morag.macdonald

As part of our paired maths in P2, parents and grandparents are invited in to play maths games with the children once a week in class. I decided to utilise the interactive whiteboard for a tens and units game. The first volunteer to help the children was a grandad who soon got to grips with this new technology and was very impressed.

Used the Activote pods which I have on loan for the first time. Children loved it and although we had a few technical difficulties with some pods not registering sometimes it has great potential. I used an example maths file from the Promethean software and have since been looking for other examples on Promethean Planet. My next task will be to make up my own files.

I have been back finishing the free tutorial for Level 1 on the Promethean website. My only gripe is that if you make a mistake on 1 question in the assessment you have to redo the entire assessment-  I still find the difference between the Mac and PC interface a bit problematic but I shall plod on.

Returned to school today to see the shiny new Promethean boards. Unfortunately old lathe and plaster does not hold up a board and a big projector arm, so not every board could be set up!  The best laid plans and all that……

We have a mixture of Smart and Promethean boards so a bit of swapping about will be required…glad to have spent a bit of time looking at the SmartBoard with Sat yesterday.

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Just got back from the 2 day Glow Mentor conference at Inveraray. As ever these occasions provide the opportunity, not only to hear about the latest happenings in the ICT world, but also the chance to catch up with or get to know better the other mentors. I particularly enjoyed learning more about the Promethean software and finding out what happens at Bowmore Pre-5 unit on Islay. I got the chance to see an e-Beam in action and picked up a few hints and tips along the way.

I would like to recommend Sparklebox which contains a wealth of ready-made resources, many of which are free. These would be of use to Pre-5 and infant staff. It contains some Smart Notebook files as well as Promethean flipcharts. Some Beebot and Pixie resources have also been provided. Dive in and have a look- guaranteed you will be there for a while.

Tomorrow I will begin to set up a garden centre in my house corner. I have on loan from Tighnabruaich At the garden centre from Granada learning which is part of a great series of ICT/role play software. I will also get the children to use the digital camera to photograph plants and flowers as well as try out the digital microscope to take a closer look at seeds and plants. I found it in a cupboard last week so think I shall be the first to use it.
I have been printing off resources to laminate and was annoyed once again to have run out of ink. I use an Epson Stylus CX6600 ( my own printer) and only use genuine cartridges as I was having printing problems with the compatibles. Just how many copies should I expect….does anyone know?