Teachers Pet App – Like the Argos Catalogue for Teachers

For busy teachers who need quality resources, there are probably two sites we turn to. One is Teaching Ideas and the other is Teachers Pet. Though, if I am honest I have them both on separate Chrome tabs when I am on the hunt for something for my classroom. In the past, I was probably quite snooty about sites that offered labels, word banks, posters and the like to teachers. I though teachers should make their own. But, that view was held when I was working as a consultant and I actually didn’t have my own class.

And now I am a teacher again, marking and planning take up most of my time, as indeed they should. I don’t have the time to make my own posters about parts of speech,magnets, materials, space travel or story writing. Though I may create a very interactive whiteboard file or Powerpoint on the topic, it can often be a very ephemeral resource. I often find I want to return to a topic or a teaching point a few days after I first flashed it up on-screen. Having effective and well placed visual descriptions in the room can offer a longer term reminder of key facts for my class and an aide memoir for me. They help and prompt me and my pupils during lessons on a mostly daily basis.

The resources I use from Teachers Pet are bright, colourful and very clear. I use them around my classroom and point them out during teaching, particularly at the moment when we are focussing on strengthening our understanding of parts of speech.

So, now it is even easier to browse for these resources. Now we have an app, or at least a soon to be released app from the TPet Team. I was asked to test a version of the app last week and I have since spent some time playing with it. As I was testing I was looking for bugs and glitches , but there weren’t any that I could see. Pages turned smoothly, buttons behaved, screens rendered very quickly and search boxes delivered as they should. Perhaps I had missed something.

This app is effectively a regularly updated index of thousands of useful and essential classroom resources.But then so is their website. However, I am struck by how much more natural it feels to flick and browse through these on a tablet. For regular iPad and IOS users like myself it feels so much less like work to pick up the iPad on the sofa and skim through for a space poster or writing targets , rather than powering up the ageing laptop or PC. Yes there is so much here, but the app still feels clean and tidy with lots of white space and not a hint of advertising or distraction. I think I’d like to see a similar app offering from the TES Resource bank and the collected works of Pie Corbett and then I may not have to power up my computer very often at all.

Download the app from here

First Look at Switched On ICT for Early Years – App of the Day

   Today’s app is actually a scheme of work, which is so good it is worthy of mention here. Last week Switched On ICT Early Years arrived at our school. We have been using the Primary units from this scheme for some time and I have been really happy with the depth, rigor and flexibility of these plans. And as they are just a few months old they are still relevant in terms of the online tools they mention. A real answer to prayer in a post QCA scheme of work era.

But up until recently, there had not been a set of plans for Foundation Stage and from experience this can often be a neglected or forgotten area of Primary ICT.

There can also be a good deal of confusion over what makes good ICT for this age group. One popular misconception centres on the advanced skills of these youngsters. Some schools believe that as these children are confident users of electronic devices and that they have a penchant for computers. Then they should experience ICT lessons in the same  spirit and style as Key stage 1. This can involve trooping younger children across the school into an ICT room to work at computer stations, which sometimes are too big for them.

My eyes were opened to what effective and age appropriate  EYFS IT should look like after a talk at a NAACE conference some years ago from Rachel Ager. Rachel, who is one of the main authors of this set of plans shared about her work with early years practitioners in Northampton. She showed a collection of video clips where children were using technologies within a meaningful and topic driven context. I remember watching children sending an email using the office computer, contacting the elves from the Elves and the Shoemaker. A further example showed children taking digital pictures within the photographic studio role play area. The images were edited using simple accessible software and printed out. think of all those skills yet gained in a meaningful and enjoyable dimension.There were many more examples like this and out of it emerged a number of key points. With each example she gave a context  and grounded it in theory, mentioning the work of for example, John and Iram Siraj Blatchford.

ICT was meaningful and relevant and part of what happened naturally within the setting, rather than being decontextualized and taking place in another  room.

The spirit of the IT that took place was emergent, experimental and playful.  Rachel Ager pointed to the link she and her teachers had made between emergent writing; in that at foundation stage writing skills were facilitated and developed through playful, contextual mark making. I think of Charlie my younger son, who as a keen reception pupil loves to experiment with letters ,  attempt lists for Santa and write names on Christmas cards. I would not dream of formerly sitting him down for forty minutes to write at a desk. And here is the parallel with ICT and ICT lessons at this age.

