Category: Community Posts

July 20, 2020

Mossend Primary School – Remote Learning Journey – Every day is a school day

The role of the teacher is forever evolving. We work in a complex and dynamic society, and this unexpected pandemic shone the spotlight on the tenacity, innovation and resilience of our profession across Scotland as we all worked hard to find ways to continue our delivery of quality teaching and learning in an unchartered and uncertain context.

At Mossend Primary School we had our one Microsoft Team set up and the reasons for this we discussed on Blog 2 – Team Mossend, but we realised early on that it could very easily become overwhelming as the school closed the doors for the last time and an increasing number of children began logging in from home. Furthermore, there was a reasonable and fair expectation from some families that children would continue their learning from where they left off and eyes were now looking to the teacher for this guidance, routine and structure, when the contrasting reality was that no one in our school had ever taught remotely before and no school in Scotland had been preparing for this eventuality. We were all in it together.

Therefore, we knew two people could not sustain a full school Microsoft Team with live lessons on their own, so naturally the next key decision had to be about how to get our staff team involved and upskill them as soon as possible to contribute since they were now working from home too; it would involve speaking to the hearts and minds of our team – it could not be something forced upon them or done to them, instead they had to be on the journey with us.

The heart part was easy to speak to as we are very lucky to work in a school full of dedicated, passionate and talented teachers who commit each day of their lives to do what is best for our children and families, but we needed to change the mindset that some held of their ICT abilities and their confidence in being able to deliver remotely; above all we had to open their eyes to the possibilities for digital teaching and learning and our new way of working.

Therefore, in the first week that schools closed we set up our own in-house digital Career Long Professional Learning (CLPL) sessions based around our Remote Learning FAST strategy we discussed in Blog 1:

F – They would be Flexible with follow up videos recorded that the team could access in their own time or refer back to at any point.

By the end of the 12 weeks, we had created a total of 15 ‘How to’ videos covering everything from logging into Microsoft Teams, Creating a Sway, Immersive Reader and more. We are happy to share our ‘Netflix of CLPL’ with anyone reading this blog who would benefit from it.

In addition to group CLPL, we also conducted 1-2-1 sessions when requested and specific group sessions such as for our Nursery team, who had been involved in setting up a Nursery Zone Sub Site for our younger children who did not access Glow. Finally, a further round of CLPL at the end of the term was offered, but by this stage, most of our team had evolved their teaching practice and were revelling in their newfound digital skills and confidence in delivering remote lessons.

A – It would be Accessible, as our team had to be able to access the CLPL without additional stress and this was difficult when we were not in the same building. We chose to use the Zoom platform for our first CLPL session to demonstrate how to download and login to Microsoft Teams to join a call.

The follow-up videos were emailed afterwards and placed on our team SharePoint site and we ensured all our CLPL sessions were short, sharp 15 minutes to make it accessible to our team with childcare or family responsibilities of their own, with further external CLPL sessions shared including those from Digital Learning Team at Education Scotland to allow staff access to upskilling when it suited them and their circumstances. For many of us, it did feel like we had returned to school ourselves.

S – Supportive. This was a journey that we were all on, but it was a journey none of us had completed before and it could very easily have become overwhelming, particularly in the context of our own team’s childcare, family and health concerns. The pandemic impacted teachers and their families too, but we all carried on professionally smiling in front of video cameras and talking to faceless icons.

Whatever contribution our team made, it was valued and no one was ever made to feel like they were not doing enough; there was never an expectation that staff had to sign up for live lessons, it was always voluntary.

Nevertheless, some of our team found that initially logging in to Microsoft Teams and observing lessons from others or ‘team teaching’ built their confidence and they enjoyed the daily chats and interaction with their pupils and the routine it gave to their own lives. Others preferred not to be on camera but were able to help with the creation or gathering of resources around their personal commitments and circumstances.

Every day was indeed a school day and the initial decision of having one school Microsoft Team meant that everyone could go at their own pace, in a Supportive environment with no expectations of anyone.

T – Timely. We are extremely fortunate in Mossend Primary School and Nursery Class to work in with lots of talented teachers who have a passion for varying subjects, therefore the Timing of the inhouse digital CLPL right at the beginning of the pandemic allowed these teachers to see a way of delivering their skillsets digitally, something that up until now had not needed to be considered.

