With announcements like those below indicating the health of Scotland’s renewables future, what better time to explore the contexts in STEM Central for use with learners?
This Interactive Map of Renewable and Alternative Energy projects in the UK would make a good starting point for discussion.
Osborne unveils £103m renewables funding for Scotland
Last night I was lucky enough to win tickets to the Tells They Tell presentation at the 26 Treasures Exhibition at the National Museums Scotland in Edinburgh.
For this exhibition, the museum selected 26 objects from their Scotland galleries, which together trace Scotland’s history from its ancient geological roots to its technological future. Some are iconic, others less well-known, but all have a story to tell. The 26 writers from poets and novelists to screenwriters, journalists and academics. The writers were paired up with objects at random, and set the intriguing challenge of responding to their object in exactly 62 words.
Object number 26 was a Bionic Hand which relates to our up and coming STEM Context of Bioengineering. (Watch this space for more information on this context being released).
To read the poem Hand of the Future click here.
Remember to visit STEM Central in Motion to find out how practitioners are using STEM in the classroom.
WWF’s Earth Hour – 31 March 2012
WEAR IT BRIGHT!
Join with schools and youth groups across the UK for WWF’s Earth Hour, the world’s largest display of hope for a world with a bright future.
From Edinburgh to Sydney, New York and Singapore people all across the world will be joining WWF to switch off and show they care about tackling climate change and protecting the natural world.
WWF is encouraging schools and youth groups to support the event and there is a range of FREE resources which can be used in the days or weeks leading up to Earth Hour, including:
Get involved, visit http://earthhour.wwf.org.uk/get-involved/sign-up-for-schools-and-youth to register
Do you have an interest in, or remit for, global citizenship? Need some advice or want to share ideas with like-minded practitioners?
If so, then you’ll probably want to have a peek at the shiny new online community for global citizenship on CPD Central. Join now so you can brag to colleagues about how you were one of the pioneering members .
Why have we set it up? Well, there’s always a buzz of ideas and sharing at our face-to-face CPD events and we thought it’d be amazing if we could find a way of bringing people together again and again to keep the discussion and buzz going. Well we’ve found a way! Here’s your bit:
Step 1 – Visit http://bit.ly/DGConline and add your picture (Glow log in required)
Step 2 – Share an idea or ask the audience
Welcome gift! If you join before Friday 17th February 2012 we’ll be happy to offer you a special gift to welcome you to the community – one of our highly-prized global citizenship wall calendars (these have been flying off our shelves!).
School open day
Whitelees Primary School, North Lanarkshire Council
9:30am – 3.00pm, Monday 20th February 2012
Theme: Sustainable Development Education
This event was originally due to take place on 8th December 2011 but had to be cancelled due to the severe storms. It has now been rescheduled for Monday 20th February 2012.
Whitelees Primary School hit the headlines in 2011 when it became the first primary school to be awarded five ‘excellent’ grades by the school inspectors. This isn’t the first time their achievements have made news. The school’s accolades and awards include:
A key factor in the school’s success has been the way it has placed global citizenship and sustainable development education at the heart of the curriculum to provide exciting, relevant and engaging contexts for learning. This has helped to create, ‘Highly motivated, confident and ambitious children who are keen to learn and to make a difference in school and the wider community.’
This CPD event offers practitioners and school leaders from across Scotland the chance to visit Whitelees Primary School to meet with the Head Teacher, staff and learners and also tour the classrooms, buildings and grounds. A focus of the event will be to identify and share the practical lessons and ideas that have helped the school develop a successful whole school approach to sustainability and global citizenship including:
Those participating in the open day will also have time to reflect and share their own experiences.
Click here to download programme for open day
How to book
To book, please email: globalcitizens@educationscotland.gov.uk or Tel. 0141 282 5172.
Places are limited so please book early to avoid disappointment. This is a free event!
Dual post from the Glow Scotland Blog.
Firstly, we would like to thank all schools who took part in our Panda leaflet competition. We were overwhelmed by the response we received, both in the sheer number of entries (which is why it has taken us so long to judge!) and in the standard of those entries.
We took into account how well the entries had met the competition’s requirements (a leaflet giving information about visiting them at the zoo) and the standard of information provided, as well as the overall design quality.
We really were most impressed with the entries and only wish we had more prizes to give out. Congratulations to everyone involved. We have also been very impressed with the number of comments on the blog and just how much interest has been shown in the topic. It clearly shows that pupils have been as excited about the arrival of Tian Tian and Yang Guang as we have. Well done! And Happy Chinese New Year to you all as well!
