Category: Local Authority

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Movie Makers at Banchory Primary

Like everyone with recent events we were thrust into a new way of delivering learning.  Normally at this time of the year Primary 7 are asked to prepare a short speech on a project of their choice.  The pupils are then asked to present these to their class, the selected pupils then present to the whole school before going forward to the cluster final in which they deliver their speeches to a judging panel.

The pupils were asked to continue with the project using the skills which had been taught previously in school, the pupils use iMovie, Do Ink Green Screen, GarageBand and clips to create their speeches.

This is one example of a Student Speech that was submitted. This student created a script, got into character, filmed himself in front of a green screen and then edited the video. I am sure you will agree the content is excellent and the theme for the video has made the video extra special.

Coalburn Primary – A Digital Transformation Story: Using G Suite to enhance and support learning

A Digital Transformation Story: Using G Suite to enhance and support learning 

Our story begins in 2017 when Coalburn Primary School received 11 Chromebooks as part of an IT refresh. After a very short time, these devices became a regular feature in our daily teaching, so much so, that we purchased a further 14 to allow the whole school to benefit from their use more frequently. (We are a small school of 4 classes) 

In the beginning, the Chromebooks were used primarily for online games to support learning and access to the GLOW Launchpad tiles. Their compact design, long battery life and portability meant that they were easy to have within the class, on desks. However, after attending a course on Google Classroom, the scope of the G Suite tools became more apparent.  

Google Classroom has provided pupils with a platform for collaborative learning. With assignments being scheduled ahead of time, class teachers can work with a group, free from interruption, while other pupils access tasks set in Google Classroom with resources attached. It has provided access at home to resources needed to revise, notably using Google Classroom for Bikeability videos and tasks. Children from different classes within the school, in the same virtual classroom, sharing their learning.  

Google Classroom assignments led to exploring the other Google tools: Doc, Sheets and Slides. Upper school pupils can use these tools confidently, knowing that their work saves automatically to Google Drive. It has afforded them the chance to work collaboratively on documents to share the tasks. The online nature of the programs means the pupils can access tasks at home and in school. Since August 2019 large number of pupils were using Google Classroom on their phones and tablets, through the apps available. Google Assignments have allowed staff to comment on tasks completed and give constructive feedback for pupils to act on.  

Another major benefit to using Chromebooks in class are the accessibility extensions available within the browser. OpenDyslexic converts all text on the screen to a bottom-heavy font. This has been a game-changer for dyslexic pupils in terms of accessing text. The font is easier to read and pupils are gaining confidence in their ability to work independently. Another accessibility tool for pupils with literacy difficulties has been Read&Write, a screen reader which reads any text on screen to the user. It also provides talk and type, allowing pupil to record ideas and tasks. Pupils can have a Chromebook on their desk and work more independently, thus increasing confidence in their own abilities.  

Growing confidence in the use of G Suite tools led me to joining South Lanarkshire’s first cohort of Google for Education Certified Educators, spending 2 days training and sitting the exams for Level 1 & 2 accreditation. Having been encouraged by the course leaders to continue this adventure, I decided to apply for Certified Trainer status and was delighted to receive notification in January 2020 that I had passed. This has led to meeting a group of like-minded people, enthusiastic about digital transformation and a network of worldwide educators sharing their ideas. The rest of the school staff have also engaged fully in this journey, developing their digital skills and knowledge and sharing this with their classes. Pupils in the upper class have become our digital leaders, helping younger pupils access these new technologies with gentle encouragement.  

