Author: Martin Coutts

Digital Skills Development Officer

Create-A_Long comic book with custom images

Create-A-Long Activities – Create a custom comic book

Communicate visually wit colourful graphics to tell a story, explain a concept, summarise a plot, or show how a pattern can be represented visually.

Comics can be a great way for learners to showcase their storytelling skills, explain concepts, and visually represent a concept. For learners with limited or no communication skills, this can be an excellent way to have them contribute to the wider conversation in class.

For this activity we have used a modified version of the Create a Comic Activity from the  Everyone Can Create Apple Teacher Learning Centre section.  

image of an iPad with a comic book literacy example

For this activity we used

an iPad, Apple Pencil, pages app, adobe express icons

We used an iPad, an Apple Pencil, Pages, and Adobe Express using our Glow Scotland credentials. Whilst these are very specific examples we appreciate that not every school has access to these resources. An alternative might be to use a web based tool such as Book Creator which has excellent comic book templates and Pixabay which has free to download graphics. 

Step 1: Create-a-long: Download the Activity

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Step 2: Create-a-long: Create Your Characters

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Step 3: Create-a-long: Put your comic book together

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Now that you have tried all of the steps and put the comic together, you have developed the skills in your learners to apply this knowledge in different situations. Using comic book style activities can be a great way to Visualise concepts, retell failure Argos from history with custom characters, or even explaining concepts like the water cycle in new and engaging ways. 

Try it yourself and feel free to share your stories of success with us via social media:

Bluesky: @digilearnscot.bsky.social

techfest 24 save the date

Scotlands Digital Science Festival 1st to 8th November – Powered by Techfest

As part of Scotland’s Digital Science Festival, powered by TechFest, a number of online sessions are taking place that your Secondary School students won’t want to miss!

These dynamic events are packed with fascinating content and practical insights that are sure to inspire and engage your pupils!

Friday 1st November, 18:30 via zoom:

An Eye Below Zero, a Long Term Look at the Poles 

45 years of polar experience have given Doug Allan a unique perspective on both the Arctic and Antarctic. He’ll be telling exciting and inspiring stories about the winter he spent with Emperor penguins, and his face to face encounters with polar bears. But Doug has also witnessed how the warming of the poles is affecting the animals. He’ll explore the innovative and imaginative steps and solutions that we can adopt to take on the challenge. We can still turn the tide.

Register Here

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Saturday, 2 November, 19:00 via zoom:

Campaigning for Change: Banning Disposable Vapes 

Can grassroots activism really create meaningful change? Absolutely! Join Laura Young who proved this theory true. Laura is the founder of the campaign to ban disposable vapes, which has prompted legislative change across the UK. She will share her campaign journey, top tips & key takeaways at this online talk!

Register Here

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Sunday, 3 November, 19:00 via zoom:

How to Robot-Proof Your Kids

AI makes many promises about making life easier. Companies are selling AI to read your emails and then write your responses. But at a time when all of the world’s knowledge is free in your pocket, your value is your unique voice. From augmented intelligence to neuroprosthetics, Dr. Ming will explore how we can use AI not to make life easier but to make ourselves better.

Register Here

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Wednesday, 6 November, 19:00 via zoom:

The Straight A’s Brain

What if your child could remember superhuman amounts of information and never forget what they studied for exams? Can they boost focus and concentration while taking care of their brain? Join Dr. T, Aberdeen’s TV psychiatrist, for an exciting online workshop where they’ll unlock powerful memory techniques, brain health tips, and study hacks for kids and teens (ages 8-16). Parents can join too, learning top tips to help their kids ace school and study smarter than ever before!

Register Here

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Thursday, 7 November, 11:00 via teams:

Pokémaths: The Maths of Pokémon

Delivered by fantastic Dr Tom Crawford aka Tom Rocks Maths, the Pokémaths: The Maths of Pokémon session will investigate how many Pikachu’s it takes to power a lightbulb. How much a Charizard eats? And why the world of Pokémon seems to ignore the basic laws of physics! Dr Tom Crawford looks at the maths one of the world’s favourite video games.

Register Here

 

#CSW24 featured image

#CSW24 – Computing Science Week Scotland 2024

Computing Science Week 2024 will run from November 4th to 15th 2024. Both weeks will comprise of Live Lessons, Success Sharing Sessions, Educator Webinars, and a face to face event in between to bring educators together and share good practice.

Week 1 has a mainly low code theme, with a few exceptions. It showcases the ways in which Computing can be explored without always having to focus exclusively on code based activities.

Week 2 will be hands-on coding activities for pupils and educators alike.

Click the links to see which sessions you would like to attend.

