This article was originally posted on my other blog at MrWarner.com. I thought that readers of Teaching News might find it interesting too.

A while ago, I was was offered the chance to receive a Dell Latitude 2100 netbook for review purposes. While I don’t normally write reviews for products on my blogs, I agreed to take a look at the machine for two reasons:

1. My blog post ‘Using Flip Video in the classroom‘ has become extremely popular, attracting lots of views and receiving the most comments of all of the posts here. So, I thought that readers of the blog might also be interested in hearing my experiences of using another gadget in the classroom.
2. I love computers (most of the time!), so it was a nice opportunity to play with a new ‘toy’ without having to spend any money.

Before writing the rest of this post, I want to make it clear that I’m not receiving any payment for this review… and I don’t get to keep the laptop (sadly!).

When I first received the Latitude 2100, I was instantly impressed at how small, compact and sturdy it is. It is covered with a rubber casing which makes it extremely eye-catching and easy to hold. The one that I received was ‘School Bus Gold’ (i.e. yellow)… it’s certainly bright and colourful, but the red and blue ones look smarter (although I’m just fussy!). You can see more images of the netbook on Dell’s site or on Flickr. The machine is supposedly ‘influenced by the needs of primary and secondary students’. Having used it in the classroom for a number of weeks, I can certainly see that it would make a valuable addition to primary and secondary classrooms if you don’t already have netbooks.

Booting and Connections

My review machine is quick to boot into Windows 7, which runs very well. As a Mac user, I’ve only used Windows XP at school over recent years (skipping Vista completely). However, it was very easy to get the machine up and running, connecting it to my home wireless network quickly and allowing me to browse the Internet and listen to BBC Radio via the desktop radio gadget.

It was also incredibly easy to use at school, again connecting to our wireless network and enabling us to use lots of web tools in the classroom (Superclubs Plus, Etherpad, Google Docs etc.). The machine doesn’t have a CD/DVD drive and I didn’t install any software on it (apart from Microsoft Security Essentials for virus protection), but most of our ICT work has been online, so this wasn’t an issue. I am sure that it could be connected to a school’s network so that software can be installed in that way if necessary.

Touchscreen

One cool feature of the netbook is the touchscreen. It’s really nice to be able to interact with the machine by tapping on the screen, but the novelty of this can wear off after a while if you’re more used to using a mouse / trackpad. For younger children who might not be as experienced with the trackpad, it is very easy to control the machine by simply touching the icons. Browsing around the web in this way is also easy … I found it very comfortable to hold the machine on my lap and navigate the web by tapping on the hyperlinks.

I did find using scroll bars to be a little awkward… as I had to drag the slider bars (which are much slimmer than my fingers). However, the children (with their much smaller fingers) were whizzing around the screen really quickly. As an iPhone user, I was also expecting to be able to touch and drag on any part of a web page to move around, but this wasn’t possible.

Design

I’ve shown the machine to lots of children at school, as well as friends and family. Everyone has been impressed with how it looks and performs. People couldn’t believe that it was a computer when I first showed it to them. One person mentioned that it looked more like a folder or an exercise book than a laptop.

I was also really pleased with the keyboard. I do have a netbook of my own and the keyboard on that seems a little cramped at times, making typing for long periods a little uncomfortable. However, the keys seem a little larger on the Latitude 2100, making it easy to type on for those with big or little hands!

At our school, we all use standard sized laptops. We don’t have an ICT suite, so large (and heavy) trolleys of laptops move around the classrooms for use in all curriculum areas. Our laptops take over most of the children’s desk space when they’re using them in the classroom, leaving little room for other equipment that might be needed (paper / books etc.). I can really see the benefits of the netbook form factor and would love to have a set of these in my classroom which the children can grab as and when they are needed. The Dell site shows a ‘mobile computing solution’ which can hold and charge 24 of the little machines… I wonder if I can convince my headteacher to buy one?!