In these unprecedented times, when home learning has become essential, our pupils have engaged enthusiastically with tasks set in Google Classroom. They already had the skills and knowledge from school this year and could apply this from their home setting. The key has been to keep it fresh and assign tasks that allow collaboration even though they cannot physically be together. They have planned a “virtual sports day” using Jamboard, using Sheets to create scoresheets. Literacy tasks have been completed using Breakout Rooms to allow pupils to share their thoughts and knowledge as they would have done in the classroom. One of the simplest but most important things to have come out of using Google Classroom for home learning is saying good morning every day. Some pupils log on at 9am every morning to say hello to their teachers and classmates. This is a link that they need, to bring normality to our new routine. It makes me smile.  

email: gw07fergusonleighann@glow.sch.uk
twitter: @MrsLAFerguson1, @CoalburnPrimary
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Tinto Primary & Nursery Classes – Digital development with Google for Education and G-Suite

Digital development with Google for Education and G-Suite


Over the past year I have been developing my digital skills as a teacher and as ICT coordinator by taking part in Google for Education training. This has been a key part of our digital journey throughout our school. We identified digital literacy as a priority in our school improvement plan and as we had recently moved to Chromebooks in our refresh we had already decided we should uplevel staff and pupils skills in using G-Suite through Glow. 

My local authority South Lanarkshire Council offered the opportunity for ICT Coordinators to take part in Google Educator bootcamps at the end of last year and I was really excited to get this opportunity. They were led by Ian Vosser, Faculty Head of Digital Literacy & Enterprise at Larkhall Academy who is a Google Trainer and Innovator and Karen MacLeod, Digital Support Officer for South Lanarkshire Council. I hadn’t really appreciated how transformative this training would be and over four (long, hard, rigourous!) days of training in a really supportive and positive group we got our Google Educator Level 1 and 2 and then Trainer qualifications all within a term! It’s hard to explain the level of technical expertise and confidence I have gained but I went from google novice to trainer in the space of a few months. 

The impact in my teaching has been immense, in my P4/5 classroom we use google tools for everything, from using voice typing on docs, to creating slides to share our research, to building our own websites to showcase our learning, making data using forms and sheets, we have embraced it all. My class has really become independent too with technology and are happy to use Google Classroom to access materials in class, or at home and then create responses in docs, slides and jamboard. The Chromebooks have been of enormous benefit to digital literacy, we now have 14 in our school of 88 pupils over 4 classes and they are  used each morning across the school and then pooled in the afternoon and used on a timetable. The accessibility tools have been of particular benefit and all the children have been trained in using voice typing and screen reading. 

This practice has extended across the whole school with all children now using G-Suite and Google Classroom which has been invaluable during lockdown. Every child P4-7 used Glow and G-Suite every week in school and at home and they were able to train P1-3 in logging into Glow and navigating classroom in March so we could smoothly transition to online teaching this term. 

But the greatest impact has been training staff across our learning community. Starting with sharing Google training sessions with our learning ‘trio’ of local primaries this session, I quickly opened this up to our whole learning community across 12 associated primaries and our local high school. We are planning to offer Google Educator level 1 bootcamps as soon as we can but in the interim I have taken my training online and offered sessions to introduce Classroom and G-Suite supported by our own training classroom which has been fantastically well attended. I’ve also taken part in some live YouTube sessions sharing Jamboard, primary Google classroom and our digital journey story with the greater education community. The support and interest from Google Educator groups nationally and internationally has been really developmental to my practice and I am really enjoying training other educators and sharing practice across the world. 

Further Infomration
email: gw14rodgerannabel@glow.sch.uk
twitter: @annabelrodger

 

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Spotlight on: Claire McVittie, Teacher of English from St Kentigern’s Academy in West Lothian, Forth Valley and West Lothian.

In this Guest blog post, Claire McVittie, Teacher of English from St Kentigern’s Academy in West Lothian, Forth Valley and West Lothian shares on how she has created a OneDrive page for English specialists to share resources and ideas.
As a Teacher of English, it’s safe to say that my skill set does not rest in technology. However, I am always keen to learn how to use it both inside and outside of the classroom in order to best support pupils and colleagues. I’ve been fortunate enough to work with staff who are always willing to share resources. I am a big believer in working together in order to learn about different teaching styles and different approaches. This said, given that there was only twelve of us in the department, our resource bank was somewhat limited. 
I was becoming increasingly interested in how much time Teachers of English could save, if only we worked together from a shared bank or resources.  On Sunday 11th September, I decided to do something about this, and created my OneDrive page (which I recently synced up with Teams).  The OneDrive page/Teams page is a safe place where people can share ideas, resources and expertise.  I need to add people through their Glow email address – feel free to get in touch if you’d like me to add you.

