Category Archives: Social Studies

Drama, Social Studies

Incredible Film Competition for schools and youth groups

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The hunt is on for teams of young people to represent Scotland in a competition linked to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games

Young people across Scotland are getting the chance to make films that answer two questions:

If you could change one thing in your neighborhood, what would it be? And what could you do to change it?

It’s part of a competition called Big Voice from BT, and it’s one of the education programmes linked to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. To enter, teams of young people aged 11-19 need to submit their film proposal by May 27th.

Three teams from Scotland, chosen by judges, will get £1000 and support from a team of film students from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama to produce their film next Autumn. They will also qualify for up to £5,000 and support from Unltd., a charity which supports social entrepreneurs, to turn their ideas into a community project.

The resulting films will be screened on giant London 2012 Live Site screens  all over the UK during Spring 2012, with the Scottish winner being announced at a Live Site event in Glasgow. The final stage of the competition is an Oscars-style ceremony to announce the UK winners just before the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games begin.

“BT’s Big Voice is a great opportunity for young people to learn how to work together, consider the big issues, and get a chance to express themselves. It comes with free resources that make it a really educational project,” said Brendan Dick, Director BT Scotland.

The project supports several aspects of the Curriculum for Excellence including interdisciplinary learning, personal achievement and subject areas like the expressive arts and social studies.

There’s still time for other schools or youth groups to enter: the deadline for the first stage of the competition is 27 May 2011.

Full details: www.bt.com/bigvoice

For more information on BT’s Big Voice contact:

Tom Osborn on 020 8960 6069 or btbigvoice@dialogics.com

For press enquiries contact

Anne Bailey on 020 8960 6069 or anne@dialogics.com

Notes to editors:

  1. Big Voice comes with a set of five video based resources that introduce the project, teach the skills of group discussion, creative problem solving, turning ideas into a film, and how to develop a film proposal to enter the competition.
  2. Students will have the unique chance to incorporate stock footage from the BBC archive as part of their final film. This could include aerial photography, crowd scenes, or other video or audio material relevant to their script that would otherwise be impossible to film in the time and budget available.
Social Studies

New Tall Ships Glow Group launched

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‘Get on Board’ Glow Group and Glow Meet http://ltsblogs.org.uk/glowscotland/2011/05/04/glow-inverclyde-and-the-tall-ships-races-2011/



A Glow Group <https://portal.glowscotland.org.uk/establishments/inverclydecouncil/Get%20Onboard/default.aspx> has been set up to celebrate the Tall Ships Races 2011, offering a wide range of information and activities for teachers and pupils.  A related World of Work Wednesday Glow Meet, ‘Working on the River Clyde’ will take place 2-3pm on 11 May. Sign up <https://portal.glowscotland.org.uk/establishments/nationalsite/Enterprise%20in%20Education/World%20of%20Work%20Online/default.aspx> for the Glow Meet.

Dance, Drama, Health and Wellbeing, Languages and Literacy, Mathematics and Numeracy, Music, Religious and Moral Education, Sciences, Social Studies, Technologies

Co-Create: Sharing the Learning, Perth Concert Hall, Wednesday 20 April

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This one-day event aims to share the learning from Co-Create, a Scotland-wide arts project for Glow, the world’s first national schools intranet. See below for details on how to reserve a place.

Co-Create is a pioneering initiative which has brought together schools, Creative Scotland-funded arts organisations and other partners in ten online collaborations using Glow, new media technology and imaginative, high quality arts to create exciting and relevant teaching materials and experiences to support the implementation of Curriculum for Excellence.

This event will give practitioners from both the arts and education sectors direct access to in-depth case studies from Co-Create participants and partners on how they have used Glow to develop innovative and creative approaches to learning and teaching.

If you have not already reserved a place and would like to, or for more information on the programme, please email Glow Admin: glowadmin@ltscotland.org.uk, using Co-Create: Sharing the Learning as the subject header.

Co-Create is funded through a partnership between Learning and Teaching Scotland and Creative Scotland’s National Lottery Fund.

Health and Wellbeing, Languages and Literacy, Sciences, Social Studies

Excellence Groups reports acknowledge “The link between creativity and achievement.”

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Education Secretary Michael Russell today welcomed the publication of the reports of 17 Excellence Groups which highlight best practice in key subjects and areas.

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/News/Releases/2011/03/11121127

The reports, which include 15 subject reports and reports on excellence in health and wellbeing and on developing young people’s skills, emphasise the importance of both subject knowledge and skills such as creative thinking and problem solving.

The key findings include: “The opportunities the arts present for promoting creativity across the whole curriculum, and the link between creativity and achievement.”

Social Studies

History and Heritage Glow Meet

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World of Work Wednesday – Working in our Past (History and Heritage)
23 February 2-3 pm

https://portal.glowscotland.org.uk/establishments/nationalsite/Enterprise%20in%20Education/World%20of%20Work%20Online/default.aspx

Have you ever wondered what sort of jobs you can do related to history and heritage?  What sort of jobs are there beyond being a historian and a history teacher?  What sort of skills would you need to be successful in this line of work?  Now you can find out more!

