Primary Bits and Bytes

(Posted by Fiona)

Good news for schools wishing to work towards ICT Mark over the next 12 months, the following news item appeared in the recent Naace newsletter:

Naace has been advised this morning that it will be given a licence to run the ICT Mark, endorsed by The Department for Education, for the next 12 months. This is excellent news for schools and all those engaged in supporting schools to raise standards by using the Self-review Framework and working towards the ICT Mark.

Details have to be finalised and we will report them to you, our valued members, as soon as they become available through Naace channels. It is likely that changes will have to be made to the way the scheme operates to ensure that more sustainable models of engagement are determined thus securing the long term future of the scheme. We will bring you more on this as soon as it becomes available.

We welcome applications from schools ready to go for the Award- just head over to www.naace.co.uk/ictmark where you will find all the information that you need. Any other queries? Please email ictmark@naace.co.uk.

(Posted by Fiona)

Here are the notes, presentations and handouts from last week’s ICT network meeting for those who couldn’t make it. There were presentations from Clare Askew and Victoria Turner (YHGfL) and Allan Qualters (AST) as well as updates from Dughall and myself.

Clare Askew spoke about the services available for Kirklees schools through YHGfL. Kirklees will be part of the regional grid for the next three years. This means that YHGfL will provide the broadband connection from Kirklees to the National Education Network (NEN). Clare also mentioned other services which are available, including free Sophos antivirus software, and a VPN solution using text messaging for security. The VPN solution is available to schools for £200 initial setup per school and then £4.50 per year for each user.

Victoria Turner demonstrated an audit tool for eSecurity, which is available on the YHGfL website here. The tool assesses how effective current arrangements are for keeping confidential data secure. She also mentioned the free blog (Classblog, which this blog is written on), podcasting tool, and upcoming video hosting which will be available shortly.

Allan Qualters, Advanced Skills Teacher for ICT, Lydate J&I School gave a presentation on effective use of visualisers. You can download it below:

Using the Visualiser

I gave an update on Gmail for schools, Google Apps for Education (Moople), ICT Mark and the future of support for schools from Kirklees Learning Service. The main points can be found in the presentation below:

ICT Network March 2011

There was an opportunity for those attending to complete a survey on the future of ICT network meetings, as these may change slightly when the new traded Learning Service begins in April. If you couldn’t attend, please give us your opinions using the online survey at:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/KCW9QBS

Dughall discussed renewal of DBPrimary for the next 12 months, and suggested small schools group together to reduce costs.

Please get in touch with us if you would like further information about any of the presentations.

(Posted by Fiona)

Newsome Junior School have two used Smartboards to give away. They are small boards, one mobile and one for wall mounting. They may be useful if you want a spare board to use in a shared area or group room.

Any schools interested in taking the boards need to contact Andrew Hancox, the ICT Coordinator: andrew.hancox@edukirklees.net

Tel: 01484 226689

(Posted by Fiona)

I have just received this in an email from YHGfL, book now if you are interested:

World Book Day – VC workshops with Kate Holden ( illustrator )
Thursday March 3rd and Friday March 4th

YHGfL are running a series of videoconferences with the comic illustrator Kate Holden.
Katherine E. F. Holden (Kate to friends, also known online as ‘Darth Mongoose’) is an illustrator and comics and manga artist based in Cumbria in the north of England!. Her illustration and design clients include Nintendo, Climb Magazine, GoUlverston.com and LMB Design.
Kate will be will be discussing her work as an illustrator and demonstrating some of her drawing techniques. Children will have the opportunity to ask questions.
Kate would also welcome students to send in drawings they would like to share with her.
Sessions can be modified to suit key stage
You can see examples of her work here
http://www.kateholdenart.com/index.htm
To book a session please goto:
http://www.yhgfl.net/News-and-events/eLearning-Events
Free to YHGfL member schools

(Posted by Dughall)

YHGfL – ‘Google Image Search’

YHGfL have identified a potential issue for schools searching for online images through ’Google Image Search’.  Google have changed the way that they are displaying images and, as a result, images which previously would have been filtered are now circumventing the filter system and are being displayed.

The problem seems to have arisen because Google have changed the way that they display images: after a user request, they are delivered as part of the page request rather than as separate image files, meaning that the filtering system cannot detect the origin of these files. In consequence, an innocent request for images on say, ‘Roman Gods’ may display images which have been unfiltered and cause upset for  staff and students alike.

While the YHGfL support team are doing their utmost to alert Google of the problems, this may be a good opportunity to direct staff and students to use other search engines which provide a greater degree of filtering, thus reducing the chance of unfiltered images being displayed. Examples of these include Bing (http://www.bing.com) or Yahooligans (http://kids.yahoo.com/).

Now could be a an ideal opportunity to raise the issue of using copyrighted images and ICT leads could encourage students and staff to use Creative Commons licensed images. Examples of these were covered in the Autumn YHGfL newsletter and include the following sites:

http://gallery.nen.gov.uk/

http://www.morguefile.com/

http://primaryschoolict.com/