Using Glow to support Higher Biology

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Karen Maitland is a teacher of Biology at Queensferry High School in Edinburgh. Karen is an advocate of the use of technology aimed at enhancing the learning and teaching process.

In this cookbook Karen will talk us through how she uses Glow to support the learning and teaching of Higher Biology.

Context

Through the appropriate use of technology in class, Karen has aimed to enrich the experience of her pupils during their time in the Biology Department. Through various websites and podcasts, Karen looks to provide her pupils with the opportunity to access advice, information and resources out with the barriers of the traditional school day.

With the introduction of Glow to Queensferry HS, Karen was keen to investigate how best to use the tools and functionality to further enrich the learning experiences of her pupils.

In this cookbook, we will:

• Hear Karen outline how she uses Glow to support the teaching of her Higher Biology class.

Ingredients

What Karen uses to support the teaching of her class:

1. A Glow Group
2. News web part to post learning intentions, homework information and support notes
3. XML web parts to display science feeds from the BBC, videos from YouTube and presentations from the web site slideshare
4. Web links web part
5. Discussion web part
6. Documents web part
7. A Page Viewer to give students access to BBC revision site from within the Glow Group

Recipe

In the first video below, Karen talks us through how she uses Glow to support her class teaching. The other video clips will take you through how to replicate some of the activities that Karen demonstrates in the group:

Impact

Karen is very positive about how the tools and functionality of Glow can support her teaching. Karen makes use of a number of Glow tools to add impact:

• The News web part allows Karen to publish lesson learning intentions, provide advice on projects and attach support documents for homework and project work
• The XML web part which is used to embed class presentations and videos into Glow pages which both engage the pupils in the Glow Group and provide them with further revision materials and sources of information
• Web Links web part provides a quick jump point to frequently used web sites
• Archived support materials – as the term progresses, Karen populates the document store with worksheets, homeworks, presentations and assessment materials all providing the pupils with anytime, anywhere access to resources
• Pupils submit homework and assignments for review by uploading them into the Documents store (this requires that the pupils have Contributor permissions to the Glow Group)
• A science news feed that is updated automatically giving the pupils access to up-to-the-minute sources of relevant, research information

 In making use of a variety of Glow tools, Karen has developed a Glow Group that is engaging and relevant for her pupils. The group provides an easy access point for a variety of information sources and stimulus to deeper learning.