This was critical to our overall success, as it allowed us to tap into the talent of our team and be able to expand and diversify our timetable to offer a range of quality and engaging lessons such as British Sign Language, STEM, arts and crafts, coding and physical challenges. Our children also loved seeing and speaking to a range of teachers and this increased overall engagement, which we will blog about next week.

Teachers are committed to Career Long Professional Learning, it is embedded within our professional standards, yet the difference in this scenario was that our professional learning could not take place at a convenient time or even over a period of time, we had to learn and adapt quickly while supporting our families in their newfound normal and living with the consequences of the pandemic in our personal lives.

Therefore, we are extremely proud and thankful of our talented team at Mossend Primary School and Nursery Class who did just that and in the end went on to deliver nearly 200 live lessons across the 13 weeks, working together as #TeamMossend.

Patricia McKay is the Depute Head Teacher at Mossend PS & NC in North Lanarkshire and Gordon Reid is a class teacher and ICT Co-ordinator. Together they facilitated and led the remote learning strategy for the school.

Mossend PS & NC is a non-denominational school situated in Bellshill, North Lanarkshire. The school has 382 pupils and there are 40 children in the nursery attached to the school.

Patricia McKay is the Depute Head Teacher at Mossend PS & NC in North Lanarkshire and Gordon Reid is a class teacher and ICT Co-ordinator. Together they facilitated and led the remote learning strategy for the school.

Mossend PS & NC is a non-denominational school situated in Bellshill, North Lanarkshire. The school has 382 pupils and there are 40 children in the nursery attached to the school.

Twitter: @mossendps @Mr_G_Reid

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/nl/mossendps/

July 7, 2020

Digital Learning at Beancross Primary, Falkirk

Beancross Primary School have taken some time to reflect on their digital learning journey. Their presentation covers the challenges and opportunities the school faced during remote learning.

The presentation covers the key features and tools within Microsoft Teams as well as the other digital learning apps used by the school.

Twitter: @BeancrossPS

View the full presentation here

July 7, 2020

Distance Learning 2020 at Kinneil Primary School, Bo’ness

Kinneil Primary School in Bo’ness have shared with us their distance learning experience over the school building closure period. This Sway outlines their use Teams, Twitter, Sumdog and Big Maths across the school, from P1 to P7, to deliver curricular content and wider school experiences such as assemblies and choir.

Twitter: @Kinneil_PS

July 3, 2020

Digital Learning in Maths From the MIE Scotland blog

Hugh Wallace

Teacher of Maths

Kyle Academy, South Ayrshire

Twitter @MrWM4ths

 Waking a Digital School

As with all schools in Scotland, Kyle Academy closed our doors on Friday 20^thMarch with very little warning, and quite literally, no time to prepare. The final week was spent ensuring that those who were still able to attend school, had a note of their Glow login details and knew how to access Microsoft Teams.

For some staff, they had already been using Teams with a handful of classes, but for most, they hadn’t logged into Glow for a very long time! This was going to be a challenge!

As the ‘Digital Champion’ in school, and the only MIE Expert, I knew it was time to step up and offer support to the school community. This has been a huge task, but I feel very proud of where we are now!

Mossend Primary School – Remote Learning Journey – Team Mossend

At the beginning of Lockdown, John Swinney stated that schools should, ‘respond in a variety of imaginative, creative and stimulating ways to support continuity in learning for pupils.’

We investigated Twitter and spoke to friends who were also teachers to see what their schools were planning to do in terms of Online Learning during Lockdown and from these various discussions, and taking into account the confidence levels of our staff, we decided to create One Online Learning Microsoft Team which all children would access. We wanted something which was not overwhelming for our staff, children and parents/carers and would be consistent across the school, as we were very aware of the differing levels of skills.

Having the one Online Learning Team for the children meant that we were able to offer a minimum of 3 teacher-led activities per school day each week. This was in addition to the accounts which had already been set up for StudyLadder, Sumdog and the other activity suggestions (both online & offline) which had been added to our Mossend PS & NC Website prior to Lockdown.

In the beginning, we had a daily visual timetable and we worked very closely with NLC Communication Friendly Environments to create these timetables. As we evolved we were able to create a Weekly Visual Timetable which was shared on Twitter, emailed to all parents/carers on a Sunday so they could plan the week ahead and uploaded to the Online Learning Team for the children.

