Hi all,
As the children may have told you I have
managed to set the children up with individual accounts to HWB+ which is an on
line learning platform created by the Welsh Assembly government. It has some of
the highest security settings on the internet so is perfect for us as a school
to share information and work collaboratively online in a safe environment.
At present I have just introduced the
children to three aspect of the platform
- Our class page - which we will look to
develop over the coming weeks, it can be used for us to discuss work through
blogging and discussions.
- j2e - these are online apps that can be
used for a range of things including coding and making websites - I have
invited the children to have a play around with these and let me know what they
find out and we can teach each other about the apps (there are video
demonstrations to explain what each application does.)
- the main focus of the platform for us at
the moment will be to use the Office 365 platform. This provides the children
with their own outlook email address and use of the office applications for
free. Using the storage system in One Drive it will allow the children to store
and share work with each other.
They have all managed to sign into their
new accounts and sent me an email. I would now like them to request that they
can join the class group 'Eryri' This way I will be able to send them group
emails and we can also have class discussions if they are needed. I am hoping
to share a document with the children (a maths activity analysing pie charts)
for them to look at as part of their homework. They can either have a go at
completing the document online or if you are able perhaps print out the
document and write on the sheet. This won't need to be submitted until the end
of next week so if there are problems accessing it we can sort it out on
Monday.
Enterprise Troopers - The other main
reason I wanted to get the platform up and running this week is to allow the
children to collaborate with each other as we work towards selling our
products. The children may have told you that we have been selected to enter
the regional finals for the competition, meaning one team will be selected to
represent the school after half term. If the children would like to converse
with each other using their email address' this would be good evidence to show
that the groups are working together in their own time (which I know lots have
already been doing) but it would be great to show that we are using another
Welsh Assembly Government initiative, as the project is organised by them as
well.
I did say that teams can create their own
business groups so they can converse with their team as a private group but I
asked if they could copy me into the group so I can monitor their
discussions.
I hope everyone can find the time to log
on and send me an email requesting to join the group so that I can set it up
and share the maths activity (it will also allow the children to see each other’s
email addresses) I will be offline until tomorrow afternoon but I will log on
to check if anybody has been able to respond.
I have also stressed to the children that
as it is a school and learning based platform that I expect correct grammar to
be used at all times during emails and discussions and they are not to use
abbreviated text type or any slang that they might use when sending a text or
during other areas of online communication. However they may use the smiley
face 'emojis' at the end of messages if they wish.
Due to the security features of the
platform they are unable to access their Office 365 account through Microsoft's
own site - they must log on through HWB.
The government have designed the platform
in hope that the children's accounts could follow them all the way through
their schooling, as they have unlimited storage on One Drive for any documents
they wish to share or save.
It will be a learning process for the
children and we will work together to see what uses we can gain from the
platform as a learning tool, particularly in preparing the children for their
transition to high school, where some teachers may wish for work to be
submitted electronically.
As I said I will be offline until tomorrow
afternoon but if anybody has any difficulty logging on please send me an email
to my HWB account - ballj23@hwbmail.net and I will try to resolve it with
you but if not we can look at it on Monday.
Sorry for the lengthy message but I just
wanted to give you as much information as possible about the platform as I am
sure you are aware that any form of online activity needs to be handled
cautiously but if you do have any questions please let me know.
Enterprise Troopers
The children have been fantastic in the
work they have put into the project up until now and I have pencilled in next
Friday afternoon (5th February) for us to hold an opening sales event during
the afternoon. I will confirm this on Monday but if you are able to
provisionally book some time on Friday afternoon to visit the children and buy
something from their stall that would be great.
The children thought that they should just
open their initial sale to just friends and family but also allow infant
children to come if they wish.
They wanted to not invite junior classes
on Friday as they plan to hold additional sales events during playtime which
would attract further sales from the juniors.
Some children are wishing to use a
business loan of £5 from the school. If they have sourced their product on line
then they may send me a link to where it is being sold (I have an Ebay and an
Amazon account) then they may send me the link so I can order it for them on
behalf of the school.
Have a great weekend and I look forward to
reading some messages if the children if they have time to log on :)
Mr Ball
