Glow Scotland

September 21st, 2010

The Daily What News service is now live

pcurrie

Comments: Comments Off Tags: Tags: CfE, cross curricular, English, Glow, health and wellbeing, Literacy, Literacy and English, Mathematics, Maths, news, news service, Numeracy, politics, relevant learning, science
 : Categories Curriculum for Excellence, Glow, Literacy, Mathematics, National Groups, Pupils, Sciences, Social Studies, Technologies

The Daily What News is the all new Glow news service for schools. Launched this week, the service provides a sophisticated and interactive news service for Glow users, with articles written by a specialist news content editor especially for a schools’ audience. Articles will be published every school day and there will be two versions of each article: What? gives readers a less complex approach to the story; What’s More…provides a bit more of a challenge. In the very near future, there will also be three articles each week which will be published in Gaelic.

The articles are arranged in news categories and will be tagged according to CfE subjects and experiences and outcomes. The articles will be archived and searchable from the main homepage, giving users a rich learning resource that offers learners the opportunity to make meaningful and relevant connections across different curricular areas. Many of the articles will feature an interactive activity that will provide Glow account holders with a fun way to extend or cement users’ learning on the story’s topic. Users can also use their Glow logins to take part in forum discussion topics for each article.

Teachers will find the Teachers’ Area Blog an excellent resource. Beneath each daily news article there is a link to a blog post that provides Glow users with a wealth of lesson ideas and suggestions for several curricular areas from the one news story. The posts are written by a specialist education content editor who links the news story to CfE outcomes and experiences and provides links to other interesting and relevant content. Teachers themselves are encouraged to contribute to these posts so that we build up an extensive bank of cross-curricular lesson suggestions for each news story. The blog is organised in the same way as the news site itself and offers users the option to browse in several different ways or search for specific content.

From each blog post, there is a link to a Glow group that allows users to upload resources to a document store. The documents will be tagged according to CfE level, subject area, date the article was published and article title, offering users the ability to filter searches in several different ways.  In delivering their curriculum outcomes through The Daily What News service, Teachers are encouraged to upload any materials they develop and share with other Glow users, so that we build up an extensive store of learning resources that can be archived for future use.

Feedback received so far has been very encouraging indeed and the service provides educators with a real opportunity to have relevant curricular content that can be accessed through a number of different subject areas in a truly meaningful way.

A recent article in the Sport category focused upon Rangers’ fans’ trip to Manchester and how their behaviour was better than on a previous occasion that had led to trouble in the city centre. The article would surely be a popular one with young people and, because they are known for their reluctance in reading, it is of note that it would be of particular appeal to boys. There is even an interactive activity attached to this article which invites learners to test their knowledge of SPL club nicknames. What better way to engage reluctant learners in purposeful and relevant learning? In the Teachers’ Blog, lesson suggestions were offered in a number of CfE subject areas (Social studies, Health +Wellbeing, English+Literacy) and links were provided to video content and discussion stimuli that would encourage even the most reluctant learner to engage with such relevant and meaningful subject matter.

This is, of course, just one example. There is already a good stock of interesting content on the site, with stories ranging in topic from the floods in Pakistan, for a World focus, to how young people made an impression on the Scottish Parliament, for a story that is closer to home. Each school day sees another story added to the archive, so we are building a wealth of content that Glow users can benefit from.

Whatever the story’s subject-matter, it is always the case that it will be written in a manner that is appealing and relevant to our learners. Add to that the interactive activities and lesson suggestions in the teachers’ blog, and you might just find that The Daily What News is just what you have been looking for!

September 15th, 2010

Have your say on the future of Glow

Gail Cairns

Comments: 4 Comments » Tags: Tags: Glow
 : Categories Benefits, Development, Glow

Glow is the world’s first national intranet for education. It is transforming the way the curriculum is delivered in Scotland. Now, Glow is looking to the future to ensure that it equips practitioners and learners with the tools they need today and tomorrow.

School staff, pupils, parents and other stakeholders are invited to help shape the future of Glow by having their say on how they would like to see it developed.

We would like to hear from all these groups, it doesn’t matter if they haven’t used Glow very much or have not yet had the opportunity to use it at all, we would like everyone to complete the survey to help us understand all views.

September 13th, 2010

Curriculum for Excellence and Glow – Seamless Transitions Spotlight

Gail Cairns

Comments: Comments Off Tags: Tags: CfE, Glow, SLF
 : Categories Curriculum for Excellence, Events, Glow

The Scottish Learning Festival 2010 is just over a week away now! Beginning this year’s Spotlight sessions is the very promising “Seamless Transitions – Curriculum for Excellence and Glow” presentation.

