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ICT to Inspire Conference, Ty Dysgu, Cefn Coed, Wales
Great to return again, to the ESIS Conference Centre, Ty Dysgu, Cefn Coed, near Cardiff, for another romp through digital and analogue worlds in Wales. We were joined by fifty colleagues from across the South Wales region, quite a few of whom we had worked with before., and who were back for more.
We had a practical exploration of some of the virtual worlds and visual literacy elements that can have a huge impact on raising children’s confidence across the creative curriculum.
We need to inspire young people and fire their imaginations; enhance their creativity and confidence so they can pick ideas up and start to juggle with them; encourage resourcefulness through challenge, but also the ability to reflect, change and benefit from the experience of others; to motivate a love of learning for life.
Fascination is a tool that can be easily neglected. This digital world, when mixed with the analogue, brings such potential for communication.
Technology is not the only answer… but, it does open up some remarkable opportunities, extending teaching & learning styles.
Thank you to Graham Evans, and colleagues, for organising another joyous day. The next steps in the ICT journey in our time with schools across this region. “There’s more!”
Well done & thank you to all of the folk here today, for your laughter, & the willingness to go for it & give things a go!
We took apart the powerful effect of using games, many (mostly free) Web tools, hand-held devices and more, – investigating a way of teaching, where quality learning is the focus rather than the latest gadget; ‘what is said, rather than what is used to say it’.
Virtual worlds, with their stunning landscapes, peaceful characters and realistic challenges, can be used across subject areas, abilities and age ranges, with remarkable effects: developing speaking and listening, and creativity in children of all ages, and abilities.
LiveBinders
We have mentioned LiveBinders before but found a useful one linked with today’s visit.
LiveBinders lets you create digital “binders” that are easy to make and just as easy to navigate. Various tabs can have appropriate websites collected together inside of them. Useful for many ages & abilities.
Brislington Enterprise College, Bristol
Thank you to Andy Cooper, Assistant Head at Brislington Enterprise College (BECAUSE) for inviting us back to the school to work with his students, and colleagues, for a day of exploring the digital and analogue mix of learning.
This is our second visit to BECAUSE. Our first day was reflected upon by Chris Fryer here.
Our day today started with one group of sixty plus Y7 students, some Y8′s and their teachers.
Carol Powell, SEN teacher, reflected on a few key aspects:
Positive praise to a pupil who displayed challenging behaviour previously. I’m going to come back to you for more of your ideas… is that OK”? (It’s a promise, not a warning).
“Shall we go for a walk”? But, for a long time, we don’t go for a walk- just a tiny movement, keeps pupil’s attention.
Quite a long input at start of session, but children needed this time to generate ideas and become familiar with the scene
As the pupil’s started writing, Tim broke in, as if he had forgotten some key points.
No right or wrong idea…. Don’t worry about spellings… (Some pupil’s relieved at this) The interruption seemed to motivate the pupil’s to get on with their writing.
Read out A’s writing, – excellent results, challenged himself. Lots of praise. This gave others examples and they seemed keen to get back to writing some more.
When looking around the room, ALL of the pupils were engaged in their writing and clearly enjoying the task.
On 29th May 2012 BECAUSE will be running BITES, Bristol’s first I.T. Education show, hosted by Brislington Enterprise College. Register for BITES at Because here, and see the schedule here.
The Show will boast exhibits by world leaders in emerging technologies with a focus on education. BITES is open to all leaders & innovators within education, as well as all primary & secondary school teachers across Bristol and beyond.
There is also a Teachmeet happening on the same day, which you can find out more about here.
A TeachMeet is an informal and gathering for those of us who are enthusiastic about teaching and who are keen to share ideas.
MentorMob
MentorMob is another way to gather, organise and share, collections of internet resources to guide students through a research exploration. Creating and editing Learning Playlists is a free and easy process. You can keep your playlists closed, or invite others to add to, edit, advise & refine your collections. You could also leave them totally open, but that would be something to consider carefully. MentorMob might be handy in school, and after school, in many subject areas. Let us know if you create a MentorMob others might find useful as well.
DARKLANDS GAZETTE EXCLUSIVE
Following our Senior Roving Reporter’s account of her intrepid incursion of Planet Earth in quest of information on the outrageous theft of the magic flute of Giant Grimface, which is regarded as a national musical treasure by us all, we hear of an even more alarming discovery of great perfidy committed by this same earthman criminal in that it appears he managed to gain access to our most sacred inner sanctum, the Circle of the Secret Globes.
This “Mr. Ryelands” as he has chosen to name himself, though we believe this to be an alias, was encountered by our gracious Princess who, in her customary friendly and accepting nature, believed him to be about his lawful business.
Thus she introduced this interloper to our royal golden lizard and was not warned by the scuttling exit in alarm by this creature.
Encouraged by the warm interest of the visitor in the dazzling gem hung around her neck, she explained that it was a gift from her father, the King, thus revealing her identity, & trustingly beckoned him onwards.