It is with this background and bias, that I opened the zip lock folder of Switched On ICT Early Years.  As with the scheme for the rest of Primary, there are thoroughly written plans which give you an appropriately pitched set of activities, along with the flexibility to slot the units into your curriculum. Activities are not just based on computer s either and they take into account the full breadth of electronic devices and peripherals you would hope to find in a setting.  The software mentioned is that which many schools have already got, such as 2Paint a Picture , Powerpoint or Tizzy’s Tools, though the inclusion of appropriate iPad apps like Beebot brings this scheme right up to date. I also really liked all the posters that the pack has, these depict children and technology and can also be found on the accompanying CD room, so teachers could show them on their whiteboards. Alongside the plans, posters and PDFS you will also find a whole host of digital resources and tutorials for software, which may well, be new to some teachers. I think they have thought of it all with this package and the response from colleagues I have introduced it to has been universally positive and welcoming.

Well done t to the team behind this scheme of work, it should help to raise the expectations for these younger learners, while also enabling them to experience a wide diet of ICT experiences.

I must also mention Tricia Neal who co wrote the publication.  I have long since admired her creative ideas stream and her determination to try out the new and innovate and remix ideas. Her influence on this scheme comes through when you read it.

So after that ramble I would say buy this scheme of work and then you will be helping your EYFS colleagues to plan effective and relevant ICT.

Related articles

• The Times: “Program or Be Programmed” (drtomcrick.com)
• Planning ICT Lessons for 2012 (simonhaughton.co.uk)
• App of the Day – iMovie (antsict.wordpress.com)
• New ICT curriculum proposed by Royal Academy of Engineering and BCS (schoolsimprovement.net)

 

Haiku Deck – set your presentation free

I have just created my first slideshow with an app I recently discovered called Haiku Deck. I am so excited by this app on so many levels. On a very simple level the app gives you the ability to create a slide show with a combination of photographs and overlaid text. But it is so much more than another keynote style app:

Click on the link/image above to view the slide show.

First and foremost the format of slide and up to two lines of text, forces you to be selective and avoid an overcomplicated message. Furthermore the size of the text is set with presentations in mind, I am not sure what point or size it is actually set at, but it is big enough and it avoids the awful whole slide of text syndrome!

To emphasise simplicity again I’d mention that creating a slide is at most 3 clicks/taps. No cropping or resizing photos to fit, that is all done for you

Despite the simplicity it is very versatile in its approach to pulling in images, you can use their own  bank of high quality images, take your own, explore your photo stream or use images from Facebook, Flickr, Picassa or Instagram. Ok not all of those last few would not be relevant or safe within schools with pupils, but for teachers creating slide shows this feature allows us access to a diverse and wide-ranging library of photographic assets.

Finally, let’s consider sharing which is where this app comes into its own. And lets face it many of us are on the look out for any app that lets you easily get your work off the iPad. Haiku Deck gives you the option of sharing by social network, which is great for personal slideshows, though not relevant necessarily for all schools. In addition to this sharing, you can send a link by email. This link then further offer the option of sharing via embed code to blogs or (ahem)  VLES. Though as you maybe aware you can not embed in wordprees.com blogs only self hosted wordpress.org. Did I mention you can also export the slideshow as a Powerpoint file too. And just as I am editing this, I have since found out that you can export as pdf from the main Haiku Deck website too.

I am looking forward to sharing my “Family” Haiku Deck with a group of  key stage 1 children this week. And then I’d like to work with some older children on creating and sharing their own simple Haiku Decks.

Related articles

• Create Beautiful Presentations with Haiku Deck (freetech4teachers.com)
• A next-gen PowerPoint? Haiku Deck looks to help people make beautiful presentations (geekwire.com)
• Haiku Deck (ipadsammy.wordpress.com)
• Haiku Deck is the mobile app to destroy the boring PowerPoint stigma (betanews.com)
• Friday Favorite: Haiku Deck for iPad concocts instant presentations (tuaw.com)
• Haiku Deck Is The Easiest Way to Create Gorgeous Presentations with an iPad [Video] (lifehacker.com)

Springfield Punk and Labels

Class rules

I want to pass on a site that I have found invaluable as a source of contemporary and attractive graphics. I recently inherited a classroom part way through the year, I needed to redo many of the standard signs and labels that were either dog-eared or (worse still) created in Word Art.

A selection of classroom signs

I will never be a one for Sparklebox or Mrs Pancake or whatever. I ‘d like to have some individuality and originality, rather than have my space look like most other rooms. In my environment I’d rather use a simple rounded rectangle template in Powerpoint and create my own signage.I came across Springfield Punx blog around a month ago and Dean’s wonderful Doctor Who cartoons have now started appearing all over my labels, displays and regularly feature on the IWB.

It is not for everybody, but I do think these cartoonised and colourful aliens compliment and enhance my classroom.