Glow Scotland

Our first online debate takes place this Thursday, the 11th of June. The Debate will come live over Glow Meet from the National Debating Group. Join the Glow Meet at 4PM to watch Bearsden Academy and Aberdeen Grammar debate the motion ‘This House Believes Now More Than Ever We Need A United Kingdom’ - this should be very interesting, and there will be a chance for virtual spectators to ask questions after the speeches.

Click Here to request access to the group and PLEASE check that you can access Glow Meet from your location before the event to avoid disappointment!

This morning I was at a wonderfully exciting event, shared by thousands of children all across Scotland. The Scottish Book trust arranged for Anthony Horowitz, the best-selling author of the Alex Rider novels (among many, many more fantastic books) was broadcast live over the internet on streaming video and via Glow Meet. It’s estimated that up to 7000 fans around the country viewed the event, and hundreds then joined the Glow Chat afterwards.

Anthony took questions from the children from Uphall Primary and Canal View Primary, and also answered questions that had been submitted by schools in the weeks leading up to the event. He entertained everyone with his irreverent stories of evil grandmothers and detestable teachers - according to Anthony, every teacher he has ever had has appeared in one of his books, and he’s had them all meet a sticky end!

After his very enjoyable talk, Anthony joined children on Glow Meet, answering as many as he could of the thousands of questions that flowed in - so many, that the computer eventually gave up the ghost! Not to worry, though - Anthony will be blogging about the experience on his website, www.anthonyhorowitz.com, and you’ll be able to comment there and ask him the questions that didn’t get through.

New in the Homecoming National Group is ‘Wha’s Like Us?’ This group is aimed at classes where there are pupils who have come from different countries to live in Scotland. It will allow pupils living all over Scotland to talk about their experiences living in this country, along with their classmates.

There will be regular monthly topics for classes to work on together, and a chance for pupils to upload their work, chat, discuss and Glow Meet.

The first topic will be school life, starting next week, Tuesday the 5th of May. The future topics will be chosen by the group members. Any class, primary or secondary, can get involved - just follow the instructions on the group.

Access requests are now open - come in and explore and think about how you’d like to use the group. It’s the intention that the group will change and grow to meet the needs of the classes using it, so essentially it can be designed by the users collaboratively. Hope to see you there soon! Join Wha’s Like Us and start linking across the country!

I had the pleasure of being part of a P5 lesson recently in Troon Primary School. Fiona Patterson, Principal Teacher in Troon Primary had wanted to explore innovative uses the class could make with Glow Meet and invited me out to be part of this with her. Fiona had set up 4 Glow Meet rooms in the Primary 5 Glow Group and divided the class into 4 groups. The lesson was designed around the following Literacy and English Outcomes:

– applying the elements writers use to create different types of short and extended texts with increasingly complex ideas, structures and vocabulary

I am learning to use language and style in a way which engages and/or influences my reader.
ENG 226AD

Ahead of time we had saved 4 whiteboard documents with 2 photos on each. The pupils logged on and started up Glow Meet by entering the appropriate room for their group whilst Fiona revised adjectives, alliteration, similes and metaphors. A team leader from each group then loaded different whiteboard documents. Each whiteboard document dealt with a specific aspect. For example, the alliteration one had 2 photos of snowy landscapes; the metaphor one had 2 photos of sunsets.

Pupils then used the chat facility in pairs to describe the photos using adjectives, alliteration, metaphors and similes. This allowed each group members to view what their peers were adding into the session. Using the chat facility also meant that the pupils could stay on the page viewing the photos at the same time. The pupils spent 10 mins on each whiteboard page and then team leaders loaded up the new page from a pupil shared area on the network.

The pupils were extremely motivated for the task. Fiona and their class teacher, Ruth Campbell, felt that they got far more out of the pupils during this session, than they would have on paper. Comments from the pupils at the end included, “great”, “cool”, “I really liked using the pictures on the computer”. I’m sure you’ll agree that this was super use of the Glow Meet tool.

