A wide range of Primary classroom activities, reviews and resources has been developed and published over the years originally by MAPE and, more recently since the merger in 2004, by Naace.

The Direct2U service was a weekly email service produced by Becta in partnership with Naace. The service was for primary teachers and offered lesson plans featuring ICT in activities based on six subject strands. The service is discontinued but you can view the lesson plans in this archive.

The Naace Annual Strategic Conference and Exhibition opened in Torquay in early March 2008. This is the definitive ICT Conference in the UK for all those involved in advancing education through the use of modern technologies in learning and teaching.

Naace has introduced a 'hot-seat' where invited colleagues field questions over a four week period. Our guest in the 'hot-seat' will either answer online at specific times, or at pre-arranged regular intervals. We look forward to hearing from you!

This short article aims to highlight the background, key features and current vision of the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) project at Ranvilles Infant School. The full version of this research project is available through the University of Winchester library: Aubrey-Smith, F.S., (2007) 'How the implementation of a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) can affect the strategic development of a whole school. MA(Ed) Dissertation. University of Winchester.'

Naace will be responding in due course to the Byron Review following consultation with Members. At this stage we are pleased to relay the Association's views in response to questions in Chapter 3 of Staying Safe. While we recognise that vulnerable children and young people need to be protected and need to learn how they can protect themselves, it is our view that good practice in the safe use of communication technologies should apply to all children in all educational settings.

'Sharing Success' is a monthly e-magazine that focuses on schools' and teachers' use of ICT to contribute to successful achievements. Features freqently focus on recent issues, with the opportunity for Members to post comments directly onto each Article.

Welcome to the first edition of Primary Focus in 2008, published to coincide with the BETT Exhibition at Olympia in London (9-12 January 2008). The major positive change to the Primary Focus journal is that, similar to other Naace publications, we are now encouraging Members to contribute and interact with Articles, myself as editor, and other Members - with the idea of stimulating points of view within a continuing professional dialogue.

In this month's Sharing Sucess Julie Cooper, Chair of Governors at Gloucester Road Primary steps into the Naace 'hot-seat'. Julie will be 'live' on Wednesday 9 and Wednesday 16 April between 7-8pm. Other features include Theo Kuechel's article originating from the Naace talklists regarding e-learning, a progress report on the Oracle funded 'Let's Play Project' and a summary of issues from last month's 'hot-seat'. Jim Fanning provides a fascinating two-day blog from The Tideway School.

When computers first arrived in primary schools in the early 1980s, the BBC ran a series of programmes on their use in schools called 'The Learning Machine'. We were excited then by the huge potential of ICT for learning but the technology of that time was not much good for teaching: the interactivity was too limited and the screen too small.

Things are different today. Twenty-first century ICT is superb for teaching. The interactivity is literally at your fingertips and screens can be as big as you like. (In Las Vegas this January I saw a Celine Dion extravaganza where the whole of the backdrop was an 80ft computer screen.)

But it's not just what you've got - it's how you use it. This publication is about the latest technology in the hands of creative and interactive teachers. Read on and be excited by the new potential of interactive teaching technologies.