Category Archives: Technical Troopers

Anytime Anywhere Learning, Events, Primary 5, Primary 7, Technical Troopers, Technologies

Dishing Out Our Digital Knowledge

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Today, representatives from Eastertoun Primary visited our school to find out some of the ways that we use digital technologies to enhance our learning. Primary 5B showed our guests how we share our achievements on our iAchieve blog, as well as how we have used some of the Glow tools to support and challenge us across the curriculum. We shared how Bring Your Own Device works in Mid Calder, and also gave them a tour of our class Yammer pages, explaining the different ways in which we have used these.

Next, pupils from P6 and P7 who were involved in the process of MCPS becoming a Bring Your Own Device school shared this journey with our visitors. This offered an excellent opportunity for questions to be asked and answered by pupils from both schools. Our guests also popped into Primary 4B who shared their new knowledge of the language of coding with them.

The visit ended with a chat with some of our Technical Troopers who explained some of their roles and responsibilities and how they have helped to support digital learning across the school.

We hope that our guests found their visit valuable and we look forward to hearing how they progress in their own journey using our new collaborative Yammer page.

Internet Safety, Junior Leadership Teams, Rights Respecting Schools, Technical Troopers, Technologies

Yammer Responsible Use Agreement

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As lots of our classes are using Yammer to share their learning, the Technical Troopers created a Responsible Use Agreement to ensure that it is used in an appropriate, relevant and safe way. Kirknewton Primary School had kindly shared their Glow Charter with us to give us ideas about the important statements to include. We decided on the key ways that we need to keep ourselves and our information safe, as well as how we can share our opinions in a kind and mature way.

We then sent our agreement to our Rights Respecting Schools Junior Leadership Team, who linked some of our statements to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. You can find a copy of the agreement here. Each class will review this together, editing it to suit their needs if appropriate. The new copy will then be posted to their own class Yammer page to show that everyone has agreed to the Responsible Use Agreement.

Anytime Anywhere Learning, Information for Parents, Primary 5, Primary 7, Technical Troopers, Technologies

Bring Your Own Device Update

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This week, the Technical Troopers met to discuss the use of Bring Your Own Device in MCPS to find out what is going well and what can still be improved. As we are still in the trial phrase of Bring Your Own Device, we have decided to allow children in P5-7 who have a signed BYOD contract to use their own device during Free Time Friday. The Technical Troopers brainstormed the benefits and possible problems that could occur with this, and also discussed the possible consequence of the contract being broken during Free Time Friday.

We decided that all of the details outlined in our Responsible Use contract will still stand. This will be reviewed regularly to ensure that our pupils, staff and devices remain safe. You can see a copy of our Responsible Use contract here. If you would like your child to engage with Bring Your Own Device, copies of the contract can be obtained from the class teachers in P5-7.

In addition to this, and following on from our taster session from Google at the end of last term, we have recently purchased a set of 10 Virtual Reality headsets. These can be used with most smart phones using the ‘Expeditions’ app. Google Expeditions takes children on virtual trips all over the world, allowing them get up close with historical landmarks, dive underwater with sharks and even visit outer space! This is an exciting new use of Bring Your Own Device that we are looking forward to exploring.

Anytime Anywhere Learning, Community, Events, Pupil Council, Technical Troopers, Technologies

West Lothian’s Digilearn Event

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On Friday, Mid Calder Primary School were invited along to West Lothian’s Digilearn Event to share our journey to becoming an AAL and Bring Your Own Device school. As they were part of our Technical Troopers and Pupil Council Junior Leadership Teams during the key stages of this journey, Calum, Ben, Grace and Kirsty joined Miss Burton and Miss Sherlow to present to Head Teachers, teachers and a range of other practitioners from across West Lothian.

They did a fantastic job in sharing the ongoing process that MCPS are going through in our engagement with AAL and BYOD, and received lots of lovely feedback about about how professional and inspiring they were when presenting. Well done Calum, Ben, Grace and Kirsty!