This spotlight will demonstrate how practitioners across all education sectors have successfully turned transitions into meaningful learning experiences, contributing to the delivery of Curriculum for Excellence. The presenters also offer examples of how staff are coming together and using the tools within Glow, to share and enhance professional development opportunities within their own settings.

Delivered by teaching practitioners and LTS staff this spotlight session is guaranteed to be  unmissable.

Places are limited so register now for the Scottish Learning Festival and your place at the “Seamless Transitions – Curriculum for Excellence and Glow” Spotlight on Wednesday the 22nd of September at 9.30am.

June 29th, 2010

The Daily What

pcurrie

Comments: 4 Comments » Tags: Tags: Glow, Glowscotland, Literacy, Literacy and English, news, Schools, Scotland, the daily what, the herald
 : Categories Curriculum for Excellence, Development, Literacy, Uncategorized

‘The Daily What’- the all new Glow schools’ news service- will be launched in August in association with our partners for the service, The Herald group and Tinopolis Interactive. In the meantime, we really need user feedback on initial designs for the news service. We are always keen to find out what Glow users think and we will try to recommend changes accordingly.

There is a working prototype (with limited functionality at this point) that will give you a good idea of page layout, content and navigation elements. Please remember that very few links will work at this stage, but you should get a good idea of how the service will look when it is launched.

The prototype can be accessed here: http://www.dailywhat.org.uk/prototype/index.html

We have created a National Glow group for the service, with a particular focus for the moment on collecting feedback. If you have time, we would very much appreciate feedback from Glow users. There are several forum posts which ask specific questions and invite voting from users.

These forum posts can be accessed individually from the main Noticeboard of the Glow group, or by going to the ‘Tell us what you think’ page. There is also an email link, if you would prefer to email your thoughts, and a document store, if you would prefer to create a document of feedback and upload it to Glow. The Glow group also contains images of the prototype page designs.

Whichever option you decide to use, we really do appreciate Glow users taking the time to share their views. Remember, if we find out what you think now, we can make changes before the August launch.

Click here to go straight to the Glow group

April 29th, 2010

Glow 101 – a very good place to start

Katie Barrowman

Comments: 2 Comments » Tags: Tags: Glow, Glow Meet, Online Learning, Webinar
 : Categories Glow Meet

Glow 101 will be a series of online seminars – Webinars – to help you get started with Glow. There are intitially two sessions planned, and you can choose to join either or both.

Session 1 – Wednesday 12th May 2010, 16:00 – 16:45

This will cover the basics of navigating Glow, including exploring your school site, your local authority site, your My Glow area and My Glow Groups list, and the National Glow site.

Session 2 – Wednesday 19th May 2010, 16:00 – 16:45

This will cover the basics of creating a Glow Group, including how to make a group, how to populate the basic group, and how to add members to it.

Both of these will take place in Glow Meet – click this link to go to the Glow 101 page and sign up for session 1 – it’ll take you to the Glow log in page, and then straight to the online venue.

January 13th, 2010

Find out more at the Scottish Government National Glow Group

Lorna Arbuckle

Comments: 2 Comments » Tags: Tags: Glow, Glow Group, scottish government
 : Categories Uncategorized

The New Year sees the launch of a new national Glow Group from the Scottish Government.

Keep up to date with news and information on schools policy developments and find out how to sign up to the Schools e-newsletter.

To log in, simply click on the following link. You will need your Glow user name and password to get access:

Take me to the Scottish Government National Glow Group

If you don’t have access to Glow, did you know the GlowScotland website has an interactive map of Scotland where you can keep up to date with what stage your local authority is with Glow? Click here to find out more:

Take me to the interactive map

January 8th, 2010

Arts and technology companies Co-create new ideas for learning

Lorna Arbuckle

Comments: 2 Comments » Tags: Tags: Co-Create, Glow, Scottish Arts Council
 : Categories Co-Create, Curriculum for Excellence, Expressive Arts, Glow

Ten arts organisations have been offered up to £30,000 each to develop innovative approaches to learning through Glow, thanks to a dynamic partnership project between Learning and Teaching Scotland (LTS) and the Scottish Arts Council.

In September 2009, the Co-Create Project invited Scottish Arts Council-funded arts organisations to link up with new media companies and local authorities to develop inspiring new projects and resources for Glow, the Scottish schools intranet.

The project received 37 applications for funding from across Scotland, of which ten have been selected by an assessment panel made up of local authority officers, classroom practitioners and representatives from LTS, the Scottish Arts Council and RM, the solution provider for Glow.