A small primary school in the south west of Scotland is also discovering the benefits of Glow Meet. At Pinwherry Primary School in South Ayrshire, the composite class for the upper three levels has just 14 pupils. However, there is no worry here about such a small school being cut off from opportunities, thanks to Glow Meet. The class regularly holds web conferences with three other schools in the same authority and with another remote school on the Isle of Lewis.

Joint classes on Science are taught with Sacred Heart Primary School ten miles down the road and pupils collaborate on a Robert Burns project with Troon Primary School, 20 miles away. Linking with Dundonald Primary 40 miles away, the webcam can be on for a whole afternoon as pupils join up in reading groups, collaborative maths games and problem solving exercises between the two classes with the teachers swapping between them to cover different activities. Further links are being established with Marr College for a transition project in Maths.

Class activities using Glow can include any of the following: sharing news; completing homework; taking part in discussions; completing webquests; book detectives activities; links to interactive resources and writing collaborative stories. Their teacher Avril Taylor believes that her pupils are growing in confidence through their use of Glow and Glow Meet and getting opportunities which wouldn’t normally be available to them. We can attest to this as in recent training sessions delivered to 2 separate Scottish local authorities, the Pinwherry pupils were able to teach the teachers how to use Glow Meet using Glow Meet! Avril has embedded the usage of Glow within P5 – 7’s classroom activities so that it is just a normal part of their school day.

Glow doesn’t end there in the one classroom, as P1 – 4 are stretching their Glow legs with their teacher Anne Shankland and the headteacher, Celia Crawford using Discussion Boards for staff surveys within the school site. We look forward to Pinwherry Primary School popping up many times in the Glow world.

This event was a great success. Many thanks to all who took part in the free Google earth training on Monday 19th January. Thanks to those who came to the Optima in Glasgow for what was a unique experiment. 16 Geography teachers and 1 Modern Studies teacher from schools in Glasgow, Ayrshire, Highlands, Inverclyde, Dundee, Lanarkshire and East Renfrew:

John Ogilvie High School, Hillhead High School, James Hamilton Academy, Knightswood Secondary, Inverness Royal Academy, Nairn Academy, St. Stephens High School, Harris Academy, St. Thomas Aquinas RC Secondary School, Ardrossan Academy, St. Maurices High School, Calderside Academy, Johnstone High School, Broughton High School, Barrhead High School, Cleveden Secondary School.

Thanks also to our remote participants from, Aberdeenshire, Dundee, Glasgow, Inverclyde and Angus. A special thanks to Vicky Rogers from Angus who stayed to complete the whole day’s training in Glow meet and uploaded her Google earth tour complete with photographs of Friokheim into the Social Studies National glow Group.  While Mark Hagart, my colleague, was uploading screenshots of Google earth to the whiteboard in Glow meet I was sending messages to our virtual participants Vikky said: “this is a great example of nationally provided CPD” This is also a first for educators in Scotland. I hope Social Studies teachers will follow Vikky’s good example and share Google earth tours of their local area in Documents in the SSNGG. If you are not familiar with how to share Google earth files: download two guides to using Google earth from Documents in the Place and Environments tab.  Also look out for a  GE Glow Chat session soon.

Many thanks to our presenter, Jamie Buchanan-Dunlop who prepared well for the event and spoke clearly under more pressure than usual as he was being filmed by three different cameras, one of which was recording in Glow meet. You can find participant’s work on his website. The Glow team will be offering an edited version of this training for use by schools shortly.  Many thanks to Stuart Oliphant and Mark Hagart from the Glow team for their technical support with Glow meet. There was a great deal of technology and expertise involved in this event  but that does not mean that local authorities can not deliver good centrally organised CPD across their regions with Glow meet and with with less equipment. Stuart and Mark will take what they know about how to use the whiteboard for sharing information, how to improve video and audio in Glow meet and offer this to Local Authorites who intend to use this Glow tool for similar CPD events.

If you have a Glow login you will be able to access the Science Glow Group in the National Site. On Wednesday 21st January, a very special Glow Meet session will be taking place there. It will be well worth dropping in, with your class, at 2pm – 3pm, especially if you are studying Higher Biology or are interested in environmental issues.

