The full website launches on Monday 23 November, but the online buzz around the trailer for ‘We are the people‘ is building following the premiere this week. Free copies of the film will be available to readers of The Guardian newspaper on Saturday 28 November.

Online discussions about the issues raised in the film will be hosted by The Guardian on the 24 November and 1 December.

Some strong evidence of progress but wide sector differences and rates of improvement in technology enhanced learning.

Have a read and what do you think?

http://publications.becta.org.uk/display.cfm?resID=41329

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Who says you cannot innovate in a managed service?

“Not us” would be the answer from some of the Sheffield schools in the early waves of BSF and CIVICA who last week won the “Most Effective ICT Partnership” award at the 2nd annual Partnerships for Schools BSF Awards evening held at the Grosvenor House Hotel, London.

Civica’s education solutions enable secure information and resource sharing. Together with Microsoft, the company has developed a managed learning environment offering a broad solution from electronic registration and cashless catering to student portals. One of the foremost providers, Civica has a 20 year pedigree in education and learning but it has been it’s ability to work closely with Sheffield Local Authority, attempt to satisfy the schools and the wider community and be creative in the contract management that has won praise from the judges and respect and credibility within the BSF community.

The tangible positivity, energy and enthusiasm evident in the room at the awards ceremony is a powerful reminder of the momentum partnerships for schools has now developed in this vital transformation project.

Tim Byles, Chief Executive of Partnerships for Schools and Chair of the Excellence in BSF Awards judging panel, said: “This year’s entries captured the excitement, innovation and real sense of the difference BSF is making to young people, to teachers and to communities across the country”.

There have been some questions about the perceived tension that exists between a schools desire and need to innovate and the constraints of the managed service but according to some of the Sheffield schools and Civica it is a challenge that can be overcome.

“We have worked very hard to engage and listen to the teachers and pupils within the schools and then try and make sure the managed service delivered what they wanted”, said James Grant, Bid Director from Civica.

“This is not a case of “one size fits all” and the service needs to support innovation and transformation in learning” added James.

BECTA, the government agency responsible for ICT in education, and sponsor of the ICT award, also believes the challenge can be met;

“ We know that technology has the potential to transform learning. We are committed to inspiring education providers to realise that potential and equip learners for Britain’s future success” said Nina Woodcock, Head of BECTA’s Capital programmes.

The most recent research from BECTA on ICT in schools demonstrates that whilst progress has been made to infrastructure and teachers are “enthusiastic and positive” about the use of technology to enhance learning only about 50% of teachers use it effectively in a range of tasks. Similarly, whilst an increasing number of schools are becoming “e-enabled” there is still a lot of work to be done to support schools in their transformation journey and reap the potential benefits in effectiveness and efficiency.

If the Sheffield/Civica partnership can be replicated elsewhere in BSF surely then there can be no reason why the words “Innovation” and “Transformation” cannot be synonymous with a “managed service”?

Naace will be holding a BSF think tank on December 4th on this very issue.

For more information:

CIVICA
http://www.civicaplc.com/UK/Sectors/Education/

BSF Award winners
http://www.partnershipsforschools.org.uk/media/press/pr_2009-11-13-awards_winners_2009.jsp

BECTA Schools survey and questions for BSF
http://future.ncsl.org.uk/News.aspx?ID=194

Naace
http://www.naace.org/934

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The First World War Poetry Digital Archive and the Learning Technologies Group at Oxford University have collaborated on an exciting new project in the 3D virtual world Second Life to simulate areas of the Western Front 1914-18. The team believes this is the first time anything of its type has been done on Second Life.

This project, which is funded by JISC, has arranged a range of digitised archival materials like poetry manuscripts, letters and diaries from the major poets of the First World War including Wilfred Owen, Isaac Rosenberg and Vera Brittain, along with contextual primary source materials. These materials have been supplemented with new interpretative content and a spectrum of interactive tools and tutorials, streaming video and audio effects.
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/news/stories/2009/11/ww1simulation.aspx

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Alternatively, for those students wanting to experience Shakespeare through augmented reality, ConnectED Education are working with Cambridge University Press to add a new layer of information to Romeo and Juliet by placing semacodes within the text. Using a PSP (PlayStation Portable) the student can activate these codes and play a related piece of media including audio tracks and video enactments of particular scenes.

For more information on this project and the potential of augmented reality for learning, check out the latest Futurelab podcast ‘Augmented reality‘, available online now.

Her reward for winning the “Lindsay Thompson Fellowship” was to travel to the UK for HHL and then on to the USA to research mobile learning.

Here she has discovered Travis Allen, founder of the ischool initiative and he is an inspiration.

What do you think?

https://www.ischoolinitiative.com/Educational_Technology.html

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There is a zone called Scilands where a variety of institutions including NASA have created virtual experiments and scientific experiences. Member organisations share borders of their individual regions in the hope of forging links between disciplines. One of the most compelling of the Scilands is that which enables the visitor to fly through a hurricane.

The children growing up in that valley now are just one click away from the children’s international digital library

http://en.childrenslibrary.org/

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Dr Darren Mundy and his colleagues at the University’s Scarborough School of Arts and New Media are developing a range of cutting-edge software to encourage students to be more involved during lectures – even choosing what they want to learn about.

http://www.jisc.ac.uk/news/stories/2009/10/wildthing.aspx#

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