Save the date
Themed Weeks 2024/25
Author: Martin Coutts
Digital Skills Development Officer
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!
#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
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#SDLW24 DSAS ELC Launch
#SDLW24 What’s on your island?
#SDLW24 CALL Scotland an introduction and overview
#SDLW24 CALL Scotland Inclusive Digital Literacy
#SDLW24 Inside the Magic of Make it Happen-APP-en
#SDLW24 Adobe Express Education for teachers
#SDLW24 Glow Blogs
#SDLW24 Adobe Express Curriculum Live
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#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.
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#ScotAI24 AI Wonderland: Make it HAPPen
#ScotAI24 Daydream Believers - The Power of Generative AI
#ScotAI24 Common Sense Education: AI Literacy
#SCOTAI24 International school of Aberdeen webinar recap
#SCOTNewbattle High School
#SCOTAI24 City of Glasgow - AI Tinder to Training
#SCOTAI24 Code Along: build with AI
#SCOTAI24 TeachMeet
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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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Download the Space Explorers Workbook here
Download the 1.0 version of the workbook here
Activity 12 – Article Breakout App Prototype
Final Day – Arctic Breakout App Prototype
For this final #12DaysOfCreativity activity, you will make an app prototype that takes the lessons you have learned over the previous activities, and combine into a make your adventure, app prototype.
For this Arctic Breakout app prototype, we have created a Keynote file and set it to links only. To remind yourself the steps involved have a look at this activity.
We then created tasks based on previous activity such as Pixel Art, Green Screen iMovie, and Podcasting. It is a good to have tasks like this that combine various digital literacy activities and contextualise them in such a way as to show their true ability to be used across a wide range of curricular areas.
Your task: Offer pupils the opportunity to create an app prototype like this that makes use of their various digital literacy skills.
We have the Keynote template file available for download. Use the button below to download it to your device. There is an alternative Scratch project for you to edit below.
Over to you
Try it for yourself and share your creations with us on social media
Alternative Build!
You can flex your coding skills by exploring our Arctic Escape Scratch Project. This project is a quiz that uses two lists to store the questions and answers.
A short demo is below, along with a link to the project for you.to edit. Let us know how you get on!
Things for you to try…
- Explore the script of the bear sprite and try to add your own questions and answers
- When one of the A B C or D sprites is clicked, can you get it to change costume so that the purple button changes colour for 1 second before returning to the original costume
- Add a sound to each of the A B C and D button presses
- Animate the GAME OVER and YOU WIN costumes – ensure they return to the same position at the start (clue… “When I receive Reset”)
Activity 10 – Pixel Art
Day 10 – Pixel Art
Day 10 of #12DaysofCreativity combines knowledge of maths & numeracy, computational thinking (if this then that), and creativity. To create the image below we are required to have an understanding of numeracy concepts and digital literacy. By answering the questions correctly, each cell changes colour based on a predetermined set of rules. We will explore these rules later in the tutorial video. These activities can be made in any spreadsheet application such as Excel or Numbers
We have made the file available to download, tap the app icons below to download a Numbers or Excel version of the file.
To try this activity for yourself download the files linked above. Watch this activity video to get an idea of how you can share your knowledge and understanding of a multitude of curricular areas
Try to replicate the activity for yourself and share your finished creation with us on social media @digilearnscot using #12DaysofCreativity
A special thanks to Miriam Walsh for the updated numbers document and you can see the original forum post on the Education Community
Activity 8 – Enhanced Storytelling
Animation to enhance storytelling
For day 8 of #12DaysofCreativity we will explore how to enhance your storytelling/literacy skills by building a scene and adding some animation to bring it to life. We will aim to make something like this:
In order to make this style of video, there are a few things we should consider.
- What story or poem do we want our pupils to recite?
- Where will they find/download content? There are websites such as Noun Project and Pixabay
- What apps will be useful? For this example we used Voice Memos to record our reciting of the poem, and Keynote to build the scene and animation.
- Once the animation/scene is created – what can pupils do to enhance it further? To add in more of a creative flair? Creativity never stops – it evolves.
For more ideas on ways in which you can introduce creativity into your learning and teaching practice, check out the Everyone Can Create guides from Apple Education.
Have a go yourself.
Follow the steps in the video below:
You can download the referenced in this post from OneDrive here
Try the activity for yourself and share your finished podcast with us on social media @digilearnscot using #12DaysofCreativity
Activity 6 – Create a Podcast
Day 6 – Create a Podcast
For Day 6 of #12DaysofCreativity we will explore creating a podcast on your iPad using GarageBand. This is a great activity to build pupil confidence, develop their literacy skills, expand their research and communication skills as well as developing a key skill for the world of life, learning and work – collaboration. Sharing a Podcast can be easier than you think. You don’t need to publish it to Apple Podcasts or Spotify in order to let people listen – you can share the file for download from your school blog, share using QR Codes during parents evening or even have it sent out along with the school weekly newsletter.
If you do decide to start a class podcast, then there is an excellent option available. The app Spotify for Podcasters is available for free on all platforms including the web. There are some things to consider.
It requires an account, so it is advised to have teachers create an account and publish. If you wish to explore this topic more, then this ePub is a good resource to use.
Pages can be used to plan the script for the podcast. Think about a topic, plan the research, write an introduction, and structure the flow of the episode. Who will say what. Other apps such as word, docs, or notes can also be used but for this activity we used Pages as it has a built in teleprompter.
Garageband is the main app used for this activity. A powerful recording studio that comes built in on every iPad deployed in schools. It can be used as a voice recording app, music maker, beat smasher and more. Voice effects add a touch of creativity and for this task we recorded our voice using the chipmunk effect to give us an Elf sounding recording. Mixed with free music effects downloaded from Pixabay build a comprehensive podcast experience.
Keynote continues to play a pivotal part in iPad Creativity with its versatile approach to activities. Content is key and when learners use an app like keynote to design podcast artwork, they can blend colour, design, text, drawing, shapes and more to create an eye catching colour popping podcast show artwork. You might consider the Daydream Believers activity Branding before this task to give pupils as much of a headstart as possible.
Now, it’s your turn.
The YouTube video below is broken into several chapters which can each be used as a separate lesson.
- Write your script
- Record your content
- Add some music
- Create your artwork.
You can download the referenced in this post from OneDrive here
Try the activity for yourself and share your finished podcast with us on social media @digilearnscot using #12DaysofCreativity
Activity 4 – Green Screen Scanner
Day 4 – Green Screen Scanner
One of the most powerful features of having a device in your class, is the ability to use the camera to capture content. On iPad this can open a world of possibilities when you combine it with an app like iMovie. This is a free app that comes on most deployments in Local Authorities. There are options such as WeVideo and others on Chromebook/Windows laptops and we advise you to speak to your LA digital lead about options.
The tutorial video below is broken into 3 parts. Recording, editing and a Keynote option for additional Creativity.
We have the Keynote template file available for download. Use the button below to download it to your device.
Over to you
Follow the tutorial above to try it for yourself and share your creations with us on social media
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