ICT Year 6: Creating Electronic Big Books

The Direct2U service was a weekly email subscription service for primary teachers from Becta, which ran during 2005/6. The scheme offered lesson plans featuring ICT in activities based on six subject strands. The service has now been discontinued but Becta have given us permission to use a selection from the plans in this magazine. A full archive of all the Direct2U activities can be found at http://forum.ngfl.gov.uk/direct2u

Introduction

In this activity, children work in small groups to design and create an electronic Big Book for the younger children in the school. They will take into account the reading age and interests of younger children and the format of Big Books, and test out their books and modify them if necessary. There is not room here to give full details of how to use Big Book Maker but it is well supported with manuals and guides http://primary.naace.co.uk/activities/BigBookMaker/

Last term the Council for Subject Associations (CfSA) which was set up in September 2007 and funded for three years (before it has to become a self-financing organisation) produced the first of a series of Primary Subject folders that went into all schools across England for free. Other organisations can purchase a copy for £7.50. I was asked to write the ICT leaflet for the first issue on the theme of 'Every Child Mattters'.

The second Primary Subject's theme is the Gifted and Talented strand of the National Curriculum and was sent into schools in the last week of September 2008. Although I gave a sneak preview of the text in the Summer edition of Primary Focus, I have included the PDF that will be distributed along with leaflets from the other 16 subject associations to all schools in England during the third week in September 2008. The third edition of Primary Subjects will be distributed to schools in January 2009 and it has been confirmed that the theme will be Globalisation.

Your comments (posted underneath the article) on what you think of the leaflet would be very helpful feedback!

What does globalisation mean?

Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects relating to Globalisation is that means different things to different people. The DCSF aims to focus on the new curriculum for ICT and across all subjects and dimensions. However, Globalisation infers the 'bigger picture' and the use, development or acceptance of ideas, Web 2.0 technology as well as communicating and sharing information globally. Put more simply Globalisation refers to using ICT to help schools prepare children to take their place in the world/become global citizens.

Bowes children aged 9-10, in supportive pairs, created short PowerPoint presentations with a focus on the use of ICT, showing what they had learnt from their topic work on Ancient Greece.

Focus: Summertime Special

This summertime special issue of Sharing Success is a set of activities appropriate to the last few weeks of the summer term. These include a piece by Doug Dickinson offering an art activity suitable for most age groups and a reprise of the summer activities published in Week 26 of the Direct2U scheme in 2005. The third article (which is not available in the pdf) is a collection of holiday photographs for use in the Y3 D2U activity - Make a postcard.

If you feel that you could make a contribution to Sharing Success please contact me at h.govier@btopenworld.com.

As more studies emerge into the potential application of computer games in both industry and education I'm interested in whether computer games can hone cognitive skills in the same way that a recent US study claims that they can improve fine control skills for surgeons. 'Wii warm-up good for surgeons' BBC News Online 17 January 2008.

The target for the project was the setting up 200 children with their own interactive web-sites in 4 weeks! The idea was to set up safe on-line web accounts using www.think.com with primary children and their teachers and to help them appreciate the potential that Web 2.0 technologies have to enhance teaching and learning.

The project ran for 4 weeks and was a joint venture sponsored by The Oracle Education Foundation and MirandaNet abased at the Institute of Education in London. The project sponsored several other schools and culminated in a meeting to share work and achievements on July 10th 2008 at the MirandaNet's 'WLE centre'(World e-Citizens) based at the Institute of Education in London.

Naace have been successful in securing a TDA bid won by Steven Coombes based at Bath Spa University and being delivered as a 'Visual Learning Course' by Christina Preston and John Cuthell at MirandaNet (based at The Institute of Education, London).

Focus: Big Books

This is a special edition of Sharing Success which looks at the Big Books on the Naace Primary website and the Big Book Maker utility which allows you to make similar books of your own. We are delighted to announce that there is a new and much improved Big Book Maker available from amongst the Naace Primary resources at http://primary.naace.co.uk/activities/index.htm

If you feel that you could make a contribution to Sharing Success please contact me at h.govier@btopenworld.com.

The 'Let's Play - 2008 Project' focuses on using the Oracle Education Foundation's www.think.com to provide a range of online opportunities for children to build their own websites. The project has been led by Educational Consultant and Advanced Skills Teacher, Paul Vale, as an extension to 'The 101+ Club Project' which ran in 2006-2007.