TechTok Recap University of Edinburgh, digilearnscot and Education Scotland logos

TechTok 2024: Video Recap

Below is a playlist of the sessions that were delivered by practitioners during TechTok24. Each video is linked below. Thanks to Russell White from Moray House for organising and hosting this successful virtual conference.

iPadOS Top 5: Keynote

YouTube player

Keynote on the iPad allows learners the chance to create everything from simple to more complex animations directly out of the box on their device. 

Top 5 is aims to take you through 5 of the main features and techniques that you can use on all core apps on the iPad. 

Follow along with each of the lessons and download the sample files to get started with your pupils and be sure to share any results using @digilearnscot on X (Twitter) and Threads

Lesson 1: Magic Move

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Download Sample File

 

Lesson 2: Motion Paths

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Download Sample File

 

Lesson 3: Animating GIFs

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Download Playground File

Download Dog Running

 

Lesson 4: Movie Making

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Download Sample File

 

Lesson 5: Animated Timelines

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Download Sample File

 

Microsoft Testfest Resources and Exams Available

We are delighted to announce that in partnership with Prodigy Learning, the licences for Microsoft learning resources (LearnKey) and the Microsoft Practice tests (GMetrix) have been renewed until June 2025!

 

Moreover, we are excited to offer you a valuable opportunity for professional development – FREE Microsoft Certification exams throughout June 2024. 

 

This is a fantastic opportunity for educators across Scotland to develop and enhance their digital skills with Office applications, such as Word and PowerPoint, and discover how to use your digital skills to deliver classroom experiences that will develop students’ 21st Century Skills.

 

Ensure you take the time to review the Channels in the MOS Training and Certification Scotland Team and the MCE Training and Certification Scotland | General | Microsoft Team to make the most of this opportunity!

boy girl jump device

#SDLW24 Video Recap series

Below is a playlist that shows the Curriculum Live Lessons, Professional Learning, and sharing practice sessions that were delivered as part of Scottish Digital Literacy week 2024.

Continue to share the amazing work that is taking place in your settings and be sure to mention us @digilearnscot using #SDLW24

#ScotAI24 – Scottish AI in schools week recap

Thank you to everyone who made Scottish AI in schools week a success. We were overwhelmed by the amount of schools, teachers, and students who took the time to participate in the activities laid out during this week of collaboration and learning.

We hope you all found it useful and look forward to the updates that will present themselves in the future.

Resource – Space Exploration Workbook

Version 1.0

This project stems from an example we created to support staff in their professional development. During a 4 part CLPL course that we run, This is Digital, we spoke about a Planning, Learning, Teaching, and Assessment cycle, and one of the aspects to this was that a well planned resource can help not only with student learning and engagement but with assessment strategies and establishing success criteria. We created a Pages Workbook that essentially acts as a 1.0 to the resource being shared. This example workbook was populated with digital literacy examples using out of the box features and apps, and also created spaces for teacher feedback and evaluation.

iPad screenshot showing a video
Space for ‘flight director’ comment laying out student achievement

Staff attending these sessions were not necessarily all iPad users but it was enough to spark the ‘art of the possible’ in their practice and reception to the aspects laid out were very positive. Especially when the digital examples were shared, allowing pupils the ability to share their knowledge in a way that makes sense to them. This led to the new resource being made so that it might have an impact on teaching & learning and take it in a direction that our colleague George says, is more than simply using markup to draw a face on a bin, as it puts the digital literacy into context and has an ability to take all aspects of iPad use into account.

Example created in keynote, imported in Pages and teacher feedback added

Putting the new version together

In creating this document, it was important to show the various strings to the bow that the iWork suite has, including the recent update that allows USDZ and SVG files to be included natively. It allows various levels of interactivity in a single resource and means that pupils have all the resources they need.

iPad screenshot showing a Mars habitat
Incorporating USDZ files for hands on and icons to signify each page

Layout

Icons are a great learning tool as it gives pupils a visual guide to what type of activities they can do on each page/section. The workbook has a natural flow and progression of skills making use of apps such as Keynote, GarageBand, iMovie and the Everyone Can Create projects.

iPad screenshot showing a robot
Using icons to explain what each section/page incorporates

For each of the activities, we have laid out a context beforehand, giving pupils a scenario and then set a task that builds on it. The Everyone Can Create projects are an excellent way to leverage these activities and make this book more project based, topic focused rather than a one and done style of activity.

iPad screenshot showing iPad with a page for adding content
Example of an activity page. Pupils create their example and add it to this page.

Download the Space Explorers Workbook here

Download the 1.0 version of the workbook here