And now for the big news. Here are the winners:
| Name | Class | School | Prize |
| Ellis Stables | P3 | Kirkcowan Primary | 1st– Panda and GTV T-shirt |
| Rory Crombie | P6b | St Joseph’s Primary | 2nd– Panda and GTV T-shirt |
| Liam Eccleston | P5 | Caerlaverock School | 3rd – Panda hat and GTV T-shirt |
| Ashley Leggat | P4 | Drumblade Primary | 1st runner-up |
| Faye Jackson | P7 | Caerlaverock School | 1st runner-up |
| Carine Bissett | P6 | Caerlaverock School | 1st runner-up |
| Morgan Murray + Emma Barclay | P5 | Goldenhill Primary | 1st runner-up |
| Greig Sinclair | St Joseph’s Primary | Runner-up | |
| Dylan Bell Drummond | St Joseph’s Primary | Runner-up | |
| Eilidh Skinner | Whitdale Primary | Runner-up | |
| Amy Begbie | Whitdale Primary | Runner-up | |
| Ryan Conroy | P5 | St Joseph’s Primary | Runner-up |
| Aoife Mclaughlin | P6 | St Joseph’s Primary | Runner-up |
| Abbie Ribbens | P4 | Kirkcowan | Runner-up |
| Amy Smith | P3 | Kirkcowan | Runner-up |
| Archie Mortiboy | P4 | Kirkcowan | Runner-up |
| Jy Guthrie | P4 | Barrshare Primary | Runner-up |
| Zak Service | P3 | Kirkcowan | Runner-up |
| Freya Coyle | Balbardie Primary | Runner-up | |
*Please allow until next week to receive prizes. 
We will try to post some more of the entries here as time allows, but here is the winning entry, submitted by Ellis Stables of Kirkcowan Primary School. Ellis will receive the larger of the two pandas we picked up as well as a Glow TV T shirt and some sweeties. Well done, Ellis! We picked your entry because it was very informative, with just the kind of information we were looking for. We also choose Ellis as the overall winner because of the fact that it was a P3 entry and of such a high standard.
Rory PandasThe second prize goes to Rory Crombie from P6b at St Joseph’s Primary. Rory’s entry can be viewed by clicking the link here. Very high standard from Rory, with lots of information and quite a high degree of IT skills in preparing his document. Great work!
Runners up will receive a Glow TV T shirt from us and 1st runners up will receive a Glow TV T shirt as well as a small panda gift from the Edinburgh zoo gift shop.
The CfE and Glow News e-update provides you with updates on Curriculum for Excellence and support for practitioners, along with all the latest developments within Glow.
Click here to view the newsletter or click on the links below.
Read the January issue to find out about the following:
Today I had the pleasure of visiting Wellwood Primary School in Fife. The pupils were looking at Burns’ Poetry in a range of ways to develop their ICT skills. First of all the pupils researched Burns’ poetry and selected a poem they wanted to read. They read their poems to a talk partner, ensuring they followed the Success Criteria that they had set them themselves. Pupils used the software Audacity to record their poem and then used their creative skills to create an avatar using Voki. The Voki was then added to their individual blogs.
To find out about other Burns activities visit our resource calendar.
Click here to find out about Burns Day on Glow on 25/01/11 at 9:45 am.
A series of thought-provoking and lively Glow meets 
2pm – 3:15pm, Monday 30th January 2012
Climate change is never far from the headlines and is an issue which continues to cause much debate and controversy. Scandals such as Himalayagate and the hacking of emails at the University of East Anglia have shaken public confidence in the credibility of climate science. Media reporting of the issue has also left the sections of the public with the view that the scientific evidence is contested and inconclusive.
What is the scientific community saying about climate change? How much of the evidence is beyond doubt? What do scientists agree on and what do they disagree on? Amid claims of manipulation of evidence and conspiracies, who can we believe?
In this, the second in a series of three national Glow meets, learners will have a chance to air their views and put searching questions to our panel of scientists including:
– Dr. Dave Reay, Senior Lecturer in Carbon Management at the University of Edinburgh and author of Our Planet Needs You! A Kid’s Guide to Going Green.
– Dr. Richard Milne, Institute of Molecular Plant Sciences, University of Edinburgh – winner of EUSA award for innovative teaching as voted for by students across the university.
Visit http://bit.ly/climatedebate2 to register, post your questions in advance and join the Glow meet on the day. This Glow meet is aimed at learners in upper primary and secondary schools.
For resources and videos on climate change visit Weather and Climate Change, Exploring Climate Change, STEM Central and Climate Change on Glow.
Other events in the series include:
– Glow meet 1: Our changing weather and climate – To view the Glow Meet recording click here.
– Glow meet 3: Adapting to climate change (6th Feb ’12)
On 11th January I was invited along to the Engineering Education Scheme Residential at Strathclyde University.
Young talent from secondary schools across Scotland returned to the University of Strathclyde to take part in the Engineering Education Scheme (EES) workshop on the 10th & 11th January. As a key part of the 6 month project, the EES workshop offers a unique opportunity for the whole team of students, teachers and mentor engineers to work together over the 2 day residential period to jointly solve complex engineering and technical problems. Working together the teams develop their knowledge on the practical application of theory learnt in school and gain an understanding of business and industry.
The learners have opportunities to develop key life and employability skills such as team work, project management, presentation skills, report writing and leadership.
The Faculty of Engineering at Strathclyde University hosted the event and supported the 16 teams by providing the workshop facilities and technicians on hand to assist with project development.
The organisations and academic institutions taking part in the EES programme this year are Aggreko Manufacturing, BOC Ltd, ClydeUnionPumps, Coherent Scotland, Doosan Power Systems, EDF Energy, Heriot-Watt University (Department of Chemical Engineering), Howden, Rolls-Royce. Selex Galileo, University of Edinburgh (Department of Electronic & Electrical Engineering), and the University of Strathclyde (Departments of Design, Manufacture and Engineering Management (DMEM); Electronic & Electrical Engineering: Naval Architecture & Marine Engineering (NAME); and Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering).