Instead of following, the criminal turned on his heels and, with a gadget in his hand that is thought to be a Google-associated key of some sort disarmingly called a “mouse,” he clicked open the doors to our Innermost Retreat and proceeded to make a mental record of everything within. Noticing our Bureau of the Most Secret, it appears from later investigation that he actually opened the hidden drawer before being disturbed by the noise of approaching guards & making his getaway.
What is not yet known, and of great disquiet, is what he actually saw and recorded of our most revered items of national security and way of life.
This is “restricted” matter so that we are not able to report further upon what rested within the drawer. Be assured that, when this crime has been successfully resolved, our readers will be the first to be informed of the outcome. For the time being, there will be no further information.
The Editor
Interactive Fiction…rediscovered
Interaction Fiction (IF) is the perfect blend of gaming and storytelling and has the power to engage your X-Box aficionados with both reading and writing. Kristian Still, Assistant Head at Hamble Community Sports College in Southampton is an Interactive Fiction expert and enthusiast, having seen the evidence of its impact first hand. Why should you head over to textadventures.co.uk after you are done reading this post? Because IF can make a difference to your students attitudes to reading.
So… what is Interactive Fiction?
Interactive Fiction is on-screen text adventure gaming. It is not a new phenomena, & has been around for decades & although mostly textual, the term can sometimes refer to all adventure games, including wholly graphical adventures such as Myst. It may be niche, but it’s certainly passionate and global, with its own international writing competitions, superstar authors and numerous community sites.
Simply put, Interactive Fiction tells you the beginning of the story through text and then it puts you in charge and let’s you decide what your next move in the story should be. You are the game and you have to solve the problems which the story presents. In effect the decisions that you, the reader makes will determine the subsequent information that you are given, the parts of the story or the clues you are presented with, the areas you have access to and ultimately the journey which you go on to get to the end of your story. And the end of your story could be quite different to the end of the next player’s.
Kristian says: “A good example to help you get your head around Interactive Fiction is the short Escape from Byron Bay – . Notice I said short and not simple. The first ever title written by “Mr Heard” an ICT teacher with little IF experience”. You can hear the thoughts of some lads involved in a bit of Interactive programming, in these podcasts.
When we asked Kristian about the educational value of Interactive Fiction he said “I have been experimenting with Interactive Fiction with a few of my classes…
“One observation consistent with all the groups is that playing IF is tough”.
“IF demands good deduction skills and also facilitates text engagement and comprehension. After all, not paying close attention to the text, either leaves you without closure, or results in your untimely demise. Or at least your player gets it in the neck”.
“The second observation is more important, almost all the students have engaged with reading and playing IF titles and my so called “reluctant readers” are no longer… well, reluctant.
In fact, they are quite despondent when I tell them we are not “text adventuring” today. And it is not just my classes, there are a handful of colleagues investigating how Interactive Fiction can be used to engage learners. So what is stopping you? Quest is a free text adventure authoring and there is a hatful of titles, again all free”.
“I don’t wish to overwhelm you and there is so much more I could share with you, however, let’s take stock.
Interactive Fiction engages readers, in fact it demands the reader to pay attention.
Throw in a good measure of problem solving skills, depending on the type of Interactive Fiction being read. And writing Interactive Fiction requires a much broader set of skills, it is so much more than creative writing”.
If you are interested in finding out more about IF, you could drop Kristian a line via Kristianstill.co.uk or through twitter @kristianstill.
… You decide …
Ivona – text to speech in different accents
Ivona create some superb, paid for, text to speech software, but on their Ivona Recordings page, you get the chance to hear your words spoken by some quite convincing voices, as a free preview. What is good is that you can do so in English, Welsh, English with a Welsh (or Australian) lilt, or other languages such as Italian, Castillian Spanish, Polish & Brazillian Portuguese.uJam
Make music online and create, remix a song, or instrumental, to a big range of backing styles, with uJam, a free, simple-to-use program.
Useful as a tool for many ability levels. You need not have a lot of experience of music, recording or musical structure, to come up with quite a convincing sound. For those with more experience of recording, uJam is a great way to experiment and come up with that new sound. We’d love to hear anything you create! Go make a hit or a movie score!
The Cyber Treehouse – Internet Safety
Cyber Treehouse is an American site looking at internet safety.
Learn about appropriate computer usage in a fun, interactive & informative way. Not the ultimate resource maybe, but the games side makes it worth climbing into for a bit.
Learning games from Primary Games Arena
With over 5000 organised links to learning games, Primary Games Arena is a great resource to add to your school bookmarks. All of the games are FREE and could be embedded in your school website or blog. The collection is categorized into subject, unit area & year group appropriate games.
A handy “Top 5 Games” widget is useful for blog sidebars and a clever badge system encourages children to engage with their exploration. Another imaginative tool from the Primary Technology team.
