Socrative

As we start down our BYOD journey, a question came to mind, now that our students can connect to our WiFi with a device, what can they actually use it for?

What I wanted was a free app or web tool that teachers and students could use that could have an impact on teaching and learning, and provide a good reason for students to use their own devices.

Shamelessly taken from Mike Gunn, Socrative is an excellent way to get quizzes and questions to your students, who can answer in real time on any device. All students need to do is go to www.socrative.com and enter their teachers room code and away they go with the activity their teacher has set. The app can be downloaded on iOS or Android, or just the web browser works well.

Teachers obviously need to do a bit of setting up in creating the quiz, but the amount of feedback (realtime and reports) makes the initial input worth the effort. It can be used in a variety of ways (Student led quiz, with instant feedback, teacher led, group races etc) and is the first, in what I hope will be many, really useful web tools to use with student devices.

BYOD in education

I attended the Academies show at Birmingham NEC last Wednesday, which was, for the most part, a worthwhile experience. There was a fair bit of tech there to look at, and a lot of talks about the use of technology in schools. In particular, the talk by @mike_gunn was an excellent presentation showing a really positive light on BYOD. As I wrote in my write up:

The talk I took the most out of, and a great shame it was only half an hour long. His presentation has been uploaded to his blog since the talk, and is well worth a look on it's own. Indeed his blog may well be a source of inspiration for BYOD in the future.

Connectivity

He talked about barriers to implementing BYOD, his first barrier was connectivity. Insure that all areas of the school can connect, the one area that we might struggle with would be the sports field, though whether we need an active WiFi in the field would need to be explored first.

Another barrier is that not all students can afford devices, so he suggested this was an excellent use of Pupil Premium funding, something I believe we already do, though may need to extend should we go completely BYOD.

He stressed the importance of developing a pedagogy that significantly increases what teachers can do, students can learn and ensure that results improve (sounds easier said than done!). but he emphasised that the learning is what is key, not the device that the learning is taking place on. Student devices can enhance and deepen learning is used correctly. For him, it meant that learning could become more personalised and differentiated as a result of the technology in the classroom.

He talked about how BYOD empowered students in their learning as it gave them different means on how to present their work: Powerpoint, video, photo etc He was also surprised at how quickly students can type on their phones, and actually tested students and found they could write quicker on their phones than hand write. Did mention that school still conducts hand written lessons, and picks up students whose handwriting doesn't make the grade and gives them help with that for the all-important exams.

Abuse of technology

He mentioned the potential abuse of technology, specifically the risk of disengagement from lessons as devices hold many distractions. His answer is to "treat the behaviour, not the device". Treat the device the same way as you if a student was doodling with a pencil, you don't confiscate the pencil, you get them to be productive with the pencil by treating the behaviour.

He talked about Cyber bullying and the importance of education, reinforced in PHSE lessons. Make sure students understand that what they do online has long lasting consequences, and that their online activity can be traced (especially if it's done in school).

Parents should be engaged at an early stage to get them onboard with what the school is trying to achieve with BYOD. They ran workshops and used social media to show off what the students are achieving with their own devices.

Device Specification 

For their device spec, the most important aspect was battery life, a device that can last all day was seen as a necessity, and it was made the students responsibility to keep the device charged. Like turning up to a lesson without the right books, having a device that wasn't charged meant the student wasn't ready for learning.

The school did put in charging points across the school to aid students charge up their devices before school or during break and lunchtimes.

Ultimately device selection came down to what the school expects the devices to be able to do. There was a minimum expectation that the device could access the internet, have a camera and had all the apps that the school required (all free apps). If students want to purchase apps that did the same thing as the school required, they were able to do so and use them in lesson, but all school mandated apps were free.

Again, the importance that the device is seen as learning tool was emphasised. He talked about students discussing the differences between their devices, and how one device allowed you to do one thing that another couldn't. If you can get students to talk about their devices as learning tools, you are onto a winner.

Make sure your policies are updated with BYOD specific terms (Safeguarding, ICT and Esafety).

Staff Preparation

Staff training consisted of showing staff 30 free web tools that can be learned in 3 minutes. They then had to choose 3 that they would use in their lessons over the next term. If I can't find the 30 web tools he mentioned, I'll ask him via Twitter.

The use of Digital leaders (I believe a mix of staff and students, but could have just been students) was critical in the success of BYOD.

They carried out the following:

• Auditing use of apps and assessing impact
• Deliver CPD to staff
• Solved basic ICT issues
• Develop specialisms
• Troubleshooting
• Sharing best practice
• Ran digital safety courses for parents, staff and students.
• Helped draft the BYOD policies in PHSE (My emphasis)

Outcomes of BYOD

Positive impact on motivation and enjoyment of learning (but don't expect it to last, soon becomes "the norm").

Students felt they had a more varied educational diet, as whilst devices were used in many lessons, they were used in very varied ways.

Improved student organisation, though I think Show My Homework has already helped in this regard. But students were using calendar apps to set reminders for work due etc.

Made the student body a more active body, with collaborative learners.

Allowed for more personalised interventions.

Changing teaching from "Sage on the Stage to Guide by the Side" which can be a big culture shock for some teachers.

Coding games

Nothing lends itself better to the gamification of learning than Coding. In all likelihood, if you're interested in coding, you've probably got half an interest in gaming, so a marriage made in heaven is to use coding as a gameplay element. Thankfully, some people have decided this is a good idea too, and have created some top notch websites to learn coding whilst exploring dungeons, killing monsters and getting loot!

First up is Code Combat which has 80 free levels covering all the basics of coding in a language of your choice (including Python). You can create Clans which allow you to monitor student progress. Teachers, for more info, check out https://codecombat.com/teachers

I really like Code Combat, it's got a great visual style, and I love the fact you can choose which language you want to learn. It's a nice step by step guide, with instant visual results. It's style is similar to a lot of iPad games, and it looks good without being overly flashy.

Next up is Codekingdoms which is also free. This has a younger feel to it, so probably better for the lower end of KS3, so this one might not be as useful to you. Again it has Class management built in, but the language is restricted to its own, Java based language. Again, more info can be found here http://codekingdoms.com/teachers/

I'm not as convinced by this one. There's a bit more of a game going on, but the coding is a bit more hidden and not explained as well. Maybe I'm being harsh, but I feel that you aren't going to choose to play a game like this because you want to play a basic platformer, you're playing it to learn coding. Therefore, the coding parts should be first and foremost, which Code Combat does, rather than a secondary element, which seems to be Codekingdoms approach. That said, it certainly has the capacity for indepth coding, so perhaps the mix of platforming and coding can give players some divergence in their gameplay. 

Other websites on a similar theme:

https://www.bloc.io/ruby-warrior#/ - Be aware of a load, 8 bit soundtrack!

http://www.crunchzilla.com/code-monster

Edugeek thread on the subject here:

http://www.edugeek.net/forums/coding/151071-code-combat-coding-website.html

Quiz Hero

Almost been a year since my last post! A reminder that a blog only stays useful/relevant if you update it often, which I'm failing to do...

Anyway, just saw an interesting blog collecting two of my interests into one, RPGs and game based learning, so I present to you, Quiz Hero!

Will be giving it a try later on this week, work permitting.