Durability, Performance and Reliability

The netbook is extremely tough. I’ve been carrying it back and forwards to school for the past few weeks. I’m normally very careful with my laptops, making sure that they are packed away carefully in my bags. However, I haven’t needed to be as ‘precious’ with this netbook. The tough rubber casing meant that I could just pop it in my bag without worry.

It also performed well in all of the tasks that we used it for… as I mentioned, most of our use of the machine was online. It worked extremely quickly in everything we asked it to do and we didn’t experience any crashes or technical problems.

Battery life hasn’t been an issue either and the battery is removable, so it would be possible to swap batteries in the middle of a lesson if required.

Potential Issues

The screen size can be a problem at times, especially when you are browsing websites with lots of content. However, this is the nature of using a netbook I suppose.

Dell’s site also mentions an optional carry handle which would also provide a little more peace of mind for all if children were allowed to carry them around the classroom. A number of other design features are mentioned on the site which help teachers and pupils to use the machines at school, including:

• a keyboard with antimicrobial protection (which it is claimed, ‘helps inhibit and reduce bacterial growth’),
• network activity lights (to help teachers monitor children’s use of the machines),
• personalisation windows (to help teachers, children and technicians to identify each machine).

Summary

Overall, I’m really pleased with the Latitude 2100. It’s a tough and reliable little machine which looks good and would be great for a teacher to use, carrying back and forth to school… or for a pupil to use as an additional tool in the classroom. The children who used my loan machine were certainly impressed with it, and others who saw it were desperately keen to try it out as well!

Sadly, I have now returned the Latitude 2100, but I would love one for personal use. I can definitely see the benefits of having a set of netbooks like these to help embed technology in the classroom even further.

The countdown to Sport Relief 2010 kicks off this month with the launch of exciting, free education resources for primary, secondary and early years groups. The resources, spanning the English, physical education and citizenship curriculums, bring alive the stories of young people in the UK and overseas. Sport Relief’s School Kits are available to order for free at www.sportrelief.com/schools. The kits provide teachers with all the tools they need to get set to ‘Rise to the Challenge’ and inspire their students to get active to help some of the world’s poorest people, both at home in the UK and overseas.

Sport Relief’s free to order resources range from lesson and assembly plans to photos, videos and real stories about children and young people supported by Sport Relief funded projects.

Sportacus, from BBC’s LazyTown is back to excite and inspire early years groups with a host of learning ideas. Early years kits will also include a full colour story book, helping children to understand the differences between their lives and those of other children around the world.

For primary and secondary schools, Sport Relief offers English, PE and citizenship lesson ideas and resources for key stages one to four, including lesson plans and activities that will get students thinking like journalists, with a dedicated area on www.sportrelief.com/schools for them to upload their reports on the issues affecting them in their communities, for all to see.

Get Your Socks on for Sport Relief with the Sport Relief Sock Deposit Scheme for schools. An easy way for schools to fundraise, simply pay a deposit for an order of Sport Relief stripy socks from the website and sell the socks in your school. For every pair of Sport Relief socks ordered through the Sock Deposit Scheme, Sainsbury’s is kindly giving one Active Kids voucher to the school. The Sport Relief sock will also be available to buy in UK Sainsbury’s stores for £2.

The Sport Relief fundraising campaign kicks off in January, when schools will be able to find a wealth of ideas to inspire kids of all ages to rise to the challenge and raise money for Sport Relief.

Important date for your diary – 19^th March 2010: Sport Relief Friday across schools in the UK kicks off the Sport Relief weekend of fundraising fun!

Having completed a degree in music, what feels like a lifetime ago now, I was thrilled will the opportunity to review a new piece of music software call PROTÉGÉ. When first installing a new piece of software, one of the first things that you want to do, is see just what the program is capable of and this was no exception. Having clicked on ‘OPEN’, there were six pre-prepared pieces for me to listen to. These demo pieces were fantastic and really showed the capabilities of the program. However, I was a bit disappointed, as these demos had been created in the more advanced sister program called NOTION. Undeterred, I decided to have a go at creating my very own masterpiece, using PROTÉGÉ.