The teams will now work on testing and finalising their project and attend the celebration event at the University of Strathclyde on April 23rd. Learners will present the final outcome of their projects and a working prototype to panels of judges and guests from industry and compete for the best project award.
Visit the scheme’s website to find out more or contact EES Coordinator for Scotland George Foster (e-mail g.foster@etrust.org.uk)
Pasta + mathematical equations = food as a context for interdisciplinary learning?
“With over two hundred elaborate diagrams and photographs, as well as a few words on regional provence and cusine,” writes George L. Legendre in “Pasta by Design,” the book “offers a surreal interpretation of the everyday experience of making and eating pasta. “Here is a selection of photographs, mathematical equations and descriptions of unusual pasta shapes from the book.
Last week I was invited along to the Engineering Education Scheme (run by EDT), Residential Workshop at the University of Strathclyde. At the residential S5/6 learners from around 15 schools across Scotland were brought together, along with engineers, teachers and engineering support from the University in a supportive environment in order to design prototype solutions to the industrial problem set by a company.
The Engineering Education Scheme in England & Scotland is an EDT Programme which links teams of four S5/S6 learners and their teachers with local companies to work on real, scientific, engineering and technological problems.
The scheme provides learners with an in-depth experience in science, engineering and technology that will enable them to make an informed decision about their future studies and career.
This will be achieved by giving the learners, in a 6 month programme;
During the six-month project phase, learners are encouraged to show industrial enterprise, creativity and innovation whilst gaining extensive experience of problem-solving, team-working and project management. Key life skills are developed within the context of the world of work.
Personal development education realised through work related learning is at the core of this high quality educational enrichment scheme. Find out how your school can get involved in the project.
Education Scotland Development Officers for Science are pleased to be joining our STEMNET partners for the annual STEM Ambassadors and Teachers Celebration Event at Glasgow Science Centre on Tuesday 31st January 2012. Science Connects and Global Science (STEMNET contract holders covering the South West and East of Scotland) are delighted to invite you to the Annual STEM Ambassadors and Teachers Celebration Event at the Glasgow Science Centre on Tuesday 31st January from 5:00-7:30pm.
STEM Ambassadors are volunteers who offer their time as inspiring role models for young people. They are people using science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) skills in their everyday lives and can help illuminate the potential of STEM subjects and careers through talks, hands-on activities, workshops, challenges or helping teachers with Curriculum for Excellence experiences and outcomes.
This event offers you the chance to meet informally with over 200 Teachers and Ambassadors as well as visiting a showcase of 36 local and national organisations exhibiting STEM related resources, activities, challenges and ideas.
Programme
5:00 – 5:45pm Registration (Exhibition area open)
5:45 – 6:15pm Presentations in IMAX Theatre
6:15 – 7:30pm Exhibition and Workshops
8:00 pm Close
Refreshments will be available from 5.00pm and throughout the evening . Car parking will be free of charge in the Science Centre.
Places are limited for this event so please register today to make sure you can attend! You can register by emailing alan.kerr@glasgow.ac.uk with your name, organisation and contact details or by visiting www.stemscotland.com/stem-registration.html and completing the online form. More details concerning location and organisations exhibiting can also be found at this webpage.
Thank you and we look forward to meeting you at the Celebration Event.
Developing Global Citizens through sustainable development education
Time: 3.45pm – 4.45pm, Thursday 26th January
Where: The shiny new Glow community for global citizenship
2012 is a big year for Sustainable Development Education (SDE):
If you’d like to tune into all that’s happening and are looking for inspiration and ideas to kick start 2012 then this is the Glow meet for you. The Developing Global Citizenship Team will be hosting this informal session open to any practitioner or school leader – just drop into the Glow meet to pick our brains, find out what’s coming up or tell us what you’re up to. If you missed the previous sessions then click here to see how they work.
Note: if you join us with a headset or webcam then it means we can have a good blether. However, if you prefer to type fast with wonky spellng then that’s good too!
One click (then another small one) to take part >> http://bit.ly/DGCdropin3
Councillor Hywel Davies, Lifelong Learning Portfolio Holder said: “These young people showed exceptional talent in the kitchen when they took part in the competition.
“South Ayrshire is known for great hospitality and wonderful places for residents and tourists to eat. Tourism plays a huge part in sustaining our local economy and ensuring we have outstanding people who can create new dishes, put a modern twist on traditional ones and cater for all tastes in future years is very important.
“The competition called for the students to use literacy and numeracy skills combined with their flair and talent for culinary creation.
“Cooking is a skill that will stay with these young people for life, whether they become professional caterers or enter another profession, the knowledge they have gained will be of great use to them.”
To read more click here.
Work continues towards the publication of the STEM Central context “Bioengineering”. Working in partnership with the BBC to explore the role Bioengineering plays in helping service personnel from 45 Commando Royal Marines based in Arbroath, and Touch Bionics, the Livingston based company behind world leading prosthetic technologies, this fourth level sciences and technologies based context will prove a rich source of learning, debate, discussion and creative thinking for your learners.
There is a competition for Home Economics teachers with prizes including a tutorial day in London with celebrity baker Paul Hollywood and £500 to re-equip the teacher’s school kitchen.
The Inspire! competition is looking to reward excellent teachers for delivering inspiring lessons which stimulate learning around one of the following areas:
-exploring a variety of different flour and grains;
-incorporating local ingredients;
-making the most of seasonal foods;
-celebrating bread making and/or cake making skills;
-baking for celebration events.