The Scottish Seabird Centre Education Officers, Emily Dodd and Anna Pugh have invited classes across Scotland to come into the Glow Meet session to see the dissection of a seabird, a fulmar. You may be thinking, how grisly! …until you realize this bird has died, not of old age, but because of our lack of care of our environment. Emily told me a similar post mortem was held last year at the SSC and several pieces of plastic were found in the poor bird’s stomach. Reading about this in a book is one thing, but seeing it in real time, via Glow Meet, where classes will be able to pose questions to the scientists performing the autopsy, is quite another! Some North Berwick HS pupils are going to be lucky enough to be in the SSC during the dissection, but schools all over Scotland will for the first time be able to drop into this via the videolink that Glow Meet offers.
It should not be difficult to access the Glow Meet (assuming your local authority and school have enabled this function in Glow – and you have a Glow login as a member of staff). If you are going to bring your class in to see the post mortem, I’d be grateful if you would let me know (j.jelly@ltscotland.org.uk) but essentially, navigate to the national Science Glow Group, find the Glow Meet webpart on the discussions page and click on “Join the Glow Meet”. If you have a webcam, you can be visible to others, if you have a microphone, you will be able to voice questions, but even if you have neither of these things, you will still be able to see the post mortem and pose questions by typing them in. If you are coming in with a webcam in place, a school name placard would be a great help to others in identifying you.
Glow is enabling the sharing of events such as this. There is another great opportunity in the Social Studies national group on 19th Jan. to experience first class Google Earth training via Glow Meet.
Don’t be shy, make use of these opportunities. Log on to Glow and come into these Glow Meet sessions.
Hoping to see to see you on Wednesday! (The session will be recorded though, so if your timetable means you can’t come in live to the session on Wednesday, you can access the Glow Meet recording later)

PS Click here to find out more about using Glow Meet and all the other Glow functions.
You can read more about the post mortem by clicking the poster: fulmarposter.jpg

Jim Reid tells us how a Christmas Glow Group has resulted in some teachers using Glow Meet for the first time in their classes:

18 primary schools took part in a Glow Meet session to meet Santa on Thursday 18 December over two sessions. We used one Glow meet link to each school.  In the sessions Santa (who bore a striking resemblance to Ian Hoffman) and his little elf helper (who bore a striking resemblance to Margaret Tracey) spoke to the children about Christmas. It took place form Santa’s Grotto (which bore a striking resemblance to Carluke Primary).

Santa’s elf helper had asked the schools to send emails to Santa at his South Lanarkshire Council (SLC) email account santa@theadvisorslc.rmplc.co.uk.  In their emails they told Santa what they had been doing in class before Christmas and what sort of toys they wanted for Christmas.  Santa then read out these emails and commented on what the pupils had been doing.  He then spoke to some pupils from each school who asked him some very interesting questions;

How does Santa get into the houses that do not have a chimney?  (Answer: Santa’s Special magic which makes a chimney for him to come down and he then makes it disappear when he leaves)

What does Santa want for Christmas? ( Answer : a Wii fit.  He then asked the boy if he had one and when he said No, Santa said he thought his name was on the list for one) So if RM get a bill for a Wii fit from an irate parent just charge it to Mr Hoffman!

The little elf then took over and spoke to all the schools and asked them one by one to shout “Merry Christmas” to Santa, which they all did and one school also sang to him.  Santa then had to leave as he was still busy getting ready for Christmas. We recorded the sessions for future use.

Margaret and I decided to do the project as a Christmas activity for pupils using Glow.  Its main purpose was not to increase usage of Glow but some teachers did use Glow for the first time with their classes. This was a useful spin off. In talking to one particular Head teacher, through this use of Glow she saw a way in which other projects in her school could be enhanced through the use of Glow.  That was encouraging for Margaret and I. This was a major team effort involving:

• Our Central Advisory Service Development Officers who were “out in the field” resolving early teething problems and helping the school with their use if Glow Meet.  It was also they who constructed the Glow Group and the activities on it.
• The SLC business IT team and RM our network managed Service provider, could not have been more helpful and responded immediately when technical problems arose
• Stephen Forsyth, Alistair Fay and the Glow helpdesk who helped out big time when Glow Meet went pear shaped on Monday.