There are a minimum number of icons, which is great, as you don’t get the overwhelming feeling of panic when you aren’t sure which one to choose. The whole program is driven from a simple set of drop-down menus on the right hand side, although you do need a certain amount of musical knowledge to understand what some of the terms mean. Setting up the initial score is relatively simple, once you understand how to navigate through the menu system. I chose to input the notes using the computer keyboard, although you could enter them via a midi keyboard. One thing which was mildly irritating, is that you seem to have to enter your own bar lines, even though you have entered a time signature, which interrupted the flow somewhat.

The program allows you to enter either single staves, or multiple ones to score for a whole orchestra. Each stave can be named with either the instrument name or child’s name should you wish to. Although I chose to enter actual notes, you could enter rhythmic patterns for the children to follow. This is probably the next step to take when moving on from simple graphic scoring. You can also enter lyrics, rests, accidentals, slurs, tempo marking and all expression marks, even down to ‘up’ and ‘down’ bow markings for strings!

Once you have entered the notation, the playback facility allows you to listen to your composition. Printing it out though was much easier than following it on the screen, as it seemed quite jerky and difficult to follow.

After about 15 minutes, I had created something which was quite tuneful and certainly looked very impressive when printed out! I was even able to save it as a .WAV file to put into a Powerpoint presentation!

This piece of software is definitely aimed at the upper end of the primary age phase and needs adult input. I can see huge benefits for developing musical skills for the Gifted and Talented and also for the music specialist when trying to print out ‘real’ music for children to read. It works really well as a music notation package – one of the easiest and user-friendly I have seen – but you may need to look elsewhere if it is a sequencer you are looking for.

For information about the program, go to http://www.notionmusic.com/products/protege/

The Mind-Mapping software, Concept Draw, has been reviewed on the site before, but a new update has been launched and as our school was looking at evaluating different software to help with our curriculum planning, I agreed to trial it.

When you download and open the software, you are taken aback with just how complicated it appears. However, a ‘bubble sheet’ of options pops up to select from, which is quite user- friendly. The options include a Getting Started Tutorial; Start to MindMap; Create MindMap from template; Begin Brainstorming; Outline new idea; Open last edited mind map and Explore Existing MindMap. Being a ‘manual-reader’ person, I selected the Tutorial, to see if it would guide me through the icons on the screen (of which there are a plethora!)

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I have used mind-mapping software for many years for my own personal use, so when Andrew asked me have a look at the ConceptDRAW Mindmap Professional software; I was intrigued to see what this software had to offer over the programme I use.

My initial impression when opening the program was WOW! The screen was filled with icons and file options in abundance. Apparently there are 3000 icons! The initial dialogue box gave me 7 options: new blank document; new document with brainstorming; create a mindmap with the assistant; create a mindmap based on a template; open existing mindmap; open last-edited mindmap and getting started tutorial – luckily there was the option to tick a check box ‘don’t show this dialogue box again’. Guess which option I chose?

There is no doubt that this is a powerful programme having extensive features and functionality – an fully functioning help system, a huge range of libraries and templates and there are many options regarding formats – the maps can be saved as JPEGs, PDFs, PowerPoints, HTML etc. etc. I am sure the versatility of this programme will appeal to many. You can even export the map, the text notes and the outline to your iPOD. Apparently this is the first program devoted to mind mapping that supports both Macintosh and Windows platforms. All documents and libraries can be freely exchanged between versions.

The brainstorming function allows users to capture ideas in both Outline and MINDMAP views and uses a timer to limit the brainstorming session. There is also a text notes facility to supply additional information where necessary. You can edit them in the floating window. When exported to HTML, notes come up as hints in the browser. Although I cannot pretend I explored them all, apparently ConceptDraw MINDMAP features powerful flowcharting tools: vector drawing tools, automatic shape connectors and more for creating pro-quality flowcharts and diagrams.

