Elizabeth’s Blog

East Lothian NQTs were given an insight into ICT in Education as part of their induction programme. They were introduced to the ICT Education team and given an overview of the hardware and software which is used in both the primary and secondary sectors.
Hands on sessions followed where the NQTs were shown how to use edubuzz.org, East Lothian’s online community.

GLOW also featured large in the day’s programme and a comprehensive review of what happened in the Glow sessions can be found on
http://ltsblogs.org.uk/glowscotland/2008/08/13/east-lothian-probationers-event/

Thanks to Karen-Ann McAlpine and Martin Brown from LTScotland for their input.

Have a look at the newly upgraded edubuzz ‘log in screens’ and let us know what your thoughts are about how easy it is to use. 

We have been hosting parents, teachers and pupils from Yosemite Valley in California who came to East Lothian to find out more about the early childhood of John Muir, the founder of the National Parks system in the USA, who was born in Dunbar. The group visited the birthplace of John Muir and also areas of Dunbar which are associated with John’s childhood. After a whirlwind tour of Scotland - taking in Loch Ness, of course, the group returned to Dunbar and visited the local schools whilst also taking part in the John Muir Award. This is a great example of International Education with benefits for both our American visitors and the groups from East Lothian who visit Yosemite Valley.

This month, East Lothian Council, in partnership with Lothian and Borders Police, will be hosting a series of Internet safety and responsible use training sessions for parents with pupils in P5 - S6 across the county.  This is in response to growing concerns, expressed by individual parents and parent councils, about how to make sure young people use the internet safely and responsibly. The sessions are also designed to show parents how they can protect their youngsters from on-line dangers.

The training sessions will be led by Ollie Bray (Depute Head at Musselburgh Grammar School) and PC David Gunn from Lothian and Borders Police. Both Mr Bray and Mr Gunn are accredited Ambassadors of the Child Exploitation Online Protection Agency (CEOP).

The training session has already been piloted within the Musselburgh Cluster and received positive response from over 200 parents. The content of the evening includes background information on new technologies and information about computers and mobile phones and the law. But the main part of the presentation involves Mr Bray taking the parents into some ‘real’ social networking spaces that young people use. This includes Habba Hotel, Teenspot, MSN Instant Messenger and Bebo. The session also gives advice on how you can protect your home computer and advice on on-line gaming.

Everybody who attends the training will have access to a comprehensive on-line handout.

The sessions will be held at:

·       Preston Lodge High- 3 June 2008
·       Ross High - 10 June 2008
·       Dunbar Grammar - 11 June 2008
·       Knox Academy - 18 June 2008
·       North Berwick High - 24 June 2008

All training sessions will take place between 7 - 9pm.

Ollie Bray, Depute Head at Musselburgh Grammar School, says:
‘This is a very exciting time for East Lothian to be leading the way in Internet Training for staff, parents, families and pupils.  We are going to use the feedback we gain from these sessions to inform good practice nationally through the Scottish Learning Festival.’

These evenings will start promptly at 7pm and have a limited availability. If you have any queries or you would like to book a place on one of these sessions, please email Tess Watson, (Acting Education Support Officer) at twatson@eastlothian.gov.uk or log onto http:edubuzz.org/blogs/internetsafety

GLOW Messenger

It has been such a long time since I have written a post to this blog, so feel I must make comment now and in a way it is related to my last post about using Skype.  My colleagues and I have been testing out GLOW Messenger. After a few attempts to get in to GLOW messenger we finally all managed to have a conversation with each other, albeit we were in the same room. However it was great fun and of course educational too. Thank you Dave, Tess and David for such an interesting conversation.

Thanks Ian for hosting the Skype Conference Call tonight and for inviting me to take part. Interesting conversation and ideas for future and further discussion. Thanks also for the web links which I shall investigate further.

Outline Programe

• Participants will be shown various pieces of hardware used to support the dyslexic learner
• Participants will be shown various computer programs to help the dyslexic learner
• Participants will have a hands-on session  using relevant applications

 Benefits of attending

• Participants will have a better understanding of the tools available to support the dyslexic learner.
• Participants will have the opportunity to use some of the hardware resources available to help the dyslexic learner.
• Participants will have the opportunity to use computer applications available to help the dyslexic learner.
• Participants will know where to seek help and advice about dyslexia.

Book in the normal way through Staff Development

Outline Programme

• Explanation of the program’s properties
• Start the program
• Look at the ready-made resources
• Create a simple grid for use in the classroom
• Visit the Learning Grids site

Benefits of attending

• Have an overview of the Clicker 5 program
• Be able to navigate around the program
• Be able to create a learning resource for use in the classroom
• Understand how Clicker 5 can be used to support and develop writing

Fully booked

East Lothian will be taking part in the Phase 2 Pilot of the GLOW Portal along with thirteen other authorities across Scotland.  Having successfully piloted Phase 1 of the portal in two of our schools we are looking forward to the next stage in the development of GLOW. There will be six components available for testing in this next phase which will comprise -

• Web Hosting to allow users to own, add content to and publish web sites.
• GlowMeet which will allow audio and web conferencing.
• Glow Chat which will allow real time text only communication.
• Video Streaming which allows the uploading and viewing of video content.
• Mailing Lists where users can be organised into different mailing lists and
• Secure File Transfer where data files can be shared securely.

This is quite a tall order to pilot given the timescales but after discussion with the pilot schools we can decide on which of the above six components we would like to take forward.

I attended a very interesting and informative presentation about eye gaze as a means of accessing technology. The technology was demonstrated by Mick Donegan of the ACE Centre in Oxford who has been involved in the development of this technology over a number of years, and also through his involvement with the COGAIN (Communication by Gaze Interaction) project  www.cogain.org), which is a pan European research project whose aim is to develop eye gaze expertise for the benefit of users with a disability The development of eye gaze systems has many obvious benefits for those who have a physical difficulty which prevents them from using more conventional devices for access and it also enables them to use a computer with a greater degree of independence.

The demonstration covered two different types of eye gaze technology, one which concentrated on using one eye to control the computer and the other system was calibrated to use both eyes.

With the demonstration complete we were allowed to try out one of the systems. Sitting in front of the screen and following a dot around for about 30 seconds calibrated the system to the users requirements. Wearing glasses did not interfere with the calibration process and then it was quite amazing to be controlling a computer through eye movements.

The benefit of this type of technology for those with a physical disability speaks for itself. It is, however, a very expensive piece of technology but one which could transform lives.