Tag Archives: Innovation

Shape the Future competition – improving the lives of women and girls worldwide

School should be aware of the upcoming second Shape the Future competition which will be launched on the 28 April 2014 across the UK. The competition will be open to all UK schools and will ask young people (aged 11-16) to outline and present on their priorities for improving the lives of women and girls worldwide. Following a judging panel, the winning pupils will be invited to attend and present their ideas at a global summit hosted by the Prime Minister in July.

The themes of this short group project fit into subjects across the curriculum, including Modern Studies, RME, Geography, History, English and PSE as well as lending itself to a context for inter-disciplinary learning.  A dedicated ‘Shape the Future’ website will provide teachers with a range of resources to guide pupils through the competition.

Education Scotland has provided a Learning Journey considering aspects of gender equality which will be a helpful resource to schools.  Last year Promoting  Diversity and Equality: Developing Responsible Citizens in 20th century brought to the fore exemplars of good practice and resources to assist in taking forward approaches to diversity and equality.

On 7 May Game On Scotland and Education Scotland  have organised a conference for Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games: Promoting Equality and Diversity it will reflect on the three core values of the Commonwealth Games Federation, humanity, equality and destiny.  The conference will provide delegates with a speakers and workshops focused on values education in a global context as well as the inclusion of all.

Update on the Creative Scotland website

On Friday 4 April, Creative Scotland will begin the switch-over from its existing website to its new site. Users of the site may experience some disruption over that weekend as part of this switchover but it is intended that the new site will be operational from Monday 7 April.

The new site is designed to be easier to use with clearer layout, structure and access to information. Over the coming weeks, the site will evolve to feature Creative Scotland’s new Plan, new funding programmes and showcase key projects.

The site will also feature case studies of the range and breadth of work that Creative Scotland supports and organisations and individuals from across the arts, screen and creative industries will be invited to submit content in order to showcase their work to a national and international audience. This has already been piloted and the new site will feature a range of user-generated content when it goes live, but Creative Scotland is keen to expand this content as much as possible.

As you might expect with a new site, many elements are still in development and the site will continue to improve and expand over the coming months.

In the meantime, if you have any questions regarding the site, please contact enquiries@creativescotland.com

Gaming project opens up new worlds of creativity – TES article

“Part of it is embracing uncertainty, being open to whatever comes up,” said Dangerous Ideas curator Karen Lawson. “It’s about a belief that everybody is creative, and helping them to realise that.”

http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6400535

TES article exploring the Festival of Dangerous Ideas and how two primary, secondary and colleges from Scotland and Norway collaborated on an innovative online gaming project that developed new ways of learning.

Glow TV: Better Movers and Thinkers – evolution in physical education

Better Movers and Thinkers

27 November 15.00

http://bit.ly/18OMGQW

Join this Glow Meet to find out about Better Movers and Thinkers, an innovative, exciting and challenging movement and learning programme for Physical Education, that focuses directly on enhancing the links between movement and thinking, and how these critical elements scaffold the development of physical performance and learning across the curriculum. BMT is evolution in physical education, not revolution.

Animation Competition 2014

Red Kite Animation and Edinburgh Museums & Galleries have launched their Animation Competition 2014.
Deadline for Entries: end March 2014.
The competition is open to any schools or youth groups in Scotland who are invited to create an animation based on an imagined backstory about any object in the Edinburgh Museums & Galleries collection.
You might find your inspiring object at the Museum of Childhood, the Writer’s Museum or any of the other 12 venues and then imagine how it might have been used or what happened in its history.
The winning animations from the 2013 competition are currently in an exhibition at the City Art Centre on Market Street in Edinburgh. The exhibition is on the first floor and runs through until 12th January 2014.
Download the following documents here:
Competition poster – Competition Rules
At a glance rules – At_a_Glance_Rules 2014_HEADED
Rules in full – Competition Rules

Glow Meet with the Queen’s Baton Designer

In November two exciting Glow Meets around Technologies’ will focus on the Queen’s Baton and its design. Join us on Tuesday 5 November (4.00-4.45 pm) to learn more about how William Mitchell and his design team  at 4cDesign effectively utilised science, technology, engineering, maths, art and design skills to create the Queen’s Baton and how you and your learners can be involved on 26 November (10.00 – 11.00 am) by considering your own baton design for your school or centre.