We understood that not all teachers would be comfortable in front of a camera, teaching with parents/carers in the background or using the ICT so, we identified various other jobs which could be completed and would mean the Team would run smoothly and allowed everyone to have a valued role. These jobs included compiling/creating the resources for the stories, creating digital Escape Rooms, creating contexts with a variety of genre for weekly Taught Writing lessons, monitoring Twitter, moderating the Microsoft Team so when work was added the children received feedback, adding Stars to our weekly Star Tracker (each child who uploaded work via Twitter or the Online Team received a star and it was recorded with name, class, date and reason for the star) – this became very important during our weekly Super Star Assemblies held on a Friday afternoon with all staff, children and their parents/carers in attendance. With the whole school working together on one Microsoft Team, it meant we were able to deliver targeted lessons with a variety of high-quality resources which were differentiated and suited to everyone regardless of their needs and every child received a consistent learning experience during the lockdown.

As mentioned in our previous Blog entitled, ‘Unfortunately, Fortunate’ we met virtually every week to plan our strategy which revolved around our Four Key Principles of FAST:

Flexibility

One Microsoft Team gave staff flexibility over tasks meaning they were not tied to a class Team all week and were able to engage in other CPD around Microsoft Apps, Digital Learning Webinars and report cards. This made sense to us because, rather than having more than 20+ teachers working with 5/6 children daily, we were able to establish a number of teachers working with lots of children in the one Microsoft Team, all engaged in purposeful, meaningful and worthwhile learning. This allowed our staff the flexibility to get to grips with Microsoft Teams, to observe other’s online lessons and to adjust to the ‘new normal’ at their own pace. Working collaboratively reduced the workload for us all and allowed us to sustain our online learning offering across the Lockdown period.

Accessible

Our Online Learning Team was in an accessible format because all of our children had access via their Glow login details and this allowed us to use Microsoft Teams to create a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) for live calls to take place. From the outset, we knew we wanted to create a VLE where children could engage with their teachers and peers and it was not just about uploading files for independent work. By having this level of engagement we were taking into consideration the health and wellbeing of our children at an uncertain time in their lives, we understood the need for them to see and speak to their teachers as well as having opportunities to collaborate with their peers. This led to quality teaching and interaction within an accessible ‘one-stop-shop’ VLE.

Supportive

From the beginning, we encouraged pupils to sign up to join our Microsoft Online Team, but we didn’t add anyone. They chose if they wanted to join – therefore engagement was high. We understood that our parents/carers were now taking on a very different role and not all felt confident with ICT. As a result, we supported them with videos on how to download Teams on various devices and provided technical help using Microsoft Forms for passwords. Having this VLE allowed us to have a Weekly Super Star Assembly with the whole school community as well as facilitating countless occasions for the children to work with their friends.

Timely

Our Microsoft Team was created almost instantly and we introduced it via Twitter, email and text with a signup request form, adding all users who requested access. By acting with speed, we were quick off the mark in establishing our VLE and developing our ‘new normal’ at a time when everyone just wanted to know what was happening. We believe this reassured our families that we had a plan for the continuity of learning and allowed them to join our Team when it suited their circumstances.

We firmly believe that having this approach certainly answered John Swinney’s call for schools to be creative in how they engaged with families and facilitating the learning opportunities for all our young people.

Mossend PS & NC is a non-denominational school situated in Bellshill, North Lanarkshire. The school has 382 pupils and there are 40 children in the nursery attached to the school.

Twitter: @mossendps @Mr_G_Reid

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/nl/mossendps/

July 1, 2020

A Devastating Fire, A Global Pandemic and The Evolution of Digital Teaching in the Biology Department at Peebles HS.

Iona Minto, PT STEM and Teacher of Biology takes us on the journey of how digital teaching has remarkably evolved at Peebles High School in Scottish Borders.

In this Sway you can find out how the Biology staff embraced the introduction of Scottish Border’s Inspire Learning Programme (1:1 devices) and how they have worked together to support one another through a peer to peer professional learning support network.

