far. The iPad […]
I’ve written about trees quite a few times on my blog so you are probably aware by now that I consider them to be quite important and that I am probably a tree hugger! Well trees are very important. Not only do they have a significant impact on our environment (the climate, soil, habitat for […]
You are probably aware that the websites of maintained schools now have new statutory requirements applied to them to bring them in line with academies and free schools (for once it seems that the same rules apply to everyone!) Details are on the government website but here is a summary of the information you need […]
In a recent article in Resurgence Fritjof Capra wrote: To understand how power works in social networks, we need to distinguish between two kinds of power: power as domination of others, and power as empowerment of others. The most effective social organisation for power as domination is the traditional hierarchy, and power as empowerment is […]