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Hi Marie,
Thank you for your contribution here. You have listed a huge number of benefits of digital technology integration in classrooms. Your point around how the ‘teacher’s individual practice’ domain is the responsibility of all teachers is an interesting one. While I agree with you, it can often be difficult to get teacher’s to undertake their own CPD / ask questions of others to further their own practice. Work on this domain is probably best done through the provision of structured in-house CPD that focuses on specific elements of practice and attempts to move all teachers from ‘A to B’.
Hi Owen,
Welcome to the course. It’s great that you have had some experience of using Office 365 and I’m sure last year helped to ‘dip your toe in’ to it’s capabilities. One of my motivating factors for using digital technologies in lessons is to make content more engaging and to motivate students to go above and beyond in their work. You seem to have a similar approach and the Office 365 applications will certainly help you in this regard. Your comparison between Forms and Kahoot! really hits the nail on the head – Forms offers so much more, whilst also offering more reliable assessment data.
Hi Robert,
I think you have captured the essence of Teams within your opening sentences. There is so much that you can do on it, and there is rarely a time when you could say you know everything about Teams. Microsoft are constantly updating and upgrading the interface and the functionality. Your post outlines a number of benefits of setting up a class team and using it as an extension of the physical classroom. Being able to set and grade assignments, as well as embed Forms quizzes is a huge bonus. It’s also easy to differentiate content and interpret assessment data when planning for future lessons / interventions.
Hi Marie,
OneNote is an amazing educational tool, but as you said it is not overly suitable for use in lessons with an infant class. It is much more suited to the senior class and second-level students. There is some potential for using it to share content with parents that can be revised at home. This could specifically relate to phonics and early mathematical activities. Given your experience as an SET, it’s great that you have identified the benefit of the colour-coding of pages and topics for students who may lack organisational skills.
Hi Suzann,
While we obviously teach in different contexts, our school also places a significant focus on literacy, particularly from a support teaching point of view. This is at the detriment of numeracy and we have very little (if any) support offered in numeracy throughout the school. It is clear that a balance is so important in the provision of SET support.
The use of the Immersive Reader function to make word problems more accessible is a great idea and it shows how you can incorporate digital technologies into support for both literacy and numeracy.
Hi Michelle,
I think you have really create an excellent activity around a subject that will be so topic during the first term of next year. Using an event like this as a stimulus for delving deeper into the geographical and sociological study of an area is so effective. I really like the design of the Sway you attached also. Given that I’ll be teaching a senior class in an all-boys’ school, I plan on using the World Cup as a key theme throughout November and December.
Hi Declan,
Thank you for your contribution. You have highlighted some of the many collaborative benefits of using Teams, especially with relation to video calling. It could be a great alternative for staff meetings that would allow staff to travel home first, especially on darker winter evenings. It is something that could certainly be considered within schools. However, there are many other benefits to Teams that could also be utilised within the school setting. It could be used to create a ‘digital hub’ of resources that could be shared between classes. It could also be used as a noticeboard for staff communication, etc. It really has a myriad of uses in a school setting.
Hi Michelle,
Welcome to the course. Congratulations on the birth on your child and hopefully the return to school will go smoothly from September. It is certainly exciting to be going back to a school that has such good access to digital devices. This course should certainly equip you with some ideas for using the Office 365 tools on the school laptops. It’s great that you enjoyed creating your quiz on Forms. It is probably the one tool I would recommending prioritising, as it is so easy to use and you can get so much information and assessment data from carefully created quizzes.
Hi Michelle,
I think your admins made the correct decision in switching everything over to the one platform. I would be an advocate for Google and Pat would have lots of experience with Microsoft and Office 365. The reality is that there is little difference between the platforms in a school setting. As long as appropriate CPD is provided and a school is consistent in its use, they will be successful. It really comes down to personal preferences of those making decisions at the time.
Hi Kevin,
I like the way you have mentioned the feature of Microsoft Teams that allows you to limit the permissions of those who can view certain content. Sometimes this can be very beneficial when dealing with confidential files or school support plans within an SEN setting. This is equally effective at being used for ‘teacher only’ files within a class team. This feature extends into the teacher-only folders in OneNote. This has been something we have largely brushed over on the forum to date.
Hi Laura,
As you have said, there are a multitude of uses for OneNote in an SEN setting. The ability to colour code sections and pages greatly assists a child who may struggle with organisation. Having a numbering system for pages (1.1, 1.2, etc.) may also help children find material in their ‘content library’ easier. The in-built use of Immersive Reader is also a huge tool for use in an SEN setting or with EAL pupils. The ‘ease of use’ of the tool within OneNote is one of the primary benefits.
Hi Katherine,
Thanks for your overview of the above accessibility tools. Certainly, ‘Immersive Reader’ and ‘Dictate’ would be suitable for children in 1st class, subject to their specific needs. Immersive Reader is such an excellent tool that can be introduced across a whole class, as it offers so much functionality. The ability to identify and locate ‘parts of speech’ is something that all children can benefit from. The picture dictionary is also really useful for EAL learners. Using ‘Dictate’ will also help those children who are strong orally but struggle with getting their thoughts down in writing.
Hi Shane,
Thank you so much for sharing this activity. I can see myself using it with my own class next year. I am often looking to find activities to do based in a novel – very often I find myself stuck in a rut of assignment comprehension questions, character profiles, etc. and motivation among the students wanes over time. However, this activity is just fantastic and has the added bonus of touching on a number of 21st century skills.
Hi Claire,
Thank you for sharing your Sway outlining how you would promote collaboration in junior infants. Providing the children with ‘what if?’ scenarios is a great way of promoting talk and discussion and a critical approach to their thoughts. This is particularly important in the infant classes. As you said, working together allows children to partake in decision making, problem-solving and turn taking. These are all important elements of the 21st century skills of both collaboration and skilled communication.
Hi Claire,
Thank you for offering your thoughts on the differences between Seesaw and Microsoft Teams. I would have to agree that Seesaw is a more accessible learning platform for children in younger classes. However, in senior classes I think the use of Teams or Google Classroom allows students to go deeper into their learning. Potentially from 3rd/4th class onwards, they could start transitioning over to the more ‘grown up’ platform.