The successful partnerships will now go on to deliver pioneering and ambitious demonstration projects which will pilot new ways of learning and teaching. The projects selected will be implemented all over Scotland and represent a wide range of art forms. Successful projects include ‘State of Emergency’, a project which will help pupils to create online dramas broadcast ‘live’ from a fictional country in conflict to explore dilemmas and themes associated with war. Another project seeks to bring together mainstream and disengaged primary pupils and their teachers, learning across the curriculum through traditional arts and new media.

Marie Dougan, Director of Learning and Technology at LTS, said: “I’m delighted that we received such a great response from the arts and technology communities for the Co-Create Project funding.

“Glow is proving to be an invaluable tool in the implementation of Curriculum for Excellence and I’m looking forward to seeing the fantastic ideas put into practice to illustrate the key role that the arts play in supporting this.”

Co-Create projects will take place throughout 2010 and will represent all art forms and engage with a cross section of age levels and target user groups in schools across Scotland.

The ten successful organisations are as follows:

• Citizens Theatre
• Drake Music Scotland
• Fèis Rois Ltd
• Horsecross Arts
• Imaginate
• NVA
• Street Level Photoworks
• Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Arts Centre
• Visible Fictions
• Y-Dance

The Glow Arts Project Co-Create is funded through a partnership between Learning and Teaching Scotland and the Scottish Arts Council National Lottery Fund

December 2nd, 2009

Climate Change Summit – Get Involved!

Jennifer McDougall

Comments: Comments Off Tags: Tags: blog, climate change, Copenhagan, Glow, Heather Reid, sustainable development
 : Categories Curriculum for Excellence, Events, Glow Groups, Glow Meet, Local authorities, National Groups, Social Studies

The UN Climate Change Summit is nearly upon us and people across the globe will be watching as world leaders and government officials meet in Copenhagen from the 7th – 18th December to negotiate new international targets to tackle climate change.

Learning and Teaching Scotland will be bringing you photos, videos, blogs and live feeds from Copenhagen to enable your school to be part of the experience and to participate in the climate change debate.

To kick start our programme of events, we’re giving all schools the chance to take part in a live Glow meet with Heather Reid, BBC weather presenter and professional meteorologist. Heather will be answering your questions on weather, climate and the impact of global warming.

This live Glow meet will take place on Wednesday 9th December 2009 from 11:20am to 11:50am. To take part, visit the
Sustainable Development Education Glow group.

Submit your questions to Heather in advance of the Glow meet by visiting the SDE Discussions Page or by emailing Ian Menzies at I.Menzies@LTScotland.org.uk

Plans are also being finalised for a further Glow meet live from the Copenhagen conference on Fri 11th December 2009. Watch the Sustainable Development Education Glow group or LTS online for further details.

September 10th, 2009

Reminder – Join in a National Glow Meet!

Katie Barrowman

Comments: 3 Comments » Tags: Tags: Events, Fiona Hyslop, Glow, Glow Meet
 : Categories Events, Glow Meet

There’s still time to sign up to take part in a nationwide Glow Meet on Tuesday the 15th of September with Fiona Hyslop, the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning. The Glow Meet starts at 13:00, and will last for an hour. Ms Hyslop will be speaking about why she is proud to be Scottish, and then answering questions from the audience at Gavinburn Primary School, and from the Glow audience.

If your class want to join in and watch or ask questions, you can sign up by clicking this link and reading the Glow page for more details.

Questions should be submitted before the end of the day on Monday the 14th of September.

There will be a chance to log in and test the Glow Meet on Friday and Monday, so please have a try if you’ve never joined a Glow Meet before.

September 4th, 2009

Glow Meet with the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning

Katie Barrowman

Comments: Comments Off Tags: Tags: Events, Fiona Hyslop, Glow, Glow Groups, Glow Meet, National glow groups, National Groups
 : Categories Curriculum for Excellence, Events, Glow Meet, National Groups, West Dunbartonshire

The SLF Extra Glow Group is now live, with things to see before the Scottish Learning Festival, and a preview of what to expect over the two days. One event you can get involved in before the festival is a Glow Meet Session with Fiona Hyslop, the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning. In advance of her Keynote Speech at SLF, Ms Hyslop will be hosting a Glow Meet for Scottish Schools from Gavinburn Primary School in West Dunbartonshire. The Glow Meet will take place on the 15th of September between 1pm and 2pm.

The cabinet secretary will be talking about what it means to her to be Scottish, and inviting questions from the children at Gavinburn and the Glow audience.

To sign up your class to watch or to take part in the question and answer session, please visit the SLF Extra Glow Group by clicking on this link