Connected Falkirk: Curricular Carry-Out Connected Falkirk

In episode seven, Lauren McKechnie from the Connected Falkirk team joins a group of teachers from Graeme High – Cara Stewart (Drama), Gavin Morrison (English), Kevin Kennedy (Science) and Lorna Lyon (Art) – to discuss digital collaboration tools. The discussion revolves around an improvement group that supported teachers to try a new collaboration tool with a class and reflect on the results.

As always, we’ll focus the discussion around our 3 main tenets which are: Easy, because we’re all about making things easier; Compatible, because you don’t want to go out of your way to
incorporate these ideas and Useful, because it’s important that everything we discuss can be used in classrooms.

Do you have an idea for a future episode? Is there something you would like us to explore?

Follow us on ⁠Twitter (@connectedfalk)⁠ and send us a tweet (or a wee DM).

 

In episode six, Mari-Jane Paterson and Gavin Morrison from the Connected Falkirk team are joined by Falkirk Council’s Principal Librarian Yvonne Manning and Braes High School librarian Moira Paton to discuss how iPad supports reading. We’ll consider how a Connected Falkirk iPad can improve access to reading, enhance the reading experience itself and open up new possibilities for how we respond to something we’ve read and share our thoughts with others.

As always, we’ll focus the discussion around our 3 main tenets which are: Easy, because we’re all about making things easier; Compatible, because you don’t want to go out of your way to incorporate these ideas and Useful, because it’s important that everything we discuss is relevant to actually using in learning situations.

Do you have an idea for a future episode? Is there something you would like us to explore?



Follow us on Twitter (@connectedfalk) and send us a tweet (or a wee DM).

In episode five, Gavin Morrison and Mari-Jane Paterson from the Connected Falkirk team are joined by Kirsty Chatburn from Larbert High School and Steve Bunce from XMA to discuss “The Paperless Classroom”. We consider the benefits to teachers, advantages for pupils, difficulties that may be faced when moving to paperless and explore some tools that can allow learning to take place using digital solutions in place of paper.

As always, we’ll focus the discussion around our 3 main tenets which are: Easy because nobody’s listening to this for ways to make their life harder, Compatible because we want to share ideas that fit in with what you already do and Useful because anything we discuss should be convenient for you to actually use yourself.

Got an idea for a future episode? Is there something you want us to explore?

Follow us on Twitter (@connectedfalk) and fire us a tweet (or a covert DM).

In episode four, the Connected Falkirk team are joined by Falkirk Council's ICT Curriculum Development Officer, Kerry Abercrombie, and Michael Conlon from XMA to discuss making the most of iPad mobility. We consider how iPad can maximise learning opportunities beyond the traditional classroom in three different spaces: alternative indoor spaces, outdoor campus spaces and extramural school visits.

The discussion is anchored in our three main tenets for CLPL : easy, because moving learning outside of the classroom already brings its own additional challenges; compatible, because you’re not going out-and-about just to use an iPad, it should always support important learning; Useful, because who wants to hear about something you can’t actually make use of?

Got an idea for a future episode? Is there something you want us to explore?

Follow us on Twitter (@connectedfalk) and shoot us a tweet (or a more private DM).

In episode three, Mari-Jane Paterson and Gavin Morrison from the Connected Falkirk team are joined by Steve Bunce from XMA to discuss the benefits of coding and computational thinking. We then take a deep-dive into the app-design activity Steve has worked on with pupils throughout Falkirk and hear from Ms Archibald and some of her P7 pupils from Carron Primary about their experiences of designing their own apps. 

We focus the discussion around our three main tenets which are: Easy because the life of a teacher is hard enough, Compatible because these ideas should work alongside existing practice and Useful because we’re teachers too, we want to know about things that actually work in classrooms.

Got an idea for a future episode? Is there something you want us to explore? Follow us on Twitter (@connectedfalk) and ping us a tweet (or a discreet DM).

In episode two the Connected Falkirk team are joined by Michael Conlon and Steve Bunce from XMA to share our favourite hidden features of the iPad that have made a big difference to us. The discussions will centre around our three main tenets of professional learning: easy because we’re realistic about how busy teachers are, compatible because we want to support the things you’re already doing and fit in with them naturally and useful because we want to focus on ideas that can be put into practice in classrooms.

Got an idea for a future episode? Is there something you want us to explore? Follow us on Twitter (@connectedfalk) and drop us a Tweet (or slide into our DMs).