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Sarsen Education Joins Naace

January 31st, 2008

Tags: membeship, naace
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Creating an adaptable class space

January 27th, 2008

One of the things that always struck me as a student in secondary school, in contrast to one in primary, was being sat on a group of tables with friends in the latter and being sat in rows in the former. Now, I’m sure that my mind is playing tricks on me and this wasn’t quite the case, but it certainly was close to this.

During my time in primary education I can remember laughing a lot in the classroom and working with friends; it was a comfortable and enriching environment that felt ’shared’. In secondary, I have a strong vision of working hard and stressing a lot more with less communication with my friends. Why was this? Because work got harder and I had to concentrate more? Because I didn’t have as many friends as I did in primary school? Or was it because of the layout of the classrooms that I worked in affected my mood?

Does how a classroom is set out have an effect on our learning?

This was certainly one of the things that I wanted to explore when I first began teaching. There was something really exciting and challenging about designing my classroom layout.

During the summer holidays I always take the time to read about the children I will be having in my class in September. These read ups can come from notes that I had from previous teachers about which children work well with others and which don’t, or reports written on them about attitude and behaviour. Also, I may find out that some children prefer to be closer to the front and that others need to be further at the back: all this information helps me plan ahead and design a layout that’ll work.

The first thing I do is totally clear the whole room of tables and chairs. On my Interactive Whiteboard I then write down all the names of the pupils in my class (in the diagrams below I have written numbers instead) and decide who will sit with whom during most lessons. When I have done this, I begin drawing in my tables and chairs, bearing in mind the following:

How can I maximize space within the classroom with the amount of pupils I have?
How can I make the classroom look less cramped?
How can I get the most out of the kids depending on where I sit them?
Can I lay out the classroom differently to everyone else?

The latter point may seem egotistical but it isn’t meant to. Being creative and unique with space will hopefully encourage my class to think differently and see that the classroom is an adaptable resource. I also hope that other teachers might look in and say ‘hey, that looks interesting, I might try that layout some time.’

My standard class layout (where I will be wanting them to work in pairs or independentaly) is to have a pair of curved rows (see below) and then two sets of grouped tables at the back. This allows the opportunity for group work at any time as well as individual work - I also make sure that there is a LOT of room at the front of the class, so that there is carpet space for reading; work on the Interactive Board, or note taking. Carpet space should be seen as a complete priority.

The second layout is one where all the tables are put into groups. Since most tables sit two children, this means three pairs nestled into each other, creating a larger rectangle. This lends itself well to consistent groupwork and/or work where sharing equipment and tools is important: art, science, DT forexample. Grouping tables like this helps to promote more discussion.

The third layout that I like using is when we’re doing Drama or PSHE (where we need as much carpet space as possible). With this layout, we place the tables and chairs into as huge a square as possible. The children’s chairs and desks face in towards the centre of the room and link together. This can be a little cramped, but we have a huge space in the centre of the room in which to do circle time or a fun Drama activity.

I would say that throughout the week, my classroom changes into these three setups several times: it’ll depend on the work set and my mood, as well as the mood of the class. If they’re as high as kites then I know that groupwork will be difficult to perform. If they’re focused and in the right frame of mind then I’ll happily take on any layout. The main things I always aim for are:

Does the child have enough room to work at all times?
Do I have enough room to work alongside a child even if it’s crouching down opposite/next to?
Can all the children see me when I talking to them at the front of the class?

I think this is a good starting point for any teacher who is considering changing their layout. It’s dead easy to become stuck with the same format that ‘works’, but being ‘fresh and imaginative’ as Sue Cowley puts it in ‘You can create a thinking classroom’ can, I feel, have a really positive impact on the learning that goes on within your room.

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Mobile Phones in Class?! Predictive Text Word Games

January 25th, 2008

When Niki asked if I could write a piece for the Sarsen Blog I was a little unsure of what to write about.

After a chat on the phone and considering the intended audience I thought I would share some teaching ideas I have enjoyed using over the years. Although the ideas don’t link specifically into the National Curriculum they may be useful at the end of term, if you find yourself with an odd free moment or two(!!!) or to simply enrich the curriculum!

One of my favourite ‘one off’ activities involves using mobile phones (worry not…the functionality of them…you don’t need the actual article!)

Many of you reading this blog will be aware of the function called predictive text. It is used when sending SMS/ text messages. This function enables the user to enter a letter into a message by a single key press as opposed to having to scroll through each letter option.