For more information about the competition, teachers can visit: http://www.grainchain.com/competitions
Cross post from the Consolarium Blog.
Over the past few years the Consolarium team has invested in a variety of technical/digital equipment that it wanted to explore in relation to how its effective and innovative use could impact favourably and positively on teaching and learning contexts in settings from 3-18 years.
We have been thinking how best we can utilise this ‘cupboard of super stuff’ and how it can be out in schools helping teachers teach and children learn rather than not doing that! After some thought we came up with the idea of establishing a loan service that Scottish teachers could access via Glow – this is what we are now calling CPDConsolarium. Based on the excellent leading work of Con Morris and the CPDCentral team we have designed a community of practice that aims to act as the focal point for teachers to share their experiences, successes and challenges in using GBL, game design and other technologies in their practice.
We have an inventory of over 220 assets that can be loaned by any teacher that joins CPDConsolarium. Before they do this they must first of all join the community by filling in the online membership form. Once this is done they can then browse the searchable catalogue and see what resources are available and when they can loan them. If a resource is free then a bid is submitted. This is an important part because we are asking teachers to begin to reflect on how they plan to use the resource, what impact they anticipate on learning as well as what it means for their own professional development in relation to how the Standard for Full Registration is being addressed by their work in this area. Once submitted it goes through an approval process which can involve e-mails, phone calls to the school or Twitter DMs by myself to the bidder in order to iron out any problems and to get the resource out to schools.
However, any bid that is accepted comes with a blank wiki page dedicated to that teacher and the resource that they have loaned and an expectation that the developing narrative of their experience will be documented and shared with everyone else. Without agreement to this no kit is sent out.
Some of the kit that is available includes:
Already the community is growing and we have already approved quite a number of sets of kit.
This resource is here for any Scottish teacher who can access CPDConsolarium with their Glow account. It is our resource, for us to use and to help inform each other of our developing practice. Come and join and empty my cupboard of superb stuff!
Over the past few years the Consolarium team has invested in a variety of technical/digital equipment that it wanted to explore in relation to how its effective and innovative use could impact favourably and positively on teaching and learning contexts in settings from 3-18 years.
We have been thinking how best we can utilise this ‘cupboard of super stuff’ and how it can be out in schools helping teachers teach and children learn rather than not doing that! After some thought we came up with the idea of establishing a loan service that Scottish teachers could access via Glow – this is what we are now calling CPDConsolarium. Based on the excellent leading work of Con Morris and the CPDCentral team we have designed a community of practice that aims to act as the focal point for teachers to share their experiences, successes and challenges in using GBL, game design and other technologies in their practice.
We have an inventory of over 220 assets that can be loaned by any teacher that joins CPDConsolarium. Before they do this they must first of all join the community by filling in the online membership form. Once this is done they can then browse the searchable catalogue and see what resources are available and when they can loan them. If a resource is free then a bid is submitted. This is an important part because we are asking teachers to begin to reflect on how they plan to use the resource, what impact they anticipate on learning as well as what it means for their own professional development in relation to how the Standard for Full Registration is being addressed by their work in this area. Once submitted it goes through an approval process which can involve e-mails, phone calls to the school or Twitter DMs by myself to the bidder in order to iron out any problems and to get the resource out to schools.
However, any bid that is accepted comes with a blank wiki page dedicated to that teacher and the resource that they have loaned and an expectation that the developing narrative of their experience will be documented and shared with everyone else. Without agreement to this no kit is sent out.
Some of the kit that is available includes:
Already the community is growing and we have already approved quite a number of sets of kit.
This resource is here for any Scottish teacher who can access CPDConsolarium with their Glow account. It is our resource, for us to use and to help inform each other of our developing practice. Come and join and empty my cupboard of superb stuff!
There is a free mini-conference for Home Economics teachers to attend on 3rd March in Glasgow 2012. The half-day training event includes a practical lesson with a Master Baker, updates on market research and intelligence trends, nutrition updates and teaching resource highlights.
For more information or to register teachers can visit the website: http://www.grainchain.com/events
Glow meet 1 – Our changing weather and climate
2pm – 3:15pm, Monday 23rd January 2012
Click here to watch the Glow Meet Recording
What’s happening to our weather? Within days of autumn 2011 being declared the second warmest on record, Scotland was put on red alert and subsequently battered by severe flooding and hurricane force winds which forced much of our country to a standstill.
Is this weather just a random blip or is our weather and climate already changing? How can we accept the evidence for global warming when the last two Scottish winters were so cold? What’s the long-term forecast – sunny spells or scattered storms? In this the first in a series of three national Glow meets, learners will have a chance to voice their opinion and put weather and climate questions to Alex Hill, the MET Office’s Chief Advisor to the government in Scotland and Northern Ireland and former Head of the London Weather Centre.
Visit here to register, post your questions in advance and join the Glow meet on the day. This event is for learners in upper primary and secondary schools.
For resources and videos on climate change visit Weather and Climate Change and Exploring Climate Change and Climate Change on Glow.
Other events in the series include:
Glow meet 2: Climate science – evidence versus controversy (30th Jan ‘12)
If you haven’t tapped into the amazing, free resource that is the STEMNET network of STEM Ambassadors, why not make a plan to explore using the STEM Ambassador scheme with STEM Central to support, enhance and enrich teaching and learning in sciences, technologies, engineering and maths?