This event will be broadcast to you live from Stirling High School and will be chaired by history teacher Neil McLennan (seconded Enterprise Development Officer).

The interactive Glow Meet will also provide participants with the opportunity to take part in challenges, ask questions and learn about the career paths taken by three individuals including:

Kirsten Wood – Education Manager, Stirling Castle
Bob Holsman – Historical re-enactment and consultancy
David Connelly – Archaeologist
Drama, Religious and Moral Education, Social Studies

Drama, Psychology and the Holocaust – risk taking and Curriculum for Excellence

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Yellow bib project shows pupils how genocide could occur.

A group of S1 pupils was deliberately ostracised and discriminated against by staff at a secondary school, in a project designed to show how genocide could occur.

The 20 Dumbarton Academy pupils, from a cohort of 120, wore yellow bibs for a day, designating that they were inferior and would have fewer rights than their peers.

Some found the day upsetting, but staff, pupils and researchers were united in praising the project, and the school hopes to run it again.

The experiment, based on Jane Elliott’s famous “blue eyes/brown eyes” experiment of 1968, took place in spring 2009, but came to wider attention at the recent Scottish Educational Research Association annual conference

Click here to see the full TESS article.

Languages and Literacy, Social Studies

A Scottish Wave of Change National Story Competition

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A Scottish Wave of Change is a Scottish-wide project about the future, and about stories and change.

The national story competition organised by A Scottish Wave of Change in association with the Sunday Herald invites people from all across Scotland to respond to the question – what values should shape the future Scotland?

To do this we invite people to submit a work of fiction –whether short story, poem, song or other short writing form, of up to 2,500 words in English, Scots or Gaelic.

Your piece should be set in the Scotland of the near-future – and we leave it to your imagination and creativity how you interpret this.

The best contributors will feature in a book published in spring 2011 and receive a publishing fee. Short-listed stories will be featured on this website.

Download the competition details and rules here. [Download pdf]

Please send your stories and comments to story@imaginingscotland.com

Close of competition – January 31st 2011

Languages and Literacy, Social Studies

Glasgow Youth Film Festival and BIG GIVE launch celebration

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Monday December 6 at 4.30pm.

The schools programme launch will take place in the upstairs bar of the Glasgow Film Theatre. We’d love it if you could join us.

Tempting festive refreshments will be provided! After the launch, we’ll be offering complimentary tickets to the 5.40pm screening of The Social Network (12A, captioned).

We’ll be unveiling the schools lineup for GYFF 11, which features premieres, workshops and special events for nursery to S6, along with teaching resources tailored to Curriculum for Excellence. We will also introduce our youth ambassadors, who helped select events for the Festival and will tell you about our fundraising campaign The Big Give.

The launch is a perfect opportunity to socialise with teachers who love film and to be the first to book GYFF 11 events. Thanks to Glasgow City Council Education Services, GYFF 11 schools events are FREE to Glasgow schools!

If you wish to attend, please RSVP to info@gft.org.uk<mailto:info@gft.org.uk> by Wednesday 1st December.

Social Studies

‘My Home, My Place, My Scotland’ 15th November

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An exhibition entitled ‘My Home, My Place, My Scotland’, aims to dissect Scotland’s cultural heritage by covering the whole spectrum of activity from castles, collections and costumed performers through to planning and conservation.

The event, which is free to the general public, will take place at the Roxburghe Hotel on Monday 15th November and includes exhibits from The National Trust, Edinburgh World Heritage, Historic Scotland, The Heritage Lottery Fund and Architecture and Design Scotland.

Click here for more info.

A highlight of the exhibition will be the opportunity to view one of the most significant finds in Scottish archaeology, the Orkney Venus. Scotland’s oldest known depiction of a human face, the figure was found last summer on the island of Westray to international acclaim. The figurine has recently been on a tour of Scotland, which has been seen by more than 100,000 people.

Costumed performers will also be in attendance, including children from Castleview Primary School who will talk about their role as junior guides. The children are taking part in a scheme run by Historic Scotland, which trains primary age children to take their peers on guided tours of historic properties during the school term.

Social Studies

‘My Home, My Place, My Scotland’ Exhibition 15th November

Leave a comment

An exhibition entitled ‘My Home, My Place, My Scotland’, aims to dissect Scotland’s cultural heritage by covering the whole spectrum of activity from castles, collections and costumed performers through to planning and conservation.

The event, which is free to the general public, will take place at the Roxburghe Hotel on Monday 15th November and includes exhibits from The National Trust, Edinburgh World Heritage, Historic Scotland, The Heritage Lottery Fund and Architecture and Design Scotland.

Click here for more info.

A highlight of the exhibition will be the opportunity to view one of the most significant finds in Scottish archaeology, the Orkney Venus. Scotland’s oldest known depiction of a human face, the figure was found last summer on the island of Westray to international acclaim. The figurine has recently been on a tour of Scotland, which has been seen by more than 100,000 people.

Costumed performers will also be in attendance, including children from Castleview Primary School who will talk about their role as junior guides. The children are taking part in a scheme run by Historic Scotland, which trains primary age children to take their peers on guided tours of historic properties during the school term.