All posts by Phil Slavin

Android, Glow, Help, Scholar

April Online Learning Opportunities

Bitesize

The BBC have updated their Bitesize app for Android

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=uk.co.bbc.bitesize

http://www.bbc.co.uk/education

Twig is a premium resource for Maths, Geography & Sciences available for free, once logged in to Glow

https://www.twigonglow.com/Shibboleth.sso/RMUnify?target=https://www.twigonglow.com/secure

Scholar

All Stirling & Clacks Senior Phase pupils were sent Scholar cards earlier in the year, and should now have access to their Scholar accounts – which they can use without a password if they are logged into their Glow account (password only needs to be entered once). 

The next Scholar online live session is National 5 Maths (http://scholar.hw.ac.uk/Resources/Live_Online_Sessions/Upcoming_Sessions.html)

Scholar have also updated their ‘watch again’ service with a wide range of subjects – please share this with pupils.

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/st/sctech4learning/2016/03/07/back-catalogue-of-scholar-homework-sessions-now-available/

 BrainPOP

A reminder that as part of the e-safety competition, we have free access for all Stirling and Clacks pupils and staff to BrainPOP resources until 30th April (closing date for the e-safety competition).  BrainPOP includes resources for English, Maths, Science, Technologies, Humanities, Arts, Health & Wellbeing, Computing as well as e-safety. 

To get free, immediate access to the BrainPOP resources, please log in to Glow, then select the Council Launchpad, then select the BrainPOP tile.

You will be automatically logged in and able to access all resources.  You will be directed straight to the digital citizenship resources (to support the e-safety competition) but you also have free unrestricted access to all of the other curricular related animated videos and teaching materials.

Please see below for further information on BrainPOP:

BrainPOP creates cross-curricular award winning cross-curricular digital content that engages students through animated movies, learning games, interactive quizzes, and supports teachers whilst adding excitement to lessons.

  • 700+ topics; 10,000 hours of teaching material
  • Animated movies explain concepts from across the curriculum
  • English, Maths, Science, Technologies, Humanities, Arts, Health & Wellbeing, Computing and online-safety
  • Interactive quizzes and high quality educational games
  • Lesson ideas, worksheets, and graphic organisers
  • Non-fiction research texts
  • Vocabulary guides
  • Printable activities
  • Mapped to the Curriculum for Excellence for primary and secondary schools
20#20 Strategy, Help

20#20 Technologies Toolkit

Building Society: Technologies and the Significant Aspects of Learning

On 9th March 2015, Education Scotland published the Technologies Impact report “Building Society, young people’s experiences and outcomes in the technologies”.

One year later, in March 2016, Education Scotland published “Technologies: Assessing progress and achievement in significant aspects of learning”.

The following pages and attached documents are intended to support schools to self-evaluate within this context.

Click on each title to open up a new page.

EDIT

20#20 Strategy

Technologies SALS published today

Education Scotland have published the Significant Aspects of Learning for Technologies today.

This is a significant (!) release for all Stirling & Clacks establishments, because the content and structure has been so heavily revised and remodelled.  This was a consequence of the Building Society Technologies impact report, which requires that technology be placed “at the heart of learning“.

“In scrutinising the role technologies have played in recent history Education Scotland believes a change is needed in the emphasis around the role of ICT, seen previously as ‘enhancing learning’. The review confirms beyond doubt that our children and young people need digital skills and technologies to be given an absolutely central role in the learning process, no longer an enhancement or bolt-on but a foundation of learning.”

The Technologies SALS document has been carefully mapped to the updated expectations of HGIOS 4.  Consequently, there is a clear need for all schools to carefully consider the central postion of their technology strategy within their School Improvement Planning processes.

It is particularly interesting to note the following on P4 of the SALS:

“Digital Literacy  As with literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing, digital literacy should be placed at the heart of all learning, not only the technologies area of the curriculum.  

  • Using digital products and services in a variety of contexts to achieve a purposeful outcome 
  • Searching, processing and managing information responsibly
  • Cyber resilience and internet safety” 
Email Migration, Glow, Help

Email Migration from Groupwise completed

The Groupwise email server will shortly be closed down, please ensure that you are now accessing your email via Outlook in Glow Office 365.

All Education establishment staff and centre staff (including education admin staff) have all been provided with a Glow account that gives them access to a fully functional Office 365 with unlimited web storage, free Office 2013 downloads on home computers/tablets, a Glow email address and an extensive range of tools provided within the Glow environment.

The reason for providing everyone in Stirling and Clackmannanshire Education with this set of tools is to improve sharing and support, communication and collaboration between

  1. Educators across all establishments
  2. Establishments and the central education team
  3. Educators and Establishments across Scotland
  • All Education staff should view their Glow account as their primary or priority account, including school admin staff in all sectors.

 

A limited number of Education staff have been provided with a second account, in the stirling.gov.uk O365 environment.  This account is limited to email, contacts and calendar – it does not currently provide any additional benefits beyond this.