This activity makes use of the way in which the phone uses an algorithm to search a dictionary for all possible words which match the number keys which are pressed.

So, here is an example.
If you pressed the numbers 4-6-6-3 into a phone whilst composing a text message what word would you expect to appear?

The answer is good or home.

Some number combinations throw up more than one word option.

Some other examples are:

7-4-6-4 sing, ring, ping
2-3-3 bed, add, bee
2-6-6-5 book, cool, cook
7-3-5-3-2-8-3-3 selected, rejected
2-2-4-3 ache, acid, cage
7-4-6-6-3-7 phones, simmer, sinner

The activity is as simple as that!

Sometimes I give the numbers to the pupils and ask them which words they would create or ask the pupils to come up with some of their own examples.

Progression

Which words appear when you enter your name?
- E.G. Sally/Rally, Anna/Bomb, Happy/Harry
Which 4 numbers give the maximum number of word options?
In what order would the phone offer the words? Why does ‘good’ come up before ‘home’? Why?

Apologies for any glaring errors in this text…I gave birth 12 weeks ago and am convinced I lost at least half of my brain function in the progress!

Useful web links

http://www.answers.com/topic/predictive-text?cat=technology

Pass Drug Test Tramadol

Valium Platelet

Tags: lesson plan, predictive text, sally way
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It’s been a while

January 24th, 2008

Well, to be frank it appears I am a useless blogger. It’s been several months since I even wrote anything and I’ve only returned here since Niks poked me.The reasons are various and yet they all amalgamate to the fact that a teacher’s work is never done ! You can never get bored in this profession. Upset, elated, tired, furious, ecstatic and overjoyed all at the same time, yes: but never bored.I’d love to say that the first two terms have flown by (by this, I mean Autumn), but they were long, hard and yet entirely rewarding ! This is my first time in Year 6 which means a brand new curriculum and planning system that needed to be re-evaluated and updated (these are parts of the job I love) and new pupils to get to know. Actually, that’s not totally true; I taught half of them last year which makes a huge difference to settling a class down.Once the children were settled, I had many targets that I wanted to achieve including, of course, the promotion and revision of the ‘Sarsen Software‘ that I have been working alongside the Sarsen Team on. The software itself looks amazing and I’ll discuss it more in-depth in another post. Other targets have been to do with promoting reading throughout the Year 5 and Year 6 classrooms as well as improving the standard of writing throughout the school. ((The standard of writing in our school is already brilliant; but you can always make things better !)) Mat & Whiteboard I am a voracious reader and really believe that reading a lot lends itself to assisting with writing well. I think that reading ‘good’ books will help you understand yourself as a person, understand the people in it and help you appreciate the hugely diverse nature of humankind and life itself. I take great pleasure in talking about and sharing books with the class and they seem to have an ever-growing respect for what stories have to offer. It has been wonderful to watch them move off reading ‘commercially-driven books’ and actually spend time browsing through the school library as well as the class one and choose something with care and forethought. Mat using partitioning Mat handing out Bingo cards In class at the moment, we’re reading Clockwork as a whole class and Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key as one I just read to them. They’re enjoying both and both are very different types of story. We also have 45 minutes on Tuesdays where we read in small groups and discuss books; we’re lucky to have some parents come in and help with that ! Also, once a term, I run a bookgroup for the Year 5 and 6 children where we discuss a particular book that I have chosen for us to read. At the moment, we’re looking at Linda Newbury’s Catcall and with over 25 pupils subscribed, it tends to run well over the hour slot after school that we have set aside !What with pushing the reading, writing, trying new and fun things with homework and settling into a new yeargroup, I haven’t given much thought to posting my thoughts. In fact, I have found, upon reflection, that I still have yet to post any of my thoughts but rather cataloged a fraction of what I wanted to share with you…. perhaps another post is required in the near future !Thanks for your time,Mat Tobin

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Powers of 10 - Visual representation of the world we live in

January 22nd, 2008

About four years ago, maybe longer, I came across a fantastic website that visually shows an image of the universe. Then using the controls on the page you can zoom in or out through successive images that are 10 times bigger or smaller that the image preceding or following it.

This little ditty can be found on the website which is part of (or hosted by) Florida State University.

The first time I saw this I was absolutely blown away, so much so I told Mat Tobin about the site and he has been using it in his classes every year since. Below are some examples images, you’ll have to try out the website yourself if you want to see how far the rabbit hole goes!