Register for the CPD session here or simply join us on the day.

For more information on all Glow Meets please visit the relevant page on Game On Scotland .

Find more information about the Queen’s Baton Relay, its design and nominating batonbearers here.

IDEO’s Creative Confidence Challenge

How do we help young people retain and develop the creativity skills they naturally enjoy as children?

IDEO has launched a Creative Confidence Challenge to find solutions to address this very issue, inviting proposals for fun, inspiring, new ways to help teenagers and young adults nurture their own creative confidence.

Ideas are being sought by IDEO through a creative open sourcing process – they are seeking the best ideas from around the world, which will be reviewed, refined and evaluated. The whole process starts with the Inspiration phase, which is taking place just now, whereby people can share their own stories, providing inspiration for others.

Visit the Open IDEO website to contribute your own inspirations and ideas, and to watch as the process for selecting the best solutions evolves over the next two months.

One Day Digital for Teachers

Digital Creativity CPD

Nesta, the UK’s innovation charity, are running a day’s CPD on digital creativity for teachers so they can teach young people the digital skills they will need in the future. Teachers can learn website development, computer animation, character design, video editing, app development, visual programming and how to design and print 3D objects. Teachers will get support materials on the day so they can use the skills they have learned back in the classroom with their pupils.

Nesta are working with a range of partners including CoderDojo, Mozilla, RunRev and Maklab to make sure that teachers attending get a real feel for how these technologies work and get a chance to work hands-on with them over the day so they are able to pass that on to their pupils.

The event is on Saturday 23 November at the University of Edinburgh.  For more information and to reserve place go to onedaydigital.eventbrite.com

Enspire Festival of Ideas – S4 Enterprise project, St Joseph’s Academy, Kilmarnock

‘Enspire’ is an exciting new festival taking place on 9 June run entirely by young people in St Joseph’s Academy, Kilmarnock. Inspired by the world famous TED Talks a team of S4 pupils from St. Joseph’s Academy in Kilmarnock have organised their own home-grown festival of ideas: Enspire.

Enspire<http://www.saintjosephsacademy.co.uk/enspire/> is being designed and curated by an S4 Enterprise class who have established an events business called ID Launch. They have been working towards this all year. The purpose of Enspire is simple: to harness energy, creativity and ideas to make a difference by thinking differently. The festival is based around three powerful words: reinvention, inspiration and transformation. All presentations will take as their starting point the themes of reinvention, inspiration or transformation. The festival also features bands, comedy, entertainment and great local food cooked by their pop-up restaurant.

The festival is open to anyone to attend.  Please contact St. Joseph’s Academy School Office on 01563 526144 for more information.

Fuselab – an immersive learning experience for 16-20 year olds

Fuselab is an out of this world experience for 16-20 year olds at Edinburgh’s
Summerhall in which they’ll plan the future of an uninhabited world.

Fuselab is looking for 80 innovative and creative minds – scientists, artists and
engineers – to help develop a sustainable way of life, free from the
constraints of the systems and structures we live by here on Earth.

Participants will be asked to challenge their thinking through workshops, skills sessions, talks and games; collaborating to design, prototype and test ideas.

FUSELAB 1      1–5 July 2013

FUSELAB 2      5–9 July 2013

Applications for both sessions close on Wednesday 8 May.

40 participants will be selected per session.

Fuselab is completely free of charge, with accommodation and all meals provided.

TO FIND OUT MORE VISIT: sciencefestival.co.uk/fuselab