The efforts of all the above meant that not one school pupil was disappointed because of technical issues. That was a big thing for Margaret and I. In the pupil’s eyes this was not just a video conferencing session. This was Santa talking to them through Glow. We knew were taking a risk, but we felt it was worth it, and it was. To hear the children’s voices as they spoke to Santa was magical.  The feedback from our Development Officers who were out in the schools superb, they said the children absolutely loved it.  

Margaret and I wanted to try out running a major central initiative using Glow and Glow Meet.  We learned a lot from the exercise which will help us for future events. Santa will Glow again in South Lanarkshire next Christmas, and we would like to try some other events like this as the year progresses.

I had the great privilege today to attend an event marking the culmination of a wonderful project. The famed Scottish artist, Willie Rodger, has been working with nine schools across Scotland, helping them to create linocut prints of their very own. It all began on Hallowe’en, with Willie hosting a masterclass via Glow Meet from his studio, with each of the nine classes joining in to watch. Over the next weeks and months, the pupils, from P7, right through to S6 Advanced Higher, had further webconferences with Willie, who was able to provide one-to-one advice and comments. In addition, the pupils posted their work as it progressed on individual Glow Groups, and met up in Glow Chat rooms every Friday to leave comments on each other’s work.

Today Angela McEwan from Media Matters, who has been managing the project, hosted a Glow Meet from Learning and Teaching Scotland’s Glasgow base. Willie Rodger was here, along with his family, to take part in the highlight of the event – the opening of a Virtual Gallery of the pupils’ work by Glasgow’s Poet Laureate, Liz Lochhead.

Glow’s very own Marie Dougan welcomed participants, and handed over to Angela to speak to the schools. We joined each school in a live Glow Meet link, and the pupils talked about their work as it was displayed on the shared virtual whiteboard. After we’d heard from each school, Liz Lochhead took the mic to officially open the gallery. We were delighted with her reading of two of her own poems, and a reading of Scottish Poet Laureate Edwin Morgan’s poem, The Computer’s First Christmas Card. The latter poem seemed particularly appropriate in light of both the time of year and the subject matter. When Willie Rodger took the mic to praise the project, the room was stunned by the rapturous applause coming from each of the schools. Indeed, it was hard to tell who had enjoyed the project most – Willie Rodger or the children he worked with. Either way, it was a fantastic success.

Today’s Times Educational Supplement contains an article regarding the event and all the schools who took part, and you can find the Virtual Gallery online at Media Matters. Its final home will be in the Glow National Expressive Arts Group, which is due to open soon. This surely paves the way for more exciting Glow-based projects around the country. Got an idea for one? Get glowing!

Today I had the great pleasure of attending the annual conference of ADES - the Association of Directors of Education in Scotland. Why was I there? This year, ADES are moving their online community into Glow, and today saw the launch of their National Glow Group. As of today, all Directors of Education in Scotland have access to a National Glow Group for them to discuss, collaborate and share - and from the word ‘go’, they did just that.

The conference keynote was delivered by Prof. Richard Teese - not live in person, but live via Glow Meet. He’d very generously agreed to deliver the keynote speech for the conference from his study (at 2am his time) to those gathered on the other side of the world to hear him.  Prof. Teese is always challenging in his observations. He raised many important questions in light of the OECD report, and called those present to think critically about some of the challenges facing Scottish education. Two of his challenges for those present leaped out at me - to strengthening student engagement and to improving satisfaction with school - how would the directors of education envisage working towards achieving this?

No sooner had Prof. Teese finished speaking than the members of ADES set about discussing the points he raised - in a discussion forum in Glow. They now have collated responses to some of his questions, and set many new questions of their own to ask him. Those present seemed to appreciate what can easily be taken for granted - the ability to see the questions and responses from people seated at other tables instantly collated in the one place for all ADES members to see.

What a great start to the ADES Glow Group. An international speaker of high reputation joining by Glow Meet, and discussion in the Glow group. What a great example for us all of how we can share our ideas for Scottish education across the country.