Education Scotland in partnership with sportscotland is hosting a series of free events for early years practitioners, primary teachers, primary specialist PE teachers and secondary PE teachers.
Click here for more information
All posts by Ms Higgins
Parentzone – useful resource for parents
Since the start of the school session there has been a lot of communication for parents focusing on the Parentzone website as a useful resource. This has led to a marked increase in the number of visitors to the site and very positive feedback from parents.
The Parentzone website has information about key areas such as Transition, Assessment, Qualifications and Broad General Education. It also encourages parents to participate in their child’s learning with sections on Supporting learning at home and Get involved.
Please remember to highlight the Parentzone website to parents of children attending your establishment.
Medieval Construction Science Show comes to St Andrews!
Historic Scotland are bringing their Medieval science show to St Andrews Cathedral, Fife.
This interactive show aimed at P4-S1 pupils follows the journey of a block of stone from a quarry to its place at the top of an arch, exploring the science behind medieval buildings as it goes and covering topics such as friction, gravity, pulleys, levers and arches.
We have the following slots available on a first come first served basis (shows last 50 minutes):
Tues 6th November – 1.00 pm
Thurs 8th November – 10.30 am
Mon 12th November – 1.00 pm
Tues 13th November – 10.30 am
Thu 15th November – 1.00 pm
Shows are £1.50 per pupil and travel subsidies of 75% are available to help with transport costs
To book or for further details contact Fiona Davidson, Central Region Learning Development Officer on 01738 828 268 or fiona.davidson@scotland.gsi.gov
Scottish Opera Connect – Call for Auditions!
Connect is made up of two strands, Connect Chorus and Connect Orchestra, and is a truly unique programme which gives aspiring young singers and musicians the chance to develop their knowledge, technique and skill with the help of Scotland’s top opera professionals. Plus, next year’s Connect members will also have the chance to be involved in the international project for the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games cultural programme, so there’s never been a better time to sign up.
The 2013/14 programme runs from September 2013 to April 2014. Entrance is based on an application and audition process.
The deadline to apply is Monday 3 December 2012 with auditions in January 2013.
Full details of the Connect programme can be found here
Help Direct the future of Education Scotland
Consultation on Education Scotland’s strategic priorities
The Education Scotland corporate plan will set out the vision for where we would like Scottish education to be in three years’ time. As our new agency moves forward, we need to agree with partners the priorities which will have most impact on learners. Take part in our corporate planning process. The consultation closes on 16 November 2012.
My Place Photography Competition
The My Place Photography Competition is a built environment photographic project run by the Scottish Civic Trust for primary and secondary school-aged children throughout Scotland. It aims to provide young people with the opportunity to express their thoughts, experiences and perspectives on the heritage, buildings and archaeology around them.
Click here for more information
Scottish Book Trust- Book Week Scotland
Book Week Scotland is Scotland’s first national celebration of books and reading, taking place from 26 November to 2 December 2012.
The week-long programme of events has opportunities for people from all ages, interests and reading abilities, to embark or continue on a reading journey.
Book Week Scotland will encourage the whole nation to embrace reading’s unique capacity for empowerment, enrichment, education, solace, pleasure and growth. It will also provide a platform for everyone in Scotland to celebrate our exceptional literary talent, our history of literary excellence, and our rich creativity.
Scottish Book Trust has worked with partners across the country to create a diverse programme of events with some of Scoland’s best loved authors including Iain Banks in Loch Leven, Val McDermid in Orkney, Debi Gliori in Carnoustie, Janice Galloway in Benbecula, Christopher Brookmyre in Greenock, Vivian French in Glenrothes and many more.
What does remembrance mean?
This year Poppyscotland has teamed up with Glow TV to bring you a series of events about remembrance.
This is the first of this thought provoking series. During this Glow Meet you will get the chance to hear from and chat with St Brigid’s Primary school as they talk about their experience of entering and winning Moving Stories 2011 and how you can enter the competition this year! Other Glow TV events on Remembrance will take place on 8 November and 22 November
For full details of this event, please log in to Glow and view the current schedule (Glow log-in and password required).
Want to know more about the new Glow?
Migration of Glow to Office 365
RM Unify
RM Unify consists of three core components, a Launchpad, the App Library and the Bus.
1. The Launchpad: Access applications and services centrally and launch via a single logon
2. The App Library: Discover what’s out there and bring together the best services and applications to support teaching and learning
3. The Bus: Manage users through simple, seamless and secure provisioning of accounts
Piloting RM Unify
RM Unify piloting started w/c 1st of October. The pilot will be carried out with specific schools from Edinburgh, North Ayrshire, Scottish Borders, East Renfrewshire, West Lothian, North Lanarkshire and West Dunbartonshire. The pilot will run from 1st of October until 24th of October. Feedback will be encouraged from all and will come in to the national Glow Group – using a survey, forum and paper on the day. We will collate and use this feedback before proceeding to the next stage.
In this pilot we will be piloting RM Unify only, not Office 365.
If you want a guided tour of this new interface then please go the national Glow Group where we have posted some video footage.
Office 365 for Education
RM Unify needs to be in place to pass the single sign-on authentication into the Office 365 for education platform and applications. Once Unify has been piloted and implemented, Office 365 will be connected and further pilots will be organised. Timelines showing the detail of the implementation plan will be communicated as soon as they have been completed and will contain accurate dates and information.
The elements of MS Office 365 that will be available to Glow Users across Scotland are listed below.
• Exchange online with full mobile experience – email, calendar, web-app, 25Gb email storage per user.
• Lync online service – peer to peer video coms, Presence and IM, integration with Exchange and Sharepoint online, usable on mobile devices.
• Sharepoint online – 512Mb personal plus 512Mb pooled data storage.
• Office Web Apps – online browser based versions of the familiar MS Office suite including Word, Excel, Powerpoint and OneNote. This will remove the requirement to have an underlying MS Office installation on a device, however when the apps are on the client, they will work together.
• Blogging and Wiki tools with social networking integration.
• Powerful document collaboration including multi-user editing facilities.
Some of these applications were demonstrated at the recent Scottish Learning Festival.
Progress of this project will be posted in the national Glow Group – Migration of Glow to Office 365
The Addressing Dyslexia Toolkit
A new updated version of the Dyslexia Toolkit was launched at the Scottish Learning Festival. The new Toolkit deals not only with the assessment of dyslexia but also with how to respond. There are new sections for parents, schools and local authorities.