Tansy Hammarton, Principal Investigator, Wellcome Trust Centre For Molecular Parasitology at the University of Glasgow, is one of over 2500 STEM Ambassadors registered in Scotland. Tansy’s work as a STEM Ambassador was recognised at the House of Lords on 13th December 2011, where she was one of three UK finalists for the award of The Most Dedicated STEM Ambassador.
The Scottish STEMNET Awards will be run in the summer term. This is an opportunity for you to nominate Most Dedicated Teacher, Most Dedicated STEM Ambassador and Most Dedicated Employer in Scotland. For more information, see the 2011 Scottish STEMNET awards.
It was an enormous privilege to be invited by our partners STEMNET to attend the UK STEMNET Awards Ceremony at the House of Lords in London on Tuesday 13th December 2011. Inspiring words from Rt. Hon Dr Vince Cable, Secretary of State for Business, and from Lord Sainsbury of Turville, former Minister of Science and Innovation, about the economic importance of encouraging and inspiring learners to pursue STEM careers.
James Murphy, Head of Science from St Mungo’s High School in Falkirk, beat off stiff competition from over 150 nominees UK wide to receive the STEMNET “Most Dedicated Teacher Award”.
The Inspirational Technician Award, launched by STEMNET in partnership with The Gatsby Charitable Foundation, recognising the work of a technician who can demonstrate they have inspired young people to follow technician career routes, was awarded to Nikki Cusworth, from Paisley, who works for Rolls Royce, Inchinnan. Nikki described her passion for making young people aware of the opportunities in STEM Careers, as a “fire in her belly” to make a difference.
James and Nikki happily agreed to talk further with Education Scotland about how we can share their inspiration and passion through STEM Central and STEM Central in Motion, our soon to be launched blog for partner and practitioner sharing. Don’t forget that you can use the STEM Ambassador scheme to support, enhance and enrich teaching and learning in sciences, technologies, engineering and maths.
Congratulations to all the nominees and award winners.
Students with an eye for design have the chance to grab a prize – by producing a logo for a logo for Scotland’s National Food and Drink Conference. The winning logo will be printed on shopping bags and promotional material for the March conference. And the winning student will receive £300 – with £100 each for two runners-up.
Rural Affairs Secretary Richard Lochhead said:
“Scotland produces some of the world’s finest food and drink and the National Food and Drink Conference is a great opporutnity to highlight what we have to offer.
“This competition is a great opporutnity for young people to get involved in something which directly links food and learning. Food and health has such a central place in Health and Wellbeing within Curriculum for Excellence – which takes a much wider approach across the whole schoolf rom 3 to 18 years.
“Through this competition, students will have the chance to showcase their creativity whilst helping us showcase our world class larder”
Click here to read more.
Eighteen youngsters from secondary schools across East Ayrshire recently competed in a hard-fought competition at
The Cook School Scotland, in a bid to win a place in the all-Ayrshire final.
The cook-off was for S3 pupils studying Home Economics/Hospitality. In schools, budding chefs prepared a main course for two on a budget of no more than £5. Top two from each school were selected to compete in the East Ayrshire heat.
Click here to read more about this great example of partnership working.
A series of interactive and lively Glow meets
In November this year, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change launched a report warning that climate change is likely to lead to more extreme weather. Within weeks of this launch, Scotland was battered by severe flooding and hurricane-force winds which brought much of the country to a standstill. Is our climate already changing? What will climate change mean for Scotland? How can we respond positively and adapt to the changes ahead?
We’re inviting your school to join the great climate change debate. We’ll be bringing together a panel of scientists and experts to answer questions, spark debate and discussion and help learners navigate their way through climate fact, fiction and controversy.
Each Glow meet will take place from 2pm to 3:00pm. These events will be aimed at learners in secondary schools and upper primary.
Please see links below for further details about each event:
GLOW MEET 1 Our changing weather and climate 23Jan12 – To view the recording click here
GLOW MEET 2 Climate science evidence vs controversy 30Jan12 – To view the recording click here
GLOW MEET 3 Adapting to climate change 6Feb12
For resources and videos on climate change visit STEM Central, Weather and Climate Change, Exploring Climate Change and Climate Change on Glow.
Lauren Boath, Development Officer (Sciences), attended the SSERC Physics Residential on Friday 2nd December. A fascinating insight into using physics in accident reconstruction from the Police, a hard hitting account of reconstruction of an accident in 2006 which claimed three lives. Lots of ideas for exploring applications of Physics with connections to health and wellbeing, and ethics. After an introduction to STEM Central, delegates had an opportunity to try out a kit which could be used within the technologies focussed learning journey from the Electric Car context. Once constructed, scope for open ended investigtion around relationship between battery voltage and motor speed, reversing direction of vehicle, design and aerodynamics.
Using Twitter, the twit-test is a contemporary take on the ‘Turing Test’ for artificial intelligence.
Working as individuals and as class groups, using a secure twitter stream, school pupils and their teachers will take part in a real-world experiment where they have to work out which tweets in a twitter stream are for real and which are fake – and they also have to work out how to fake it themselves!
With strong links to the Curriculum for Excellence, this competition has been developed by the Informatics Forum at the University of Edinburgh and delivered in partnership with the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Read more about the Twit-test in the leaflet below and find out the key dates, and information on how to apply.