As far as using the programme with children goes, I can imagine using it to introduce mind-mapping to children so that they can develop their own paper-based examples and it would be useful too in making up blank concept maps for children to fill in. However, my feeling is that this program is far too complex for my children to use. My Year 6 children are very good at ICT but the skills needed for this programme are advanced and many of the features are too complicated for their use. They and their teachers would need a far simpler tool.

I tried to remain as objective as possible when reviewing this software and am very aware that my judgement may be clouded due to many years’ experience using another mind-mapping programme but, in my view, this software is far more complex than I or my children would ever need but recognise that this is a powerful piece of software that could be a useful tool for older children and their teachers.

Whilst on the TES forums, I came across this site – The TES FAQ.

The author of this site has collected a bunch of the most frequently asked questions on the forums, and created a website with answers to these questions. This is a really handy site and covers questions about, among other things: applying for jobs, changing age phase, induction, maternity rights, Ofsted and pay queries. The A-Z index lists all the questions covered by the site.

Well worth a look if you are a student teacher or an NQT and have questions about future work.

Over the last week or so I’ve been trying out a number of
different Report Writing programs to try and find the best software for our
school. I’d like to share the details on
the software that I found to be the most useful, despite it been rejected by my school in
favour of just typing the reports up in Microsoft Word!

Report Builder was a piece of software that I came across
from a link that I was given. The
software is written by a company called ‘ApplePanic‘, which as far as I can
tell is a fairly new company. What makes
this company different is that they really seem to listen to the customer – us
the teacher! One suggestion that I made
was taken on board, and within 5 or 6 hours a new version was available to
download with it implemented. How’s that
for customer service!

Using the software is similar to other report writing
software, Report Assist by Simple Logic being the most common, in how it works with quite a few
bonus features! First of all details
about each child are put in, the name, nickname, gender, DOB, attendance
etc. You can then use the statement
banks to write the subject entries for each child. Two or more children need similar comments? Highlight the children’s names and enter the
comments and it get entered for each child. Any pronouns are automatically altered to cater for the gender.

One of the great features I like is the smart cut and
paste. Cut a comment from one child’s
report and paste it into another and the name changes plus the pronouns. This makes cutting and pasting comments easy
without that awful nagging doubt that you forgot to change Richard into a ‘he’!

The collection of comments in the comment bank is
sufficiently large to use straight away, but as usual can be added to using the
simple subject editor. Schools often do
this as a whole during a staff meeting. Each foundation comment banks is divided into QCA units (what a great
idea) and then subdivided into excellent, good, average and below average. For literacy and numeracy you can pick the
comments based on the child’s level, all the way down to P statements.

At the moment there are a limited number of report styles,
but ApplePanic are actively encouraging schools to send in their report layout so
that they can widen the number of styles available. Currently ReportBuilder prints out a cover
sheet followed by the report and finally the attendance data and reply
slip. If you wish you can also have a
sheet with test results. My suggestion
to put the attendance data on the front sheet was received and implemented in a
new download with 5 – 6 hours as mentioned above.

The updates is another area where I think Report Builder can
prosper above some of the other software available at the moment – once you
have bought the software you have free updates for the life of the
product. You don’t have to purchase a
new version of the software each year to fix bugs, it’s free updates. A simple matter of clicking the Update?
button, or even better allow it to run automatically. 

Other features I liked included the backup options, which is
also used to move the data between computers and the easy way to export your
options so as to allow all the teachers in the class to have the same set-up
whichever computer they use. It is also
possible to set a limit on the number of characters for each subject comment so
you can limit those NQTs who write reams for each child!

