Category: Community Posts

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History Teachers Connecting Through Teams

Scottish Association of Teachers of History (SATH) on Microsoft Teams by Rebecca Hay

If you are a Scottish History teacher get in touch with the SATH team:
twitter – @SATHinfo 

We got the Team set up in early February, so it’s a very new ‘baby’ of ours. Great timing as it turns out, as it meant that the resource was essentially there for teachers when the lockdown started.  

 

We have over 500 members, with an average of 100+ active every day. The discussion has been varied and interesting – today for example, an NQT put up a really interesting professional inquiry about virtual learning and it’s been interesting to hear others experiences.

Lots of people have been sharing resources they’ve discovered online, ideas that have worked, or asking for help and advice. Some teachers have worked collaboratively on developing materials (e.g. the ‘Meanwhile Elsewhere’ resource for BGE). From the Advanced Higher channel a little sub team of those who teach Germany has formed, and we’ve had virtual meetings to chat about our practice and share ideas. 

Probably the greatest help has been the huge amount of materials available in Files – 46GB of materials has been shared by teachers, and what a wonderful resource this has been to everyone, not just in the current situation, but for normal times too.  

 

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A Selfie in Isolation! North West Community Campus, Dumfries and Galloway

A Selfie in Isolation

by Jamie McKie, Primary Teacher from North West Community Campus in Dumfries and Galloway.

A Selfie in Isolation, an activity shared by Nicola Orr (@MrsOrrCPS) on Twitter has been used many times by teachers across the country.  Her resources can her found here.

Due to everyone being in lockdown, we’re experiencing home-schooling, coming together as a community and a whole bunch of emotions too! The children gave themselves something to look back on by taking a ‘selfie in isolation’. This could be completed as a family, with a pet or on your own – completely their choice!

To complete this activity, the children had to download the template and then insert appropriate sized text boxes to include information underneath the sub-headings and upload a selfie in the middle. The pupils were encouraged to be creative with font, size and colour. The result and engagement from learners towards this task was very positive and rewarding, I’m sure you’ll agree.

 

 

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Collaboration and community

This post follows a challenging week for myself, I reached out to a colleague sharing these challenges and received the comment from a colleague that I should feel proud of the leadership, compassion and support that I am offering teachers, pupils and parents during these challenging times and that my help and advice guidance have … Continue reading Collaboration and community →

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Learning at Home – Ormiston Primary School, East Lothian

Ormiston Primary School in East Lothian have documented their planning and experience of learning and teaching with technology for learning at home.  The document covers areas including

  • Pre-Lockdown Preparation Our Systems
  • Routines- Old and New
  • Pastoral Care
  • Feedback
  • Pupil Equity Fund Interventions
  • What do people think about Ormiston’s Home Learning?
  • Examples of Home Learning

Ormiston Primary School can be contacted on Twitter @ormistonprimary

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Highland Council’s Digital Support

e-Learning opportunities across Highland Council

This video looks at the innovative ways Highland Council schools are using e-learning to ensure students education can continue during the coronavirus outbreak and lockdown. We hear from two teachers who are leading the way in digital learning, Tania Mackie from Ben Wyvis Primary Schoo, and Robert Quigley from Milton of Leys Primary in Inverness.

Many thanks to Highland Council for sharing this video.

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Case study on student engagement in virtual classrooms.

In just a few short months the entire education system has changed, not only within Scotland but across the world. In response to the current COVID-19 crisis teachers have had to drastically alter their teaching practices to meet an entirely new set of challenges.

Prior to the outbreak of this pandemic I was completing my NQT year at Williamwood High School in East Renfrewshire. Although I am a Microsoft Certified Educator and have a strong background in digital technology switching to entirely remote learning was uncharted waters. I frantically began searching for any guidance or advice when making this transition. Through my great network of support on Twitter I was recommended a course by FutureLearn called ‘How to teach online: Providing continuity for Students’. This course brings together a global network of educators to share ideas and ask questions on how to best support students during this period of remote learning. I decided to focus on the very first question posed:

What do you think is the biggest challenge in online teaching?

As you can see from the results of this poll nearly half of the 10,000 course participants, including myself, selected ‘Keeping Students interested and engaged’ as their chief concern.

Having already identified a lack of engagement from my S1 Google Classroom I decided to make this my primary focus for my upcoming Professional Inquiry. Using the knowledge I gained from the FutureLearn course as well as guidance from my network of support in Williamwood I chose to alter my approach to online learning in order to boost engagement among my students. I presented my findings in the form of a Microsoft Sway and used a mix of quantitative and qualitative data to support my conclusions. I have attached the link to this report and hope that you find this useful.

Although we are living in unprecedented and uncertain times it has provided us as educators a unique opportunity to re-examine our own practice. By continually assessing and altering our own pedagogy we are giving our students the opportunity to become 21st century learners and gain the skills required to succeed in an increasingly virtual world.

Fionnuala Glover is a teacher of History at Williamswood High School in East Renfrewshire

Twitter @MissGlover19

https://sway.office.com/s/MOKG0mh8iXxs2yse/embed

Gauging Engagement at Our Lady of the Missions Primary, East Renfrewshire

Using Google Classroom Data to Gauge Engagement  

Each class uses Google Classroom as the vehicle to support learning and teaching. The teachers set up a ‘task chart’ of activities as an introduction each Monday. Children and families have the flexibility to complete lessons and assessment across the week to suit their individual circumstances. A ‘learning log’ is then completed by each child to reflect the ‘task chart’ contents. This ‘learning log’ is a Microsoft Form which provides a useful report for teachers and SMT to analyse in terms of planning for the following week and Google Classroom engagement. 

Any children who have not engaged are then flagged up to SMT. This will entail a cross-reference with a school Google Classroom usage report which we receive weekly from our Google Classroom Administrator showing who has logged in and the volume of activity for each child in the school.  

Class teachers are consulted by SMT and a decision is then made to contact those families via Groupcall – a generic ‘We’ve noticed your child has had minimal engagement with their Google Classroom content this week. Please contact the school if there is anything we can do to support…’ type communication. For the most part, this is sufficient for the families to re-engage or let the school know in which ways they require support.  

The next level up of contact would be a phone call from a member of the SMT. This personal touch is sometimes necessary and beneficial to reassure families and agree a more personalised support strategy for their child. The use of the ‘learning log data’ ensures a weekly touching base with all departments, stages and classes to allow us to target support and assistance for our school community. 

 

Our Lady of the Missions have also created these handy guides for adults to help learners access Classroom:

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/er/OurLadyMissions/parental-involvement/parents-2/ 

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/er/public/OurLadyMissions/uploads/sites/96/2020/05/12161644/Google-Classroom-Help-Guide1.pdf