Tag Archives: EduBuzz

Achievement, Active Learning, CPD, EduBuzz, ICT, Ideas

Class Blogging

I noticed that the Primary 1 Blog at Gullane Primary School was very active at the minute so I decided to get in touch with their teacher Mr Dagger to find out why they blogged…

What have you been doing?
I’ve been writing a class blog about things we’ve been up to in Primary 1.

In what ways does this relate to Curriculum for Excellence?
I think that the blog allows the children to share their success in school at home. Also I feel it covers ‘I enjoy exploring and using technologies to communicate with others within and beyond my place of learning’ (TCH 0-04a) quite nicely!

What were the reasons for doing this?
It’s a way to communicate to parents what their children have been doing in school. By looking at the blog with their parents the children are able to talk about what they have been learning about in school. Sometimes I write the posts with the children, so they are keen to look at the pictures at home. The blog also links to the children’s learning logs, which they take home every Friday. I often comment that a piece of learning a child has written about can be found on the blog.

What has happened as a result?
I’ve had a lot of positive feedback from parents. They enjoy using the blog to stimulate discussion at home about what their children have been doing. The comments left are brilliant to share with the class, and allow me to assess what the children have remembered about activities we have undertaken. This encourages them to ask their parents to look at the blog again and leave more comments!

What would you do differently next time?
I think it’s an ongoing, evolving process. Last year I had a separate page called Onion’s Patch which I had big plans for, but never got round to getting it up and running properly. I think I am going to try again this session. Also the class have been writing notes for my dog to read ever since I posted a picture of him in the snow. I was thinking about posting pictures of him with their work – to encourage independent, spontaneous writing in class, and engage more reluctant writers.

Thanks to Mr Dagger for sharing!

If you haven’t got a blog going with your class, perhaps it’s something to think about? You can sign up to eduBuzz here.

If you’d like to share your interesting practice go ahead and download the form…

AifL, CPD, EduBuzz, ICT, Ideas

Using Google Forms in the classroom

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Many of us in East Lothian now have access to Google Apps through eduBuzz. This is such a powerful tool and people are thinking of more and more uses for it in education all the time.

Tom Barrett is harnessing the power of the crowd and the cloud to put together lots of examples of how Google Forms are being used in classrooms. This is changing all the time as people add to it, but at the time of posting this was up to 57!

Tom’s got lots more of these in his blog, click here to view them.

News

What’s On?

What’s On? is an eduBuzz site with a difference. It’s a single place where any registered eduBuzz (WordPress blog system) user can post their news, just like sticking a note on your noticeboard.

You just log in with your current eduBuzz WordPress details then post your news. If you’re wanting to keep up to date with what people are posting you can subscribe to the RSS feed. If you don’t know what an RSS feed is, the BBC do a great job of explaining it.

Glow, ICT

Horses for Courses: Choosing on-line learning tools in East Lothian schools

Do you sometimes wonder what the difference is between Glow & EduBuzz? Find out more from this informative post by the East Lothian Education ICT Team:

First East Lothian had the Edubuzz.org blog publishing system. Then along came Glow, Scotland’s schools network. And now – as if that wasn’t enough -we’ve now added an Edubuzz “Google Applications for Education” system. How do this lot fit together? Will they all continue? If you’re struggling to make sense of it all, read on: this note is for you.

Before looking at the tools, let’s look at the way the world is changing. ICT in schools used to centre on the computers, and the programs we installed. That’s all changed; access to network resources like search engines, web sites and communication and collaboration tools is now more important. The web is no longer just a place we go to read things; we also now expect to contribute.

Glow

Enabling schools to prepare students for this world was the reason for Glow. By providing a national system, free to councils, it aimed for learner equity. Glow provides a toolset for learning, communication and collaboration. But it had to be acceptable to all, so is conservative in its design. It doesn’t yet, for example, include easy web publishing. Popular features include web conferencing, free access to high-quality subscription sites and national staff networking via Glow Groups. Almost all schools have now had introductory training, and we’ll support you if you want to explore Glow and use it with your classes. Accounts are available for all staff and students, and it’s being used in most schools.

Edubuzz blogs

Our Edubuzz blog system started with an attempt to improve sharing between schools and learners in East Lothian, and has grown to become a leading education web publishing system. It’s easy to use, yet powerful, and has been adopted by almost all schools. Where Glow is currently almost completely private, Edubuzz blogs are on the public Internet. That world audience can be important in engaging students with authentic tasks. They’re also interactive so allow schools to open up new dialogues with parents, students and others worldwide. Glow is being refreshed to include blogs, and these are expected to become available during 2010. Meantime, Edubuzz blogs fill the gap.

Google Applications

Glow’s email system wasn’t ready in time for cessation of the earlier commercial service, and didn’t meet some secondary needs. The contingency plan, an Edubuzz “Google Applications for Education” Mail system, successfully met school email needs at no cost. It soon became clear that its other components, Sites, Calendar and Documents, enabled introduction of new, highly engaging, forms of collaborative learning activities.

  • Documents: enable students to collaborate simultaneously on word-processing documents, presentations or spreadsheets in or out of school
  • Calendars: create and share multiple calendars and track tasks
  • Sites: create attractive private or public web sites in minutes, and easily embed documents, interactive forms, videos etc.

Experience has shown these tools to be very popular, not least because ease of use is excellent. Staff and student logins are available on request.

Keep up to date with latest from the East Lothian Education ICT Team on their own blog.