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Hi Megan,
Thank you for sharing your Sway with us. I really like a number of the ideas you have listed, and it is clear to see how collaborative work would be enhanced as a result of this. The use of OneNote is quite creative and innovative, as it allows for both individual and collaborative work. Providing children with responsibility for one area, but then getting them to critique and proofread each others work may be very beneficial for improving their ability to ‘edit’ and critique their own work in time.
Hi Emma,
Thank you for your post and for summarising some of the digital tools which will inform your teaching next year. Given that you are working in a special class, the tools you will use will be quite varied to the individual needs of the 6 children in the class. You clearly have a wide repertoire of digital tools that can be used with the entire group, and then with individuals. The Seesaw library is an amazing resource, and has numerous filters that can allow you to find the activities you want much quicker.
Hi Fionnuala,
Immersive Reader is such a powerful tool and one which really does take your interest when you see it for the first time. Its integration with the Microsoft tools is seamless and it really does offer up so many opportunities for those who struggle with literacy. There are other alternatives available through Chrome extensions for schools without a 365 license. It really is a tool which can level the playing field, and allows pupils to achieve and access content at the same level as that of their peers. The ‘Dictate’ tool within Word offers the opposite function (speech to text) and can be used in conjunction with the Immersive Reader.
Hi Maria,
Welcome to the course! The SETT model is an excellent framework, and you will have the opportunity to practically engage with it in subsequent modules. The importance of looking at the entire picture of the child (academic, social, emotional, cognitive as you have put it) when devising a plan. It is important that all those involved in working with the child are consulted about this plan, and that it feeds into the overarching targets in his/her School Support Plan. In terms of AT, the level of intervention is really important, as you have alluded to, and the teachers knowledge of the child and the particular tool will be essential in this regard.
Hi Annmarie,
Thank you for your post. I have heard of Olus and skimmed their advertising in school last year. It is great to hear some positive feedback and there is certainly a broad range of areas and topics which they offer support in. With each child having their own profile, it is easier to differentiate instruction and ensure that children are being adequately challenged. The evaluation stage of the SSE cycle is so important, and I’m delighted that you have highlighted this. We need to think of the improvement plan as a multi-year project, rather than simply ticking a box each year. We need to monitor the interventions and decide what steps need to be taken to improve upon what we have already done.
Hi Emma,
Thank you for your post and sharing your SETT plan with us. The SETT plan allows you to be really specific and think critically about what exactly you will need for a particular child. You have been able to identify a specific learning focus – to construct a sentence asking for something, using the digital device. This learning focus takes the child’s specific needs, as well as the classroom environment that they are learning in. It is fantastic that the course content and discussion forums have highlighted some additional tools which you may find useful.
Hi Emma,
Welcome to the course! We hope that you will be able to take away some useful nuggets to use in your teaching over the coming year. I love the way you have placed an increased emphasis on the use of digital technologies, and how it is being used to forge really strong links between school and home. Given the setting you teach in, it is clear that you have a great deal of knowledge and experience with assistive technologies. However, as you have said, the lack of training can be extremely frustrating. As educators, you find yourself trialling different apps and programmes with little guidance, meaning the experience of children will vary considerably from school to school.
Hi Myriam,
Thank you for your post. An online LMS works so well in larger schools, where there are multiple classes at each stream. Teachers can share resources and collaborate with one another in real time. If all classes are doing this, there will be a considerable bank of resources for teachers to inherit when they move class levels. The challenge you have outlined is one that we have also had some experience with – to get around this, all classes were set up by a school administrator with the name of the teacher included in the name line. This ensured that there was no confusion when assignments were being sent from third-party sites such as WordWall and EdPuzzle.
Hi Katie,
Welcome to the course! Applied Digital Skills is a real hidden gem within the Google Workspace toolkit. I like the particular lesson you have chosen, as it highlights another use of Google Drawings. I have used Drawings so much over the past year to create classroom posters, drag and drop activities, labelling activities and much more. It’s a tool that has huge scope for creating more interactive content for children to engage with. Drawings allows children to showcase creativity – one activity I assigned this year was to create a poster to advertise the novel ‘Holes’, and it really is amazing to see what the children are capable of coming up with.
Hi Elaine,
Thank you for your post and for sharing your notebook with us. It is such a powerful tool and is so useful for teachers. It is especially useful for classroom teachers, as a notebook can be reused each year (with minor revisions). It may be slightly more difficult in SET if you are working with different children, but many of the same principles will apply. As you have mentioned, it really is an infinite canvas, with revisions and improvements coming each year. The ability to add audio feedback onto a child’s notebook is another noteworthy feature.
Hi Myriam,
Welcome to the course and thanks for sharing your Sway with us. I really like the multi-modal approach that you used. The incorporation of video, images and text affords more opportunities for children to access the content. It is such a useful tool for creating engaging and interactive content. Children can really show their creative side when they are making their own Sway’s. However, I have found that it’s important that clear guidance is provided on the content that is expected in the Sway (as time can often be spent trying to experiment with different features rather than getting down to the core of the task).
Hi Melissa,
Thank you for your post and for contributing your Sway and Form. Your Form showcases mastery of the common skills needed to make a self-correcting Form, with point values assigned and questions marked as compulsory. Sway is an excellent classroom tool, and it can afford students the opportunity to demonstrate their creativity, once a basic level of computer literacy has been developed. I really like the potential uses of Forms you have outlined – exit tickets are something I frequently use and find them extremely useful in informing future learning experiences.
Hi Elaine,
You may be unable to locate the ‘record’ function if you are using a different version of PowerPoint. Within the most recent 365 version, you should be able to find it on the menu after you click ‘slideshow’. Teams and 365 in general are very powerful learning tools, and are certainly more geared towards senior primary classes and secondary school. The work you are doing and ideas you have will certainly stand them in good stead. The potential for teamwork and collaboration for school planning and administration with Teams is endless, and I can see more schools moving in this direction over the coming years.
Hi Sharon,
There is huge scope within the Microsoft suite of resources for assisting pupils with additional needs. I love using the lens tool when on holidays to translate road signs, menus, etc. which proves its use in all settings. I really like the idea of being able to integrate it in a special class setting, by producing photographs that may prepare these pupils for a trip/outing. The Dictate feature is of great help to students who have writing difficulties, and really helps remove the stigma and negative connotations they may have with writing. It’s brilliant that you are able to picture some students that may work well with these tools.
Hi Megan,
Thank you for sharing your sample notebook on Australia. I really like the way you have laid it out, and the variety that is included. There is so much scope for integrating this with Teams and ‘sending’ it to pupils. You will then have this as your ‘core’ notebook and things can be added as they arise to help you with your planning for the following year. The joy of using a tool like this is that once the work has been done once, there is no need for any extra work to be done in subsequent years. It affords you, as teacher, so much scope in your approach. You could decide to focus on collaboration (as you’ve indicated), or assign individual-based work.