Currently, the page has 1,398 members; teachers ask to join daily and, most importantly, it gets people sharing resources. I am always impressed with the different resources I find on it and I am very grateful to everyone who has taken the time to upload their own work – we all know how long it takes to produces high-quality resources! 

Given the current climate, teachers are working harder than ever to ensure that our young people are receiving the best possible support in so many different areas. I am delighted to see that my OneDrive page is being utilised and is supporting people during these unprecedented times and can’t wait to watch it grow. 

Claire McVittie 

Twitter: @missmcvittie 

Email: claire.mcvittie@westlothian.org.uk

Instagram: @st_kents_english            

Spotlight on: Supporting our Families, Young Children and Staff Digitally.

Bathgate Early Years Centre, West Lothian, has always demonstrated a strong supportive ethos for our families, young children and staff. We have aimed to continue this during this uncertain time. One of the essential focuses has been mental wellness; we created this Mental Health Awareness Sway as a reference point for anyone who may need ideas to help regulate emotions and feelings for themselves or children and access helplines or websites for support. This is continually being updated each week.

We communicate regularly with parents/carers through the Online Learning Journal message feature where we provide the opportunity for a chat and suggest try at-home activities to help keep the children busy and active.  Staff members regularly film themselves reading their favourite stories to the children ensuring the children are still seeing our familiar faces and hearing our voices. We then document these activities through our Glow blog and Twitter account @WLBEYC.

Our young children have always been co-creators of the learning in our Early Learning and Childcare Setting and during this time it has been no different. Following learning from home we currently have a Planting & Growing Project Sway and The Very Hungry Caterpillar Sway. These are filled with activities set from staff members and also include lots of fantastic input from our families.

Bathgate Early Years Centre was awarded a Digital Schools Award a few years ago now, and our digital journey is constantly adapting and changing.  During this time our staff team have really supported one another to adapt to working from home. We discuss and communicate every day using Microsoft teams and have weekly meetings using the video call feature. Digital Technology really has brought us all together and we are continually working together to support every staff member develop their digital thinking and skills.

West Lothian Digital Learning Team are always on hand to support us and regularly share practice using their Twitter account @wldigilearn,  and via Yammer and the WL Digi Learn SharePoint.

Email: tayloranne.kelly@westlothian.org.uk

twitter: @Taylor_BEYC

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Self Portraits on Purple Mash from Cargenbridge Primary in Dumfries and Galloway

by Louise Campbell – Class Teacher, Cargenbridge Primary

Our learners have been creating digital artworks of themselves using a graphical paint app. We started working on this after I received a newsletter from our school’s STEM ambassador, who helped to setup the Purple Mash app for my class.  

Our digital portraits linked well to previous learning at school. It was a fun, short, achievable task; which the children enjoyed creating, and handing in, with Purple Mash. I was then able to share their portraits on our class Teams page and the children enjoyed liking and commenting on each other’s work. This task encouraged interaction between the children, which has been much-needed at this time.  

Purple Mash contains a wide range of resources that the pupils can explore independently from home as well as completing teacher directed tasks.  I have been using the 2Dos section to set tasks in a range of curricular areas including music, art maths and science. My favourite feature of the site is the hand-in function which allows the pupils to leave me comments about their work and receive immediate feedback. The site is child-friendly and I would definitely recommend it for Early and First Level pupils.  

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Adapting to Teaching Online – Gillian Gillen, All Saints Secondary School, Glasgow

 

Since lockdown kicked in my main concern as a teacher has been – how do we reach our learners? Pupils had all been given their Glow logins and passwords before the school closed, so we all created Glow groups and started sending tasks online. People rose to the challenge, sending fun, modern meaningful lessons with variety and structure.  

Then the reality of Digital Literacy kicked in – many young people struggled to access their work and for those who did see the emails and reply, attaching a document was not straightforward. It is often taken for granted, Digital Literacy. There is a general expectation amongst adults that young people are ‘whizz kids’ with technology. In my experience, across a number of schools, that is not the case.