In this Sway, Iona also details

the digital tools that have helped them to work better as a department so far
the initial response to school closures in COVID-19 Lockdown
features to support pupils
what digital learning and teaching may look like moving forward at Peebles High School
and lots of practical examples of what the learning looks like

iona.minto@glow.sch.uk @MrsMintoBioSci

https://sway.office.com/s/AlGrpqcSckhNcjW2/embed

June 29, 2020

Mossend Primary School – Remote Learning Journey Unfortunately, fortunate

Unfortunately, on Tuesday 17th March 2020 we were told that we were classed as ‘clinically vulnerable’ to Covid-19 due to underlying health conditions and would have to work from home for the next 12 weeks.

Fortunately, this gave us a unique opportunity to continue to make a valued contribution to our school community and on Wednesday 18th March 2020 we delivered our first ‘live lesson’ – a simple story and quiz for children who were also shielding at home.

This was to be the beginning of a journey into ‘remote learning’ for Mossend PS & NC in North Lanarkshire: a journey which would last 13 weeks and see our team deliver nearly 200 live lessons. These lessons ranged from Literacy, Numeracy & Mathematics to STEM & HWB as well as Weekly Challenges and Expressive Arts. We uploaded countless resources and actively engaged with pupils across all stages.

From the offset, we met virtually to plan our strategy which revolved around 4 key principles ‘FAST, which became our strategy.

Flexibility
This was an unprecedented set of circumstances and we decided from the beginning that our approach had to be flexible. There would be some families who would benefit from a structure and routine, others who would need resources for their own time and others who would do their own thing. All of this was fine, but as a school, we needed to be there to support all our families with the path they chose. Our Motto became, ‘Do what works for you!’

Accessible
This would be key to engaging learners, families and staff who were operating a wide range of devices and operating systems and had a wide range of ICT skills between them. Passwords, logins, applications, file formats all had to be assessed against this principle.

Supportive
Parents and carers were about to become the ‘teacher’. Our role needed to adapt to facilitate learning remotely in a supportive manner that empowered and reassured families. Communication needed to be at the heart of this.

Timely
This was a fast changing landscape and therefore for us to support our learners in the best way possible decisions had to be made in a timely manner and we had to ensure we continue to look ahead to stay ahead. We met virtually twice per week to discuss digital learning, adapt, and change our approach.

We are very aware that we ended up in the unfortunately fortunate position of being able to get ‘ahead of the game’ and plan a strategy for remote learning suited for our own context. We understand that this may not have been possible for the vast majority, however, we hope that by sharing our experience others will be able to see where elements could fit into their own context and help build confidence and sustainability as we move forward into unchartered territory in learning and teaching.

Over the next 8 weeks we plan to blog in more detail about some of the decisions we made for digital learning at Mossend Primary School and Nursery Class:

Coming Soon
9th August – Self Assessment with HGIOS4.
16th August – Blended learning next session.

Mossend PS & NC is a non-denominational school situated in Bellshill, North Lanarkshire. The school has 382 pupils and there are 40 children in the nursery attached to the school.

Twitter: @mossendps @Mr_G_Reid

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/nl/mossendps/

June 27, 2020

Distance Learning at Deanburn Primary School, Falkirk

At Deanburn Primary, we have developed our use of digital learning platforms throughout the period of school closure. We have worked together as a team to develop new and exciting ways to connect with our pupils and their families, and to support them in navigating Microsoft Teams as a new ‘classroom’. We have been able to consolidate key learning through a number of ways but have also enjoyed introducing concepts and capturing the unique learning of our pupils.

All of our staff, our Senior Leadership Team, Teaching Staff, and Support For Learning Staff have maintained regular contact with our children and have engaged in the wide range of approaches shared – it has been a journey!

Please take a look at the sway produced by Deanburn Primary School which provides an overview, and examples of how they have used the Office 365 tools within Glow, use of video and social media for learning and collaboration.

Twitter @DeanburnPS

Online https://www.deanburn.falkirk.sch.uk/

June 24, 2020

How digital technology enhances the engagement of learning across the primary stages? St Patrick’s, South Ayrshire

How digital technology enhances the engagement of learning across the primary stages? – A Professional Enquiry

Daniella Mancini (@missmancini27)

I set out to investigate the following points:

to explore whether the use of digital technology enhances engagement levels in the primary class
to measure the importance of digital skills across a range of primary class stages (P1- P7)
to explore the impact of digital technology across the primary stages

The justification, methodology and results can be viewed in the enquiry here:

June 24, 2020

Spotlight On: Craigour Park Primary School’s Digital Journey.