If you are using the STEM Central Electric Transport context for learning you may be interested in this news article from the BBC where the BBC’s Brian Milligan has driven an electric Mini from London to Scotland, using only public charge points. Here is his diary of that journey.
Other related links include:
SQA, in partnership with Education Scotland, are holding a series of curriculum area events to discuss the new national qualifications and give practical support on their implementation. The events are also an opportunity for practitioners to give their views on the new qualifications. Places have been allocated to local authorities and their schools, independent schools and colleges. The events are part of a range of support to help local authorities and individual centres prepare for implementing the new qualifications.
The Access 1 and 2 day was on the 13th Decemeber. To view the Glow Meet recordings from the event click on the links below (you will need to glow log in to access the recordings):
Introduction and Question/Answers
To find out about other Curriculum Area Events during December via Glow TV click here.
Last session, the Computing Department in John Ogilvie High School, South Lanarkshire, decided to create a Glow Group to host all of the resources that pupils studying Higher Computing would need access to throughout the year. Joe Kane is Head of the Business Education and Computing faculty and undertook the task of building the Group.
Joe was keen to ensure that pupils studying Higher Computing had easy access to all information and resources they would need for the course and also would have a place where they could give feedback.
He wanted to simplify the look of the Glow Group and aid pupils’ navigation around it and so decided to use a graphical interface along with hidden pages.
On the Noticeboard page of the Group, Joe deleted the default web parts from the page, added a Text Editor web part and uploaded an image to it. He then created ‘hot spots’ on the image to provide links to each of the hidden pages.
See the Glow Cookbook here.
World of Work Online aims to enhance and support work placements by enabling you to step into different workplaces through a computer, whether in school or at home.
Within this resource you can discover and explore a variety of job roles, some of which will be familiar to you and others that you might not be aware of.
To find out about construction and engineering job roles click here.
On Wednesday, I visited West Lothian’s Learning and Teaching Development Team to investigate some of the ways they have been using Glow to help with communication across the Local Authority.
One of the ways they did this was to use a Glow Blog to enable schools to share School Improvement Plans. The blog alowed school to categories their plans so that they were arranged in cluster areas and also they could tag their plans with their priorities.
To find out more about this visit, click here to visit the Chalkface Blog post.
To find out about other ways West Lothian have been using blogs to communicate click here.
On Wednesday, I visited West Lothian’s Learning and Teaching Development Team to investigate some of the ways they have been using Glow to help with communication across the Local Authority.
One of the ways they did this was to change the West Lothian Glow Community. Instead of having a focus on Glow Groups, this area now has a focus on two blogs: Sharing our Learning and Staff CPD Share.
The Sharing our Learning blog is a public blog where teachers and the senior management team can share what is happening in their school, from awards to assemblies, events to an exciting lesson. The purpose of this blog is that as an authority West Lothian can share what is happening between practitioners, pupils and parents.
To view the Sharing our Learning blog click here. You can also find out how to create a blog similar to this one by visiting this Glow Cookbook.
Staff CPD Share is a Glow only blog for staff. In this blog CPD co-ordinators can advertise CPD events, staff can share Glow Groups, resources and tips, Network leaders and CfE co-ordinators can post updates, etc.
To find out more about by visit and the impact of using Glow to improve communication click here .
To find out about other ways West Lothian are using Glow to communicate click here.
Cross post from Consolarium Blog.
Derek Robertson (Consolarium Team) was contacted by Wilma Leaburn, a QIO from Renfrewshire and invited to a Mario Kart CPD evening at a school in Paisley. A number of teachers had taken this practice forward and a CPD session to share their experiences had been organised. The evening itself was a fantastic example of how creative teachers can be and how, when give the chance, their own idiosyncrasies can lead to wonderful learning experiences that meet the needs of their learners. At this event he met a teacher called Julie Paterson who invited me to Mario Kart open afternoon for parents and carers at her school, Bargarran PS in Erskine.
This series of posts will feature Derek’s observations at this event:
1/4 Driving Learning with Mario Kart: What’s in the box?
2/4 Driving Learning with Mario Kart: The buzz of learning
3/4 Driving learning with Mario Kart: The parents’ perspective
4/4 Driving Learning with Mario Kart: Healthy Eating and Grannie changes her mind
Yesterday I visited West Lothian’s Learning and Teaching Development Team to investigate some of the ways they have been using Glow to help with communication across the Local Authority.
One of the ways they have been using Glow, is that they have set up an ICT to Support Learning and Teaching Glow Group. Within this Glow Group practitioners can find:
– the ICT tools available on West Lothian laptops and computers
– video tutorials on how to use the tools
– how the tools can used to support learning
– case studies
– ideas for using ICT to support Additional Support Needs
To find out more about this visit click here.
Today I had the opportunity to visit Bridgend Primary School in West Lothian to find out how they had used Technologies for Learning during their Interdisciplinary Topic of Orkney.
To find out how the teacher used Technologies for Learning during their topic click here.
To listen to how the class used a blog to communicate with a school in Orkney click here.
Karlie and her pupils presented on this project at the Scottish Learning Festival 2011, to find out more click here.
