eLearning Laura

I recently wrote an article jointly with the Principal of Berkhamsted School, Mark Steed, on ICT as a catalyst for change in pedagogy. It was published in the ISC Bulletin, 29, June 2012, pp.30-34.   ‘Each change in technology in schools makes us revisit and re-evaluate how and why we do what we do in the [...]

    This is the video I created at the Apple Teacher Institute 2012 this week in Cheltenham. I made it for my team as a strategic tool to open our professional development session at the beginning of term. I was keen to produce something with a genuine purpose (it was going to take a [...]

Neoteny, one of my favorite words, means the retention of childlike attributes in adulthood: idealism, experimentation and wonder. In this new world, not only must we behave more like children, we also must teach the next generation to retain those attributes that will allow them to be world-changing, innovative adults who will help us reinvent [...]

    “All change please – the Internet is coming!” I attended my first ISC ICT conference this week, which was hosted at Berkhamsted on Wednesday 7th December. It was a fantastic day and I felt very privileged to speak about the work I am doing in my department on colaborative learning using iPads. Click [...]

My Year 10 boys did what they love best today. They managed to take our lesson about French regions off on a complete tangent and we got talking about our iPad project in MFL. The animation and excitement in their entire demeanour when talking about the iPads was an absolute pleasure to see: they literally [...]

This week I have been reading a lot about BYOD (Bring Your Own Device). It offers a solution to the fact that schools have been spending a fortune on hardware for far too long (be afraid, RM, be very afraid) and perhaps it’s time to invest in connectivity and network architecture instead. Given that most schools’ tech [...]

The other week I asked for some volunteers from my Year 8  group to come and have a look at the new ASUS Eee-Pad Transformer and tell me what they thought of it. Thrilled with the idea of offering their expert opinions, they turned up at lunchtime full of enthusiasm and curiousity. Firstly I showed [...]

Am I late to the party on this? That’s the way it seems looking at blog posts and videos from nearly a year ago trumpeting the importance of the iPad as it arrived on the market. The pace of change is so fast in this field that you can blink and miss a major new [...]

My team is currently developing our vision for what ICT should look like at our school. It’s shaping up as follows: Our school will provide a technology enriched interactive environment which acts as a hub for lifelong learning in our community. Learning will be high quality, engaging and aspirational, and will prepare learners for economic [...]

What’s the point of Twitter? Why should educators get involved? What difference does using Twitter make? Here are some answers that you might like to share. 1. Together we’re better Teaching can be a lonely business. In a school where lessons are long and lunchtimes are short, not enough conversations between teachers I work with [...]