The future is bright for Report Builder as well.  A conversation with one of the creators on led to some ‘future’ features being disclosed, the most significant being the ‘Report Server’.   This free add-on is due to go into beta during the summer.  It will allow you to keep reports
and pupil info in a central location – like on one of the school
computers. You will be able to access this using the schools network or
across the Internet. 

Of course using the add-on will be entirely optional, so you could use
ReportBuilder as-is, or just put the location of the server in your
settings to enable "client" mode. The Backup and Restore icons will
then change from memory cards to some other graphic yet to be decided.

Other updates are also planned to
ReportBuilder; enhancing the help and adding features people request
via the forum, fixing any problems people may find, etc.

There are many other features built into the program and I
think the only way that you can really make a choice on a program like this is
to try it. There is a free download at
the ApplePanic website allowing you to try out the software. If you’re planning to buy software to write
your reports this year then I suggest you seriously check out Report Builder
and compare the features and customer support with others.

Now if only I could convince our head to let us use a
program like this. Oh well I’ll try
again next year!

Link: Report Builder : http://www.applepanic.com/reportbuilder.html

Today I’ve received a copy of Microsoft ‘Classroom assistance for Learners and teachers.’   This two CD pack contains ‘Learning Essentials’ and the ‘Best of Innovative Teachers’.

According to the website Learning Essentials "helps students get started, stay organised, and successfully complete
high-quality assignments. Learning Essentials can help educators easily
create effective instructional resources, complete administrative
tasks, and implement new teaching strategies and with the Content
Development Kit, you can create even more templates and tools to use
with Learning Essentials."

Included on the CD, (or in the free download) there is a big collection of templates (although most of them are more for secondary teachers) including handwriting sheets, graph paper, certificates,  multiplication tables and student awards.  One of the more interesting and useful templates is for making tests for the children.  This allows you to quickly set up a quiz / test using common types of question such as true / false, multiple choice, short answer, missing word etc.  All you need to do then is type in the question.

The second CD, the ‘best of Innovative teachers’ is a smaller version of the Innovative teachers microsite at Microsoft.  All the activities and resources are for British schools rather than American.  There are very few primary resources included on the CD.  Maths has a number patterns PowerPoint, Literacy has a nursery rhymes and fun with words activity and there are a few general KS2 / 3 resources.  All of these, plus many others can be downloaded from the website will a little searching though.  This CD is obviously more use for the secondary teachers.

As a free resource it can’t be knocked and I’ll certainly be using some of the templates to help me, especially the graph paper ones which I can edit, it’s just a pity there isn’t more primary friendly resources on the CD.  Have a look and download what you need.

At last I’ve had time to get together a review of the Labours of Heracles by Gareth Pritchard!

Last weekend I downloaded a copy of
Primary Extra’s new pack – The
Labours of Heracles.  I’ve used the story of
Heracles (or Hercules if you’re Roman) a number of times in the
past, often using the cartoon version from Greek
Myths for Young Children by Marcia Williams.

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I came across the Teachers TV video library the other day – there is an impressive collection of all kinds of different types of videos that are all free to watch online. Use the search tool to find videos in either the Primary, Secondary or General Zones. Some videos are just 1 minute long, other videos last around 15 minutes.

The ‘Teachers’ Trade Secrets’ videos are accessible by just pressing ‘Go’ on the search menu without selecting a specific search criteria. These videos are great 1 minute tips from teachers on areas such as:

• Managing assemblies
• Using a class mascot
• Times table raps
• Learning vocabulary

The Primary section of the videos library (accessible by searching just for videos under the ‘Primary Zone’) contain a huge range of videos on teaching primary subjects and information and advice on areas such as behaviour management and settling in as an NQT. Here are just a few of them:

• Early Years – The outdoor environment
• KS1 Numeracy – Teaching Place Value
• KS2 Literacy – Boys’ writing 1
• Primary ICT – Whiteboard top tips

All in all there are just under 600 videos to choose from on this site, 160 of them are in the Primary Zone. They are well worth a view and great if you want to just sit back and watch.