Enhancing Staff Communications

Overview
Morna Matthews teaches at Harrysmuir Primary School in Livingston, West Lothian. She was enthused about the potential of Glow following some introductory training, and as the staff in the school were already keen to enhance their communication and collaboration, Morna decided to create a Glow Group to both enable this and introduce the rest of the staff to Glow. Hear Morna tell us more about this in the following video clip:

Morna Matthews: Reasons for creating the Staffroom Glow Group (0:26)

Context
The Staffroom Glow Group in Harrysmuir Primary contains all of the information that the staff may require in order to carry out their daily tasks. By putting all of this content on to Glow, Morna and Headteacher Susan Mackenzie, hoped that it would become habitual for staff to log on to Glow as their first activity each morning, to get the latest news for the day, check their email and access any other resources and information they might need.

Since Glow is also accessible from outwith school, it means that staff have access to all of this from home too, should they require it.

To make it easy for staff to access the Staffroom Glow Group, there is a link to it at the top of the Staff Home Page.

There is a wealth of information within each page of the Staffroom Group. The Group aids communication and collaboration by giving all staff equal access to the most current versions of policy documents and resources, and enables them to keep up to date with the latest school news. Staff know that if ever they need anything, it can be found on Glow and so now look in the Staffroom Glow Group first before asking where something might be. Amongst many other things, the Group contains:

Weekly Diary and Yearly Calendar
The What’s On web part on the Noticeboard page has been renamed currently as ‘Calendar 2009-2010’ and is used by the Headteacher to post at the start of each week, the weekly diary.

This includes information such as which staff are out of school, visitors coming to the school, training courses being attended, class observations, etc. It keeps all staff informed about all activities within the school and replaces the previously used white board in the staffroom.

There is also a separate page containing a calendar which is populated at the start of the session with all school events for the coming year. Updates are added throughout the year as required.

Announcements
All staff contribute to the Announcements web part, which has been renamed as ‘Harrysmuir Noticeboard’, often adding information about the topic their class is currently working on. It enables teachers to ask for help in sourcing resources from the whole staff community – such as used stamps for a class learning about The Post Office.

Documents, Resources and Timetables
Various document stores have been created within the Glow Group, holding:
• Up-to-date versions of documents that staff might need to refer to, such as Health and Safety guidelines, Behaviour Management policies, and Tracking & Monitoring documents.
• Documents relating to the curricular areas.
• Minutes of staff meetings.
• Class forward plans
• Timetables

Discussion Board
Here, staff can talk about any school issues, and get advice and support from colleagues.

Planning
There is currently a focus in the school on planning and so there is a page in the Glow Group dedicated to this. On this page there is a Document Store into which teachers
upload their Forward Plans. This gives everyone visibility of these, including the Headteacher.
There is also a separate Document Store containing planning templates.

Development Focus
The Headteacher is keen that all staff have ready access to all information relating to developments and school action plans, so a page has been created called ‘Focus On’. At present, this contains information about the actions the school will be working on as part of their reflections following an in-house review.

Staff Social information
There is also a page within the Glow Group with information about staff social events – including photos of staff nights out. This is definitely to be kept within a staff-only Group!

In this cookbook, we will look at
• The Staffroom Glow Group
• How to add all staff as members
• How to add and edit pages
• How to create multiple document stores

Ingredients
What did Harrysmuir Primary need to do to develop their Staffroom Glow Group?
• Create a Glow Group at school level
• Add only all staff as members of the Group
• Rename and add pages
• Create multiple document stores

In the following videos, we will take a look at the Staffroom Glow Group and then find out how to replicate some of its structure and content.

What does the Harrysmuir Staffroom Glow Group look like? (7:33)

How to create multiple document stores (5:57)

Impact
The use of the Staffroom Glow Group has meant that all staff have ready access to the same, and most importantly, most current versions of information, documents and resources. Everyone knows where to access the information they are looking for and they have access to it at any time, from any location, including from home. This helps staff who wish to do preparation and planning from home, as they have access to documents and resources that previously they would have only had access to on the school network. Staff no longer have to copy documents and resources onto memory sticks, or email them to themselves. Similarly, they can avoid carrying paper copies to and from school. On a similar note, the need to produce paper copies of documents has been reduced, which has had a positive impact upon the school budget.

The Group also allows all staff to know exactly what is happening in the school, through use of the Noticeboard page where staff share information on the topics their class are currently working on, and through the sharing of Forward Plans on the Planning page. This is also achieved through effect use of the What’s On/Calendars within the Glow Group.

Morna Matthews talks more about the Group and its impact in the following video:

Impact and Benefits of the Staffroom Glow Group (1:06)

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