If you’re using the STEM Central Electric Car context, some interesting materials to support learning around vehicle and road safety from the BBC: crash-proof cars, and a map of road deaths from 1999-2010 with information on accident cause, weather conditions, injuries and fatalities searchable by postcode or local 
authority area. Would be ideally accompanied by work with the Desktop Road Safety Reaction Timer, developed by a partnership between Fifex, Renfrewshire Council and SSERC.
Now that our amazing Glovember Author Events have finished, Education Scotland is giving you two more weeks to enter your stories, poems and illustrations for the Glovember competition.
All you have to do is go to the Glovember Glow Group within Glow, click on the competition page tab and upload your story, poem or illustration. Be sure to do this before the closing date of Friday 16th December.
Winners will be announced in January, after some of our authors have helped us with the judging.
Winning entries will be published in our eBook and read by one of the Glovember Authors.
SQA, in partnership with Education Scotland, are holding a series of curriculum area events to discuss the new national qualifications and give practical support on their implementation. The events are also an opportunity for practitioners to give their views on the new qualifications. Places have been allocated to local authorities and their schools, independent schools and colleges. The events are part of a range of support to help local authorities and individual centres prepare for implementing the new qualifications.
I attended the Technologies Day on the 1st Decemeber. To view the Glow Meet recordings from the event click on the links below (you will need to glow log in to access the recordings):
Introduction and Question/Answers
Health, Fashion and Technology
To find out about other Curriculum Area Events during December via Glow TV click here.
This case study demonstrates how setting up and running a social enterprise through the medium of boatbuilding has broadened the horizons of a group of young people as well as providing a context for learning and relevance to the world of work.
To read more click here.
Education Scotland is developing advice and guidance for practitioners on the delivery of courses within the new National Qualifications (NQ) framework. A new advice and guidance area within the NQ Support webpages is available, giving further information and linking to a new advice and guidance factfile and an online survey (http://newsletters-ltscotland.org.uk/LQE-MDNO-3GU5HR-8LLGF-1/c.aspx). As part of the ongoing development work associated with new National Qualifications, Education Scotland consulted key partners to determine the type and nature of supplementary guidance which should be developed to support the new NQs. The webpages explain the support that is currently in development and the form that this will take. This advice and guidance will be published in the spring.
A.G. Barr’s Food and Drink Challenge provides an insight into the entrepreneurial skills required to operate a successful business programme by encouraging young people to take responsibility and ownership of the challenge.
The project demonstrates the innovative and creative manner in which the pupils have developed a business plan that places teamwork, decision making, assessing risk, literacy, numeracy, health and wellbeing, technologies and leadership at the very heart of its objectives. This successful business project has enabled the pupils to develop entrepreneurial skills in a relevant, challenging and enjoyable manner whilst raising their aspirations in the wider context of skills for learning, life and work.
Model animation or stop motion animation is a great classroom activity that engages students of all ages and abilities and can support many curriculum areas.
This resource has been designed for teachers to use as a planning aid for an animation project in the classroom or/and as a printable teaching PDF resource. Each section will explain simple approaches to creating a short animated film.
To find out more click here.
To view examples of Animation in Action click here.
http://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/47993.html
More detail about how each new National 5 Course will be assessed is now available. Draft Course Assessment Specifications for National 5 have been published on the SQA website and define the mandatory assessment requirements for Courses at National 5.
The purpose of the Course Assessment Specification is to ensure consistent and transparent assessment year on year. It describes the structure of the Course assessment and the mandatory skills, knowledge and understanding that will be assessed.
Find out more about the qualifications development stages.
Draft Unit Specifications have also been published for new Higher Courses.
Feedback on these documents can be given via Have Your Say until 31 January 2012. The final versions of all SQA draft documents will be published in April 2012.
Looking for resources for Teaching Technologies?
Visit the Technologies Resource Section on the Education Scotland Website.
SQA, in partnership with Education Scotland, are holding a series of curriculum area events to discuss the new national qualifications and give practical support on their implementation. The events are also an opportunity for practitioners to give their views on the new qualifications. Places have been allocated to local authorities and their schools, independent schools and colleges. The events are part of a range of support to help local authorities and individual centres prepare for implementing the new qualifications.
The events will take place on 29 November, and 1, 5, 7, 8, 9, 12 and 13 December. Each event will be streamed live on Glow via the SQA Glow Group. Most events and workshops will be shown live and recorded for watching again later.
A number of resources will be available following each event, including opportunities to hear some of the discussions from the day.
Today I went along to the Glow Key Contacts Meeting to give an update about new resources from the Curriculm Team at Education Scotland.
You will find the presentation I used here. (Glow log in required)
The resources I highlighted included:
Organised by the British Science Association, National Science and Engineering Week aims to inspire the next generation of scientists with a programme of fun activities. It will run from 9-18 March 2012 and will explore the theme ‘Our World in Motion’.
The event highlights how the sciences and engineering relate to our everyday lives. With over 4500 events and activities attended by 1.7 million people in 2011, it is one of the UK’s biggest celebrations of science, engineering and technology.
To take part in 2012, you can either plan your own event or ask a local organisation to take part.
Working with STEM Central contexts around eco housing or electric transport? An interesting article in the BBC News Magazine this weekend on demands on the Earth’s resources – certainly gives food for thought for learners.
Sciences Development Officer, Lauren Boath, is looking forward to sharing STEM Central developments at the SSERC Conference at the Carnegie Conference Centre on 2nd December 2011. A busy and interesting programme, Education Scotland is pleased to be included to discuss STEM Central and participate in the day.