The reason for providing a limited number of Stirling O365 accounts to specified staff is to

  1. Ensure that establishments continue to have access to certain corporate services (eg servicedesk, e-financials, shared HT diaries etc), and corporate staff addresses
  2. Ensure the GCSX account holders continue to have access to GCSX mail
  3. Ensure that external ‘others’, including prospective parents and agencies can continue to get in touch using the long-established email addresses that are published on the internet and in existing school and council literature
  • Corporate stirling.gov.uk accounts should be checked for new mail from external agencies, used when accessing corporate services, and when the formal corporate email address is required or deemed to be the most appropriate, given the circumstances.
Help, Scholar

Back-catalogue of Scholar Homework Sessions now available

The following recorded Scholar Live Online Sessions for students and teachers have been made publicly available to view anytime:  Click the  appropriate link to access

20#20 Strategy, Glow, Help, Social Media

Share Your Learning…with Scotland!

There are now many schools in Stirling & Clacks using the Glow Blogs webspace to host their school websites.  There are also many classes blogging about their learning activities.

#ShareOurLearning is a place where class blogs across Scotland can share what they are learning.

Class Bloggers can choose which of their posts to share.  By simply categorising or tagging you posts with shareourlearning and registering here, any posts you categorise or tag will show up on the national site.

How to Join In

  1. You need a publicly accessible blog.
  2. You decide to use either a category or tag on your blog.
  3. Make a post you want to share or find an old one. Add the category or tag. For example  shareourlearning
  4. Once your post is published click on this link, go to the national site and fill in the form on this page: Share Out Learning
  5. Your posts that are tagged (or categorised) will be automatically added to the #ShareOurLearning site.
Glow, Social Media

2016 E-Safety Competition for Falkirk, Stirling and Clackmannanshire children and young people aged 8-18

The Central E-Safety Partnership announce the 2016 E-Safety Competition for Falkirk, Stirling and Clackmannanshire children and young people aged 8-18. Click here for the competition poster. CEP_2016_online_safety_competition poster

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/fa/centralesafety/competition2016/

Prizes include tablet devices, lock-and-play gaming sessions, online subscriptions, t-shirts, cinema tickets and more – and to win children and young people aged 8-18 just have to create a game/app or an animation/video to help deliver a strong e-safety message and promote positive uses of digital technology.

Help celebrate great uses of the Internet and mobile technology, and promote tips for keeping safe online and in using mobile devices by creating an app/game or animation/video to help children and young people better understand about the positives of sharing online but also the dangers of inappropriate sharing, as well as how to avoid making hurtful comments online.

Who can enter

Children and young people who live in the Forth Valley area or who attend schools within the Forth Valley E-safety partnership area (Clackmannan Council, Falkirk Council and Stirling Council areas) in the following categories:

Entry categories

Age 8-11

Age 12-15

Age 16-18

Entries can be from individuals or groups of children and young people – in the event of the group being of different ages the entry must be in the category for the eldest member of the group.

How to enter

What’s most important is the message and not the medium. Entries can be in whatever form is easiest for you. The entry can be sent if that is possible or hosted elsewhere and the link sent as the entry. Note that images in any entry must not include faces of real people, and no copyright must be infringed. The theme for Safer Internet Day (i.e. “PLAY YOUR PART FOR A BETTER INTERNET”) needs to be included in some way as part of the  entry.  Send your entry (or a link to your entry if stored online elsewhere) via email to CEP@glowmail.org.uk. This may be a link to the created /animation video hosted elsewhere (such as YouTube). Make sure you include details of the names of who created the song or rap, the age category, and where you’re from (school name or area in the Forth Valley area).

What you’ll win

There will be a range of exciting prizes. And winning entries will be included in the Central E-Safety Partnership online space and publicised, to include the names of the creators and their school or geographical area.

Deadline for entries

This was launched to coincide with Safer Internet Day on February 9 with deadline for entries being received being 30 April 2016

How your entry will be judged

After the deadline the judging panel will select a winner in each category and all entrants will be advised of the outcome of the judging process.

How your entry will be shared after the deadline

All entries which meet the criteria of promoting positive uses of the Internet and delivering an e-safety message may be shared in a public online space and will include the names of the writers and their school or geographical area.

Terms and conditions

1. All entries must be received no later than the closing date of 30 April 2016.

2. All entrants must be living in the Forth Valley area or from schools within the Forth Valley e-safety Partnership area (Clackmannan Council, Falkirk Council, and Stirling Council areas).

3. Material submitted must be the original work of the children or young people entering the competition, should not have been previously entered in any competition and should not infringe any copyrights or any other rights of third parties.

4. Entries may be created by groups of children or young people working collaboratively and must be entered in the category of the eldest child/young person in the group.

5. Entries must include the names of all those who created the entry, the category in which they are entering, and the name of their school (or location area).

6. Winning entries will be posted online following the outcome of the judging process. All entries which meet the criteria of promoting positive uses of the Internet and delivering an e-safety message may be shared in a public online space and will include the names of the writers and their school/geographical area.