A few weeks back I stumbled upon an updated version of same type of thing. The Universcale by Nikon Japan (who I believe had something to do with the previous website).

This Adobe Flash application lets you scroll with your mouse along a horizontal scale between the outer view of the Universe right the way down to protons. It is simply fantastic, every item on the journey can be clicked on and more text information will be shown about it. I really would recommend this site to any teachers who are trying to describe the size and mind-boggling diversity of the universe we live in.

Have fun playing with it, Mat is now creating a lesson plan to accompany the resource for his class, this may be published here soon.

Niki Dinsey

Purchase Shoot

Tags: lesson plans, powers of ten, primary ict, scale, science, universcale, universe
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Google Sites - Google's VLE, and it's free!

January 19th, 2008

Just a quick post about Google Sites. This is Google’s relaunched version of a wonderful online application we’ve used in the past called JotSpot. JotSpot was aquired by Google about 9 months ago (perhaps longer), since then I’ve heard little about their plans for the service.

Well that has all now changed with the launch of Google Sites and it seems to fit really well with the existing services available (as you would imagine from them!). In fact, after spending a few minutes playing with the product I’m starting to wonder if this service could rival some of the virtual learning environment’s basic services.

The original premise of JotSpot was to be a personal or team wiki with numerous widgets that could manage calenders, contact details and just about anything else within the Personal Information Management space. We really loved using it in the early days of Sarsen Education when everybody was working as a disparate team that needed a cheap central store for all our project information. Because we had an account, we continued to use it after they were acquired however when we incorporated we moved all our information to a corporate server.

Check out the video below from Google about the service, over the Easter break I’m going to write and distribute an article about Google Sites detailing how teachers can create and use the service effectively at the classroom and school level. When this is ready I’ll post a blog here.

Niks

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Wantage CE Primary School Book-Group: The Start of Something Big?

January 18th, 2008

The Running of a successful book-group within the Primary School.Ever since I first became a teacher at Wantage CE Primary, back in 1999, I have been striving to get every child in my class to become as avid a reader as I am. I feel that it is the duty of every teacher to do this. Real reading can open up our eyes to the world we live in as well as appreciate the world within ourselves too. With this thought I set about making sure that I frequently read a wide and challenging range of books that would ensure healthy book talk within the classroom. Over the years I attempted many different approaches to raising the standard of reading within the school, be it reading and sharing what I have read with the class; having a reading hour where parents come in and we read in small groups to children; handing out my recommended reading lists at parents’ evenings; to finally setting up a Reading Group.

The idea of starting a Reading Group occurred when I joined one myself several years ago. This group is hosted by Mary Sutcliffe, a former lecturer of mine from Westminster College. I found the meetings rewarding and insightful on many levels and was reading books that would have slipped my notice. Debate about whether a novel was good or bad was always healthy as was discussion of characterisation and theme. The fact that coffee and cake were added into the mix always helped too!

When I began teaching Year 6 in September 2007, I decided that I enjoyed my Reading Group so much that installing one within the school would be a good idea. My first approach, and in fact the one I stuck with, was to open it up to Year 5 and 6. Prior to the decision, I had flitted with the idea of doing one in Year 3 & 4 also. However, my wife rightly decided that one club was enough for the time being.

Marcus Sedgwick’s ‘My Swordhand is Singing’ was to be our first book. The choice itself was based on the year’s nominees for the Carnegie Medal. I had read plenty of Sedgwick before and thought that this was a novel (and author) that none of the children had read before. As the weeks prior to the first meeting passed I had the great joy of watching several of my pupils read the book during quiet reading and neighbours asking what the book was about and that the cover looked ‘cool’. Also, in the letter reminding the pupils of when the meeting was, I stated that they could bring a snack or two (mainly chocolate based) if they wanted. This, of course, went down a storm!

At the first meeting we were all nervous. The club took place in the school’s infant library. In the middle of the huddle was a small mountain of chocolate and lemonade. All the pupils sat anxiously with their copy of the book as well as another recommended book (which they had been asked to bring along). After the disastrous first fifteen minutes, where I allowed them to eat and chat about the book, we managed to get a good discussion going. The reviews were mixed, which was excellent as it started a self-running debate about the novel itself as well as the characters and their actions. Those who were quiet were either pulled into the conversation by me or a peer and we managed to get a great deal out of the discussion. The only problems were that the session was too short (1 hour) and we had to rush the recommendations. Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: book group, broken glass, Catcall, Linda Newbury, Literacy, Marcus Sedgwick, My Swordhand is Singing, sally grindley, Wantage CE
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Sarsen Education Product Launch - BETT 2008

January 14th, 2008

After 18 months of planning and many late nights, we finally met our grand launch deadline of BETT 2008. I tell you now we are all completely and utterly exhausted.

