Monday, December 17th, 2007...8:26 pm
‘Txt’ V’s Keyboard: North Berwick High
This morning I popped out to North Berwick High School. Robert Jones is a Maths Teacher and Glow mentor there. Over the weekend Robert had been questioning how Pupil writing would compare when using a ‘text‘ device to that of a keyboard. The use of ‘text’ communication is ever increasing and this ‘End-Of-Term’ experiment could be quite interesting.
As Ewan McIntosh (LTS) had offered to lend us the cre8txt hardware, I volunteered to be the Postwoman (as such!). I saw this device in action at SLF briefly, and it is very similar to a mobile phone. It has a USB connection that allows it to communicate with a computer in a similar way to that of a keyboard/mouse.
I am not exactly sure what Robert intends to do lesson wise, but I imagine there will be some exciting findings (possibly percentages?). I do know that if possible, Robert will integrate the hardware with a Promethean Whiteboard.
If you would like to find out how Robert gets on give his site a click this week!
What a fun way to end the term!
(I have no doubt in my mind which would be more speedy for me 
).
3 Comments
December 17th, 2007 at 9:06 pm
I saw the salesman dressed in the cre8txt costume at the Scottish Learning Festival and had a conversation with him about this product.
The premise sounded interesting.
Until you realise that they want £49.99 for a mobilephone style USB keyboard and SMS slang conversion software. I can program MS Word to expand my abreviations and predict my words using the AutoCorrect facility. Which leaves a simple USB keyboard for the remainder of the price.
This is a complete waste of money.
What I would be interested in would be a Bluetooth dongle and software that allowed you to turn the pupil’s mobile phones into voting and communication handsets.
December 17th, 2007 at 9:18 pm
Why thank you for your input Kenneth.
This is an “End-Of-Term” experiment…
And it is free!!!
Let us see what JonsieBoy uncovers…
December 26th, 2007 at 10:47 pm
Quite interesting Tess. I don’t know anything about the software which you mention. But having just got a new mobile phone which allows me to write text messages by traditional phone style, by using a computer keyboard layout or by using a special pen to write, I find using the computer keyboard layout much easier to use, faster and you only need to press the buttons once. I think I am as up to date as most pupils with texting but I still prefer to use the computer keyboard layout. Would be interesting to see what the pupils think of this new technology.
Sharon
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