Tag Archives: Technology

Modern Studies, Teacher Posts, Teaching Pedagogy

Digital Learning Day, 21 March 2015. 

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A really useful CPD course involving professional dialogue about the success and challenges of using digital learning in the classroom. Delegates also had the opportunity to learn digital learning skills by attending practical workshops.  Below I will share some of the highlights of the day and their impact on practice.

“Reconnecting with Glow” 

One of the key messages of the day was the potential Glow 365 has for improving learning and teaching.  The collaborative functions and cloud storage space can be used to create online learning environments and move away from the iPad/AAL as a “thing to google things” and instead to access course materials and carry out learning and homework.
OneNote in particular is being used to create digital textbooks, track students’ learning, collect and store evidence of unit outcomes and learn collaboratively.
http://onenoteforteachers.com/

“Kahoot” 

I attended a workshop on using Kahoot to create and play quizzes on any device.  I had used similar things before but this site allows the students’ responses to questions to be exported to a spreadsheet to identify areas the class are weak on.  AiFL takes place and students’ can rate their understanding of topics and enjoyment of the game at the end.
https://getkahoot.com/

I have already used this with my Nationals and Higher as part of their revision which went down very well (see below)

one two

 

Over the next 3 months I will be carrying out a practitioner enquiry, and hopefully implementing some of the ideas and practices I encountered.  In particular I will try to explore OneNote and the other apps available through Glow to enhance learning and teaching.

 

S.MacKenzie

CPD Sessions, Geography, History, Literacy, Modern Studies, Numeracy, RMPS, Self-Reflection, Skills, Teaching Pedagogy

SERA/WERA Conference – Edinburgh 2014

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As part of my MSc I have recently presented findings from my research at the SERA/WERA (Scottish Educational Research Association/World Educational Research Association) conference held in Edinburgh this November. It was a rather nerve-wracking build up creating an academic poster to present to academics from across the world (USA, Taiwan, Norway, Iceland, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and over 40 other countries) and with a few glitches along the way I eventually managed to get everything brought together in the poster below. Continue reading SERA/WERA Conference – Edinburgh 2014 →

CPD Sessions, Geography, History, Modern Studies, RMPS, Skills, Teaching Pedagogy

MSc in Educational Research: Use of iPads to Develop Higher Order Thinking Skills

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Over the last three years I have been undertaking an MSc in Educational Leadership at the University of Stirling. This culminated recently with my final submitted piece of work on how iPads can be used effectively within Social Subjects to support pupils’ development of higher order thinking skills (taken from Anderson et al’s 2001 reworking of Bloom’s Taxonomy). This project was run within the Social Subjects faculty and from the intervention, which was incorporated in to the S3 curriculum, there were several interesting findings. Firstly, pupils were less confident in their use of iPads and associated software than we as teachers perhaps assume and it was interesting to note that the majority of pupils reported increasingly levels of confidence with the use of mobile technology to enhance learning. Secondly, pupils were more capable of discussing and identifying how they can apply knowledge and skills across the discrete subject areas and this aided us in moving past the “but this is Maths/English/insert random subject” type of response to a more holistic view of learning.

Continue reading MSc in Educational Research: Use of iPads to Develop Higher Order Thinking Skills →