 

Our Council is providing iPads to learners – this plan was in place well before Covid19. It is a staggered rollout, so some schools already have their devices, and some are still scheduled to receive theirs over the coming months. Being an active member of the Digital Working Group, I had already started preparing. I have a Student Digital Leaders of Learning group and they were creating resources for use across the school. We had iPad training events where we promoted the use of OneDrive so that lessons were readily accessible on staff iPads. I started a Digital Newsletter to smooth the transition to Apple: 

 When staff were issued iPads earlier than planned it looked like we were all going to have ample time to prepare ourselves to support learners with their iPads. But now we aren’t in school. Collaboration and development opportunities have been lost and our priorities have swung towards doing the best we can with what we have, and adapting rapidly to the ever-changing needs of our learners. 

Most of our learners have a device of some sort at home (some don’t, and they’ve been sent Home Learning Packs). I did a short video on how to access Glow, showing learners how to add to their Launch Pad and which Apps they would need. As my first wave of lessons went out, I quickly realised that pupils who would normally embrace the tasks weren’t responding to the emails. The Glow groups default meant that emails to the Group weren’t going to their Inboxes and instead could only be viewed if the pupil went into their group. If you access Glow from a browser like Safari or Chrome on a mobile, you can’t even see the Groups menu. I filmed a short video on how to access Glow Groups from a mobile, and I changed the defaults on my groups. We put it on the school’s Facebook feed and waited. Gradually, there were more responses coming in, but still not as many as we’d like. 

I had screen recorded some of my lessons, doing a voiceover and taking my virtual learners through PowerPoints. I also downloaded my class novel and audiobook, and screen recorded my Kindle as it read the first chapter of the book. I sent these out and settled into some semblance of a routine. My younger learners really enjoyed the videos and were taking photos of their work and sending it in. I used Mark Up and my Apple Pencil to correct and offer feedback, drawing sparkly stars on their work and sending it back. It was when I was chatting to teacher friends on WhatsApp that I discovered that this, too, wasn’t common practice. I recorded a short video showing how I Screen Record a PowerPoint lesson, then sent it to my WhatsApp group. The questions then came back thick and fast – but where is my screen record button, how did you get Kindle to read the story etc. I responded, adapted my videos and sent more. I then started to drop them onto a YouTube channel so that they would be easier to find. I’ve improved them a bit, using iMovie to edit out passwords and adding a little background music to the ones for learners. I’ve since added clips on sending Word documents, logging onto Glow in Word, and using the dictate and Immersive Reader on Word. I have plans for more. 

These have all been in response to questions sent to me, both from pupils and colleagues. I’ve had some lovely stories sent by pupils since, all carefully typed into Word then shared links on Glow. Still not as many as I’d like.  I’m hoping that once we are all back at school I’ll gradually be able to show my other learners face to face how to do these things, so that they can continue to build on their digital literacy skills and really make the most of all the fantastic resources available to them online. If learners have the technical ability to access and respond to the lessons, it will improve their blended learning experiences. We are now gradually introducing Teams to learners, and using it for lessons; I think this will be where the fun really begins! 

Gillian Gillen 

 

 

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Fintry Primary School – Engaging with Learners and Parents

 

 

At Fintry Primary School, we understand the challenges of teaching through an online platform and have explored a variety of options to ensure that our ‘classrooms’ are as welcoming and engaging as they would be in person for our pupils.

Within the infant department, we have focused on setting up online tasks using Education City and Sumdog which are supplemented by our learning grids that we have sent home.

For our middle and upper students, each class has their own Team through Microsoft Teams where assignments are set, feedback is given and there is an opportunity for a general chat as well. This is also supplemented by learning grids and the websites mentioned above. For our children who require further support in Literacy and Numeracy, we encourage them to access the online support resources that we use at school.

All our children can engage with their teachers via the school twitter feed – where we love seeing what they are getting up to!

Some teachers have faced their fears of being in front of the camera and shared videos of themselves setting challenges which have been STEM and HWB related, and even doing the challenges they set, to motivate and engage students further.

Through the tools available on the websites and Teams we can gather information about who is accessing these and for those who are not we can perhaps put some support in place.