7. Entrants should keep a copy of their entries as entered material will not be returned.

8. By entering the competition entrants accept the terms and conditions and agree that entries may be used by the Forth Valley e-safety Partnership for promotional purposes at no cost, which will include placing them online and promoting via various avenues. The rights and ownership of the entries will remain with the creators.

This competition is promoted by the Central E-Safety Partnership which covers the Forth Valley area of central Scotland.

E-Safety Advice and guides

You can find e-safety advice and guides here which might help with content you wish to include in your app/game or animation/video: http://www.saferinternet.org.uk/ and  http://www.thinkuknow.co.uk/  

Resources which may help

BrainPOP animated videos specifically aimed at children and young people are being made available free of charge for the duration of the competition to Glow users in Falkirk, Stirling and Clackmannanshire – just click on the BrainPOP tile on the local authority launchpad within Glow. All BrainPOP animated videos and resources on a whole range of topics (which inclides e-safety resources) will be accessible free of charge to Falkirk, Stirling and Clackmannanshire until 30 April.

Freely available resources which may help in creating an animation can be found here: https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/fa/ICTFalkirkPrimaries/online-animation-tools/  

Resources which may help in creating a game can be found here: https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/fa/ICTFalkirkPrimaries/creating-online-quizzes-for-the-classroom/  

Resources which may help in creating an app can be found here: https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/fa/ICTFalkirkPrimaries/thinking-of-creating-an-app-for-your-school/

Please note that the above links are only provided as suggested starting points and entrants may choose to use any tool which they prefer.

Glow

Innovation Fund – Applications Open

Applications have opened for the £1.5 million Innovation Fund to help schools close the attainment gap.  

Schools can choose whether to apply quickly for funds to run projects that are ready to start in March, or to consider bids for the 2016/17 financial year. The Fund is open to all publicly funded primary, secondary and special schools in Scotland which are not already benefitting from the Attainment Scotland Fund.

Funds of £3,000-£10,000 (per school) are available for projects that will help children and young people experiencing socio economic disadvantage. Applications are encouraged from partnerships of schools working collaboratively or individual schools.

Under the twin track application scheme, schools can apply:

  • Fast track: by 21 February 2016 for projects that will start in March. Notification will be given between 1 and 4 March.
  • Standard track: by 31 March for projects that will start in the year from April 2016. Notification will be given by the end of April.

Proposals should have a particular focus on literacy, numeracy or health and wellbeing. They can be new ideas, or a project with a specific focus, building on what has had the greatest impact within a school, cluster or group of schools. This may include projects involving parental / family engagement and career long professional development or those that help develop and realise aspirations for children and young people.

The guidance and application form are available:

• On our website

• By email

The information is also on the #SAC Scottish Attainment Challenge Glow site (login required), where practitioners can seek advice and collaborate on applications.

20#20 Strategy, Email Migration, Glow

HTs, SROs, & School Email Addresses

In discussion with colleagues in ICT and across other services, we recognise that there is a need to maintain links to the centre and a corporate identity for our schools/establishments. It is also critically important that we do not confuse, or cause unnecessary workload during this transition.

For these reasons, certain specific school accounts will continue to exist as part of the centre/corporate email service.  As the corporate accounts are migrated from Groupwise to Office 365 (corporate), these few accounts will also move across, providing an email service using the @stirling.gov.uk address.

What this means:
1. All the existing @stirling.gov.uk email addresses for schools (e.g. cowieps@stirling.gov.uk, wallacehs@stirling.gov.uk etc) will continue to exist and there will be no need for these to be removed from contact lists or the council website information.
2. All head of establishment @stirling.gov.uk addresses will also continue to exist.
3. Some other specified accounts (eg Secondary SROs and Primary Admins) will also continue to exist
4. All of the above postholders will additionally have a full Glow account with a corresponding @glow.sch.uk address and a full Office 365 experience
5. All other school/establishment staff will ‘only’ have a full Glow account with a corresponding @glow.sch.uk address and a full Office 365 experience

– Lynne Alexander (alexanderl@stirling.gov.uk) holds/maintains a list of these contact email addresses on behalf of education and other services. It is important that these addresses remain valid and contactable during the coming months.

Action
For those establishments who have created a “our address is changing” rule already for their school address, can you please remove it as soon as possible to avoid any confusion by centre staff, partners and the public?
You can continue to use a forwarding rule so that you gather all email in the one place for convenience.

– Please expect centre staff to continue to use and share your school and head of establishment @stirling.gov.uk addresses.
– This will reduce workload and stress.

For the purpose of clarity:
The GroupWise email system is being replaced across all services. All services will be moved into an Office 365 environment over a period of months and will all be using Outlook for email. Education establishments are moving first, and are moving into a specifically educational Office 365 (which forms part of the much greater Glow offering).
–>All establishment staff do need to move into Glow Office 365 for their email as explained previously and I would encourage you to ensure that all staff feel confident to move into Glow O365.

Please get in touch if you require any clarification , or if I can offer any support to you or your teams. Contact me at slavinp01s@glow.sch.uk