The Glow school day
It’s Wednesday morning in the first weeks of the new spring term - pupils and teachers are arriving at our West Lothian secondary school.
Early in the library
Three S1 boys go straight to the school library, and bag their favourite computers. They’re using the internet to research alternative energy sources, for a project their science teacher set up for them at the start of term.
One of the boys asked his teacher if they could find out what other young people think about alternative energy. It was easy enough to get the answers – the teacher used Glow to create a discussion on the intranet, attracting six different schools in the local authority area.
Pupils use the discussion to share thoughts, ideas and information on everything from wind farms to clockwork radios - even though they’ve never met.
Emails from the staff room
Three teachers and a classroom assistant are already at work.
One is balancing a laptop on her knees, writing a feedback email to her Curriculum for Excellence review group. The email’s about proposed changes to the English curriculum, and she’s excited about the long-overdue focus on the assessment of oral English.
Marking homework before the bell
Two others are marking homework - minus the usual pile of tatty looking exercise books. Instead, they’re working through homework which pupils completed on the Glow virtual learning environment.
One teacher is simply reading the results of tests automatically marked by the system. The other is writing comments and entering them in the markbook, these are then automatically returned to the children. With this system, there are no more back-breaking runs between home, the staffroom and class with piles of heavy books.
The school office
The headteacher’s secretary is using the intranet to update today’s calendar for the whole school. (The changes also appear on the flat screen which greets all visitors to the school.)
She then drafts a news item to all senior staff about a healthy eating initiative the headteacher is keen on. It takes less than two minutes to draft and distribute to the senior management team, who will pick it up when they log on.
Lesson catch-ups and tests in the library
Boys and girls from all year groups are working on their own at desks and computers.
One S5 girl is catching up on a lesson she missed earlier in the week – the entire lesson was created by her teacher in the Glow virtual learning environment. (Anyone in the class can revisit the lesson until the teacher decides to remove it).
An S3 boy is doing a French test - staring at the screen hoping that he’ll remember if “vacance” is masculine or feminine before he clicks the relevant box.
Video conferencing in class
In a classroom along the corridor, a small French class is gathered around a video conferencing suite. They’ve invited a class from a Lycée in Angoulême into Glow as guests, giving them guest accounts and access to a wide range of Glow tools - including videoconferencing.
That means the opportunity for pupils in both countries to practice their language skills. However, it also offers the chance to share other parts of Glow - such as creating messages boards and sharing lessons.
Lunchtime
Everywhere in the school, pupils and staff use tools on the intranet – and all the staffroom computers are busy. The head of PE is publishing team lists - and the trainee maths teacher talks online to her university tutor about a class she was observed on the day before.
Targeting the message
After lunch, the school librarian uses the portal to publicise the latest additions to the library. The technology allows him to target each year group with their own message. This has seen an upsurge in borrowing new books from the library.
He’s also seen a similar pattern with staff - and more subject teachers are requesting new titles than in the days before the national intranet. It certainly saves time on research, and makes sure the library stock really reflects the work going on in class.
The librarian also takes part in a threaded discussion on managing the use of computers in library spaces; this takes place on the interest group created within the intranet for all Scottish school librarians.
After school
There’s the traditional rush for the school gates, but for other pupils there’s a chance to use the new technology once more. From completing homework to sharing ideas, and from catching up on missed lessons to carrying out their own learning, almost anything is possible.