Category Archives: Summer term 2012

Looking for cursive fonts to support handwriting?

http://www.cursivewriting.org has a large range of different fonts which should allow you to find one that suits the style your school has adopted… Not too expensive either!

They even have a unjoined precursive and cursive fonts to support the development the children make over time.

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WES gets a new look!

Over the next few months the Worcestershire E-safety website (WES http://wes.networcs.net ) will be refreshed through a collaboration between ourselves and the the University of Worcester.  Accessibility and appropriateness of resources will be key so that all groups of users can continue to find the best e-safety resources through a one-stop-shop.

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Want to edit the best bits out of a YouTube video?

Came across a really simple on-line tool for editing YouTube videos… www.tubechop.com 

Just put the url of the video you want to edit into the website and it provides you with options to indicate where you want to start and stop the video. Once you have ‘chopped’ the video you are provided with an embed code for your edited version as well as a url.

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Recommended i-Pad apps

At the recent i-Pad day at the Finstall Centre it was suggested that we tried to bring together a list of apps that people were finding really useful, either as teacher productivity tools or to support learners.

Use the comment facility to add any that you have found interesting.  It would be really helpful if you could indicate:

  • cost, (if any)
  • what area of the curriculum you felt the app supported,
  • what age range you were working with.

This of course will not be definitive as it is how you use a resource rather than the resource itself which makes it age appropriate, but it might help to give an indication of where people might start to look.

Posted in Look here for ideas, Summer term 2012 | 6 Comments

ICT remains a National Curriculum subject

Perhaps the Government have listened to some of the concerns of the ICT community about the disapplication of the ICT Programme of Study – Gove has rejected the proposal to relegate ICT to the basic curriculum come 2014, ie it will remain a NC subject with a statutory (but slimmed down) PoS.

The Government will maintain the requirement for the teaching of art and design, design and technology, geography, history, ICT, music, and physical education across all the primary years.

Programmes of Study for these subjects will follow later this year. They will be much shorter than the drafts for English, maths and science being published today. This will give teachers much more freedom in these areas.

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YouTube for Schools

http://www.youtube.com/schools allows you access to thousands of free, high-quality educational videos on YouTube in a controlled environment.

You can customise the content available in your school. All schools get access to all of the YouTube EDU content, but teachers and administrators can also create playlists of videos that are viewable only within their school’s network.

YouTube.com/Teachers has hundreds of playlists of videos that align with common educational standards, organised by subject and class. These playlists were created by teachers for teachers, so you can spend more time teaching and less time searching.

 

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Radiowaves App released

Radiowaves has released an innovative app which is in the Apple app store now.
It is for use by schools, teachers and pupils to create and safely share content from mobile devices.

Pupils of all ages can upload video, audio, blogs and images, post comments and take part in competitions instantly from an iPhone, iPod touch or iPad. Specially designed teacher tools allow educators to quickly take creative learning outside the classroom and easily manage their student’s social media work anywhere.  The app – called MakeWaves – can be freely downloaded from the Apple app store now.
Whilst anyone can view content, for security reasons a Radiowaves account is required for users to post content. Optional teacher tools can be purchased from within the app. An Android version will also be available in the Google Play store soon.

Download the app at http://www.radiowaves.co.uk/makewavesapp or search for MAKEWAVES in the app store.

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Bridgeman Art library App

Browse images on-the-move with The Bridgeman Art Library App for the iPhone!
• Download FREE from the App store
• Create and save slideshows, view images and their full metadata
• Available to all subscribers and trial users; simply download and then log-in with your username and password
• Register here to sign up for a trial account or contact us

What is Bridgeman Education? Bridgeman Education is the online digital image resource of The Bridgeman Art Library, with over 390,000 images copyright cleared for educational use.

Who is Bridgeman Education for? All those in Education including schools, colleges, universities and libraries as well as individual students, teachers and academics

What’s in the archive? The cross-curricular archive spans the visual culture of every time period and art movement from prehistory to present day and is suitable for subjects across the Arts, Sciences and Humanities
Register now at www.bridgemaneducation.com for a free trial or email for more information

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Some interesting thoughts on social networking

I posted this late last term, but it is so good I have reposted it so that none of our newer followers miss it.

As we expect more from technology, do we expect less from each other? Sherry Turkle studies how our devices and online personas are redefining human connection and communication — and asks us to think deeply about the new kinds of connection we want to have.

Click here to discover  how Sherry Turkle considers technology is shaping our modern relationships: with others, with ourselves, with it.

 

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