Anytime Anywhere Learning, Primary 5, Primary 7, Technical Troopers, Technologies

BYOD Glow Meet

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To celebrate Digital Learning Week, today some of our Technical Troopers took part in a Glow Meet with Williamston Primary School to share our progress with Bring Your Own Device so far. Both schools shared how they have been using BYOD to enhance teaching and learning, and it certainly inspired our thinking and gave us some great ideas about what we could do next. Some of the pupils in Williamston have been using online tools to create their own profile pictures for their Yammer accounts, which has inspired P5 in Mid Calder to do the same.

Thank you to the pupils who gave up some of their lunch time to share some of the great examples of learning through digital technologies happening in both schools.

Anytime Anywhere Learning, Events, Information for Parents, Pupil Council, Technical Troopers, Technologies

Bring Your Own Device Parent Information

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Thank you to all the parents and carers who attended our Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) parent information session. For those who were unable to attend, here is the PowerPoint that some of our Technical Troopers, Pupil Council and House Captains brilliantly presented. Thank you to those pupils for giving up their time to share our BYOD journey so far.

Anytime Anywhere Learning, Events, Health & Wellbeing, House Meetings, Internet Safety, Primary 1, Primary 2, Primary 3, Primary 5, Primary 7, Pupil Council, Technical Troopers

House Meeting: BYOD and Internet Safety

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Last week we had our first House meeting of 2016 and the House and Vice Captains decided the focus should be on Anytime Anywhere Learning (AAL), Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) and internet safety, as these are currently hot topics of conversations in our school.

As usual we started the meeting going over the plan for the meeting and expectations. Then the house members took part in a community builder. The House and Vice Captains showed us a video about internet safety as it is Internet Safety Day soon.

This led on to telling us about Bring Your Own Device, this is something the Technical Troopers and Pupil Council are leading. We had to create a post-it pledge to show how we would follow our school values of responsible and respectful if we became a BYOD school. The House and Vice Captains have taken these post-its and created a school crest.

Thank you to the House and Vice Captains, and P7s for organising such an interesting house meeting.

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Anytime Anywhere Learning, Primary 7, Pupil Council, Technical Troopers, Technologies

Glow Meet with Williamston PS

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On Thursday some of our Pupil Council and Technical Troopers took part in a Glow Meet with some pupils from Williamston Primary School. Some classes at Williamston Primary already use Bring Your Own Device (BYOD), so we decided we would ask them some questions about their journey, including the benefits of BYOD and how they resolved any issues they came across. A big thank you to the P6s who gave gave some of their lunch time to meet with us, we have lots to think about.

Anytime Anywhere Learning, Primary 1, Primary 2, Primary 3, Primary 5, Primary 7, Pupil Council, Technical Troopers, Technologies

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD)

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Today at our Pupil Council meeting we discussed the concerns we had about bring our own device and came up with some solutions.

  1. Lost, stolen, damaged devices: We recognised that we would have to trust each other. We think it’s important that your device has a protective cover. Some of us discussed that if you brought you own devic e it is just for you to use. We would have to learn to take responsibility for our own devices and respect other children’s property.
  2. Taking photos & videos: Some of us had the idea that if you were using your own device you could only take photos of yourself and your work and you could use school devices to take photos of other pupils in your class. We discussed how you had to ask someone before you took a photo and then delete the photo from the device when you are finished. We recognised that we would have to be responsible when taking photos and videos to ensure they were appropriate.
  3. What if I don’t have a device?: ‘So what?’ -We have lots of devices and eq uipment in school that you can use. We discussed how you might want to take an old device to school with you to use.
  4. Responsible use: We thought it would be a good idea to create a contract so children remember how to use the devices responsibily. We don’t think we should use social media or texting  at school, we want to use our devices to help us learn.

On Thursday some of the Pupil Council and Technical Troopers are having a Glow Meet with the Pupil Council at Williamston Primary. They are using BYOD and we think we could learn lots of them.

Our new school devices are almost ready to use on our Anytime Anywhere Learning network … We are very excited abut the possibilities this will have for us and our teachers!

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