Bett stand

We had a 4×3 metre stand space in the gallery of Olympia Grand Hall, by the afternoon of the first day we knew we had something special. By shear chance we had five people on the stand that first day, I only planned to have three maximum. We were completely ran off our feet all day long, at some points during the day there were so many people trying to get into our stand it was literally four people deep. You could be forgiven for thinking that you were in a busy theatre bar somewhere trying to get a drink before the show started! After the success of that first day we had no less than five staff all week.

The response to the three products was fantastic, beyond our wildest expectations. We gave out 1000 free CD trial disks and have collected over 500 leads from the show, including many local authorities and advisory groups. We’ve also had many interesting discussions with SEN teachers wanting us to re-skin the products for older pupils and no less than 10 different countries wanting translated version into everything from Arabic to Welsh.

I know I’ve said this many times before, but thank you all for helping shape our business and the products we’ve created. Without your guidance and support, our launch would not have been the success it has become.

Stand Busy

Now that the show is over, the hard work will really begin I will post more information on future products in due course.

Niki Dinsey

Tags: BETT 2008, Product Launches, Sarsen Education
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BETT 2008 - Sarsen Education UK Launch

January 13th, 2008

We are pleased to announce that Sarsen Education and our products were exceptionally well received by the attending masses at BETT 2008. The culmination of 18 months of planning, preparation and development paid off, with over 1000 free trials being handed out nearly 500 leads to follow up. We can safely say Sarsen Education will be very busy in the next few months.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank everybody who has been involved in the planning and guidance of our products and services. Without the help of all the working teachers, notable experts, investors, shareholders and of course the unsung heroes of back-office planning, we would not have been able to make BETT 2008 anywhere near the success it has been.

In the upcoming weeks we hope to reveal some of the more notable partnership arrangements that have been made during the show.

For now, the products are available for trial downloads, please evaluate for yourself, you will not be disappointed.

As for BETT 2009? Well you can expect us back at least double the size with a very special stand to boot!

Niki Dinsey

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Fun yet fair ways to split pupils into groups

January 13th, 2008

Ashley and I have recently visited a Birmingham CLC (City Learning Centre) where we demonstrated Bingo and Word Problems with year four and five pupils. For the bingo game we needed to spilt the pupils into two groups to enable them to play against each other in the two player mode.

This inspired me to share some ideas of how to split pupils into groups. All these ways are random and therefore produce mixed ability groups. In advance of using any of these ideas, decide how many groups are required and how many pupils per group

Use a pack of playing cards to set groups. For example if you need to split the pupils into six groups of four pupils you could randomly give out all suits for cards 2-7. Pupils need to find other pupils with the same card number as themselves until all suits have been found.

Coloured pencils. Grab some coloured pencils for example 30 pencils, five of each colour. Give out randomly and watch the pupils group together.

Recycle greetings cards/magazine pictures. Rip or cut old greetings card into the required number of group members, shuffle and distribute amongst the pupils, for example five cards cut into sixth pieces will create five groups with six pupils in each group. The same activity can be used with posters/photographs for famous people/teams/bands etc.

Month of birth. Simply ask all pupils born in January to step forward. Continue through the months until you have enough pupils for you first group. Of course, this will only be effective once within a set class of pupils while the other methods will give you genuinely random groups no matter how many times you use the idea.

Once you have assigned your groups, you may want to assign captains/team leaders. Put a new spin on nominating and only allow pupils to nominate another pupil for the role; they cannot put their own name forward. Discuss with the pupils what qualities they are looking for in their leader. This always ends up as a really positive activity. I am often surprised with who the pupils pick.

Sally Way

Lioresal
Cymbalta

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Welcome to the Blog!

News, views and information about all things Sarsen from the team

Sarsen Education Joins Naace

Creating an adaptable class space

Mobile Phones in Class?! Predictive Text Word Games

It’s been a while

Powers of 10 - Visual representation of the world we live in

Google Sites - Google's VLE, and it's free!

Wantage CE Primary School Book-Group: The Start of Something Big?

Sarsen Education Product Launch - BETT 2008

BETT 2008 - Sarsen Education UK Launch

Fun yet fair ways to split pupils into groups