In this blog post, Matthew Greig, P4 Teacher and Digital Strategy Lead from Craigour Park Primary School in Edinburgh takes us on the digital journey at Criagour Park Primary.

Before the idea of school closures ever crossed our mind, Craigour Park had been working towards improving digital engagement for staff, learners and parents. We had over the past year evaluated our progress, highlighted our strengths and had a clear vision of how we would like to move forward. A new skills progression was being developed in collaboration with learners and parents. Our class teachers were routinely integrating digital technology into learning experiences, robotics dance parties were no longer a wild dream, our learners were becoming experts in the world of Office 365 and words like Plickers and GoSpiral now had meaning. Then Covid-19 emerged as the next great challenge our nations schools would have to overcome. The classrooms fell silent and the school doors were locked. Despite the significant changes to the way that we now lived our lives, our staff took this as an opportunity to enhance the digital literacy of our learners and seek new and creative ways to continue delivering high quality learning experiences.

Communication

Our journey began with our teachers establishing multiple lines of communication. For our P1-3 teachers this meant Learning Journals. For the rest of the school (P4-P7) class teams were set up on Microsoft Teams. Twitter accounts were established by each stage from Nursery up to P7. Our school website was updated, and a school YouTube account was created. During this initial phase of lockdown, we gained useful feedback from learners and parents by using Google and Microsoft Forms. This allowed us to actively respond to our learner’s needs and ensure that we engaged as many pupils as possible.

Microsoft Teams

After a few initial teething errors, Microsoft Teams proved to be a huge success amongst learners and teachers. As well as providing a platform for learners to access their learning it also provided them with a social space where they could talk directly to one another. Who knew that a 3-hour conversation could be sustained purely with emojis? Teaching staff embraced the opportunity to develop their pedagogy with Sways, Forms and assignments now becoming commonplace. Using rubrics, points systems and forms a variety of assessment techniques are routinely implemented and our whole school marking policy is continuing to be used. Our Spanish teacher was added to all our Teams allowing them to run school wide competitions ranging from creating a Tapas feast to recreating famous works of art by Spanish Artists. Several additional apps have been trialled by our teachers. Insights for example has now become the standard tool for assessing engagement allowing us to target further support to pupils who may need it. Our school has also realised the value of Teams in supporting transition with new teachers having the opportunity to communicate directly with learners and assess their current levels and interests.

Twitter

Our school Twitter accounts have provided opportunities for our learners to engage with school and city-wide initiatives. Recently to support the transition from Nursery to P1, many of our staff and learners went on a Teddy Bear Hunt! Our P5 teachers led a #BigDayIn where learners had the opportunity to showcase their wider talents and achievements which would normally be celebrated at assemblies, the magic tricks were mind boggling! Throughout lockdown our school PE teacher has created a variety of challenges and initiatives which keep our learners healthy and active. Ranging from community treasure hunts to playing conventional sports with items you might find in the cupboard. We are ending the school year with our own version of the Olympics and a school wide BRAW (Bike Run and Walk) challenge where participants are challenged to do one activity each day for the whole month of June.

YouTube

During lockdown our school established a YouTube channel to directly show learners different strategies and skills. Feedback from teachers, parents and learners indicated that this would be a useful tool to support home learning activities. This has enabled us as a school to deliver lessons directly to our learners with the same explanations and guidance they would receive within the classroom. Our P3 Team have used this excellently with learners now having access to videos showing them how to create and understand Pictographs, Bar graphs and Carroll Diagrams. Our Nursery is regularly reading bedtime stories, a favourite of which is of course the Wonky Donkey. Learners can learn new PE skills directly and learners can join in with Maths warm up games. In addition, our SLT and Head Teacher have taken the opportunity to deliver messages directly to parents and learners. The school year is ending with a whole staff video for our P7’s in lieu of their usual leavers assembly.

Although Covid-19 has certainly raised many challenges and continues to have a significant impact on the lives and education of our learners, one positive is that our staff and many of our learners are certainly now more adept and confident delivering learning in the digital age.

https://craigourparkprimary.wordpress.com/

@CraigourPark