The aim of these materials is to support teachers who wish to undertake interdisciplinary learning for children and young people from pre-school to age 15, by providing high quality guidelines for planning.
The principal focus is on science and technology, while making appropriate, relevant and purposeful links to other areas of the curriculum. The project has been developed as a partnership between the Association for Science Education and the Technology Teachers’ Association, led by HMIE and with professional support from Learning and Teaching Scotland.
‘Ideas maps’ are used as the basis for developing related activities and experiences for the sciences and technologies. The approach offers choice, flexibility and stimulus for teachers to develop their own ideas. The ideas maps provide a good start for interdisciplinary teaching and can contribute to connected, meaningful learning for children and young people.
The project provides many opportunities for cross-subject working in secondary schools, and for collaboration between primary and secondary establishments. The potential for involving parents, employers, entrepreneurs and community organisations as partners is significant – each topic highlights these opportunities and suggests where this would be of benefit.
To find out more about the resource click here.
To visit the Glow Group and access the resources click here. (Glow log in required)
Watch again and think about future sports podcasting
Over two Mondays in November and December, we want you to work with us to make your own radio programme or podcast – on a sporting theme. We’ll be hosting two workshops in the L.A.B at BBC Scotland, and you can join in from your classroom. Click here to sign up.]
Click here for more info
In Prestonpans the primary and secondary schools in the area are addressing this by getting together to share expertise. The result has been a series of CPD ‘twilight sessions’ run by Preston Lodge High School for the benefit of its cluster of five primary schools. And it seems to be working.
Home economics teacher and health and well-being co-ordinator Liz Nichol explains that when teachers at Preston Lodge started examining what was needed for food and health from early years right the way through to age 18, they quickly realised they needed to work with their primary school colleagues.
“I thought: we already have the food and health specialists in secondary schools in the form of home economics and food technology teachers and this really lends itself well to a cluster approach with the secondary teachers helping the feeder primary teachers.”
Such an approach would also be mutually beneficial. “We could help ensure what was being delivered in the primary setting fitted with the secondary syllabus and vice-versa.”
Over a period of two weeks Liz and her colleagues held four CPD sessions on different topics in the food and health strand of the curriculum. Between 10 and 15 teachers from the feeder primary schools attended each session.
Three of those topics aligned with the main syllabus topics – nutrition, safe and hygienic practice and food and the consumer. The fourth was devoted to practical food skills and during the two-hour session teachers were shown how to create different recipes, ranging from a couscous salad to Caribbean fruit cake.
This session, which was very practically based, was extremely popular with the teachers, Liz reports. “We allowed staff to take over as much as possible. We also showed how different the approach would need to be if you were teaching primary year one compared to primary year six.”
The emphasis throughout was on a “can do” approach, she adds. So although teachers were told about the importance of an initial risk assessment, they were also assured that if done sensibly it should not run foul of health and safety and that the skills being imparted were sufficiently generic for any teacher to employ.
Teachers also started to realise this was about imparting particular skills rather than having to make a meal from start to finish, says Liz. One teacher found it particularly instructive to learn about some of the techniques for cutting vegetables, for instance. “She realised this could be used to make simple things like a dip or vegetable crudités. She’s now thinking: we can do this on a skills basis.”
Liz and her colleagues have followed up these initial sessions with two further refresher sessions and the evaluation has been positive. “They are saying we can do something here.”
Preston Lodge already encourages children from the feeder schools to work with secondary pupils on food and health topics and it is hoped the cross- fertilisation will continue.
This can sometimes be an eye-opener. For example, it is clear to Liz when she demonstrates cutting, coring and peeling an apple that many of the children – who are 10 or 11 – have never done this before, at school or at home.
She encourages them to take any chance they can to cut and peel fruit and vegetables when they are at home because that will help prepare them for what they will be expected to undertake once they are at high school.
She is delighted that food and health now play such a central part in the new curriculum. And she is optimistic that in time this can start to have an impact on the rising tide of obesity.
“I think children are becoming much more aware of health issues and their potential impact,” she says. “But although they often know what they should be doing, actually putting it into practice is a different story. But if everybody is approaching it in a similar way it will definitely have an impact in the long-term.”
Contact details: enicoll@prestonlodge.elcschool.org.uk
More information: practical food skills
Moving Image Education (MIE) is fast becoming an integral part of 21st century literacy and modern teaching practice. Using moving image texts as a source in addition to the written word has been proved to vastly increase wider literacy skills, confidence, engagement and fun in the classroom.
Education Scotland is working in partnership with Creative Scotland to make moving image education more accessible and active within Glow.
We now have a Moving Image Education National Glow Group which is steadily being populated with information, resources and CPD opportunities. Work is also underway to engage with Glow users across Scotland and encourage them to participate in interesting and relevant topics of discussion through the group’s Glow Forum. We look forward to seeing you on Glow.
Wondering how engineering connects with your teaching in sciences, technologies, maths, or other curriculum areas? We will shortly be publishing a series of videos on STEM Central useful for practitioners and learners. Titles such as “Why Engineering?”, “Getting Started in Engineering” and “Inspiring Space Engineering”, all with a Scottish flavour, exploring routes in engineering, skills required for success in engineering and the future of engineering in Scotland and beyond.
