SG Drama Glow Group. Click to enlarge.

Glenwood High School in Fife, with a roll of 860 pupils and with 90 teaching staff, has seen a significant increase in the use of Glow over the last six months. By the end of the year, around 75% of staff and pupils had active accounts and in an average week over 200 pupils were using Glow during school hours.

The cookbook, “Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School“, describes how a number of staff from different departments, have been using Glow to enhance learning and teaching.

In this cookbook we focus on the work of one teacher, Clare Todd, and how she uses Glow Groups with each of her Drama classes. In the Recipe section, video clips show how you can replicate Clare’s use of surveys for self-evaluation.

Context

In January 2011, a number of Glow training courses were run in Fife and staff from eight secondary schools were invited to attend. At Glenwood, volunteers were sought from across the school and 14 participated in the training. Most of the sessions offered were one-day Glow Basics training, which covered how to create a curricular Glow Group to support learning with a specific class. At the end of the day’s session, staff had a Glow Group ready to go and a good idea of how they wanted their pupils to use it. The aim for many of the staff was initially to upload revision documents in preparation for prelims and for pupils to be able to use discussion boards or forums to ask questions or look for help.

Homework dropbox. Click to enlarge.

Drama teacher, Clare Todd, attended the training having been put forward as the representative for her department. She comments that she “was really excited when I first heard about Glow. It was exactly what I’d been looking for.” What Clare wanted was a collaborative area where pupils could find learning resources, use forums to discuss their work, hand-in homework and use surveys to evaluate their learning. While she didn’t have the skills to create her own website, she could immediately see the potential for Glow to deliver what she was needed.

Clare first created a Drama Glow Group open to all pupils in the school. The Group showcases current work, with videos of recent trips, photos of class productions and discussion boards where pupils can post comments. All pupils can interact in this Glow Group and get excited about what they might be involved in as they progress through the school.

Clare Todd: Drama Glow Groups – part 1 (7:14) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

Next Clare created a Glow Group for each year group, with separate pages for each teaching group. This structure allows her to upload materials appropriate for each class, guiding pupils in their learning. In the Standard Grade Glow Group, for example, there are links to theatre review websites, discussion boards where questions are set for homework, and a spreadsheet where pupils assess themselves against grade-related criteria.

The Documents area of each Glow Group has proved particularly useful. Learning resources are uploaded, so that pupils have access to all the materials, such as the course handbook, from home.

As a number of colleagues in other departments have also done, Clare has created a homework web part, where pupils can submit work for review. This has proved very successful in encouraging pupils to complete their homework, and in addition it allows Clare to monitor the progress of draft pieces before final submission. Clare gives feedback either within the web part or in more detail on the pupil’s document which is then returned to them. Permissions on the web part are set so that while Clare can see everyone’s work, pupils can see only their own.

Clare Todd: Drama Glow Groups – part 2 (2:29) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

Survey questions. Click to enlarge.

Survey results. Click to enlarge.

With many of her classes Clare has used surveys for self-evaluation exercises. The surveys are quick to create, easy for the pupils to respond to and, as the data is automatically collated, pretty painless for the teacher to review. For multiple-choice type questions, such as “When working in a group, I contributed imaginative and sensible ideas”, a bar chart provides a valuable overview of the responses. For free-text questions, such as “What were your main strengths in Drama?”, the bar chart view is less useful, but viewing pupils’ individual responses provides excellent personal feedback. When first experimenting with the survey options, Clare had hoped that it would provide a means of creating vocabulary tests, but having been introduced to Glow Learn by one of her colleagues, now feels that would be a more effective tool for assessments and tracking progress.

Ingredients

For each year group Clare required:

* a Glow Group

* the relevant pupils given Contributor membership of the group

Recipe

Having created each Glow Group, Clare has added many features, such as discussion boards, video clips, surveys and a homework web part. The video clips below focus on the use of surveys and show to replicate each part of the process from creating a survey to viewing pupils’ responses. A cookbook about Clare’s colleague, Kayleigh Brown, shows how to create and use the homework web part.

* How to create a survey (4:15) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

* How to add the Survey web part to a Glow Group (1:54) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

* How to change the permissions on the Survey web part (2:37) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

* How pupils respond to a survey (1:44) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

* How to view the results of a survey (2:42) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

Impact

From the outset Clare was impressed with how Glow would support her learners and it has lived up to expectations in day-to-day usage in the classroom. She’s already looking ahead to the next stages in her own learning and progression, ready to explore the potential benefits of using the assessment and tracking facilities offered by Glow Learn.

The use of Glow at Glenwood has grown very rapidly over just a few months, not just with Drama classes. Glow is becoming well embedded in the curriculum: it’s not viewed as an adjunct, but a tool to be used, when appropriate, to enhance learning and teaching.

In the video clip below, Dave Dawson, DHT at Glenwood, explains the progress that has been made.

Dave Dawson: uptake and usage of Glow at Glenwood (1:35) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

The challenge now is to continue to develop. In the new academic year, each department has been asked to have a Glow representative and for Glow to be included in development plans.

Dave Dawson: next stages of Glow development at Glenwood (0:36) “Just what I’d been looking for…”

Glenwood High School

Glenwood High School in Fife, with a roll of 860 pupils and with 90 teaching staff, has seen a significant increase in the use of Glow over the last six months. By the end of the year, around 75% of staff and pupils had active accounts and in an average week over 200 pupils were using Glow during school hours.

This cookbook describes how a number of staff, from different departments, have been using Glow to enhance learning and teaching. The video clips and Glow Group tours show the work that has been undertaken, the pupils’ responses and the lesson learned. Additional cookbooks focus on each teacher in turn, and provide the detail of how you can replicate (or adapt) their ideas.

Context

In January 2011, a number of Glow training courses were run in Fife and staff from eight secondary schools were invited to attend. At Glenwood, volunteers were sought from across the school and 14 participated in the training. Most of the sessions offered were one-day Glow Basics training, which covered how to create a curricular Glow Group to support learning with a specific class. At the end of the day’s session, staff had a Glow Group ready to go and a good idea of how they wanted their pupils to use it. The aim for many of the staff was initially to upload revision documents in preparation for prelims and for pupils to be able to use discussion boards or forums to ask questions or look for help. As can be seen from the clips below, while these basic Glow features were used extensively, staff have also progressed on rapidly to using other tools, such as wikis, blogs and Glow Meet.

In the first clip here, Dave Dawson, DHT at Glenwood, describes the progress over the last few months:

Dave Dawson: uptake and usage of Glow at Glenwood (1:35)Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

Alison Wood

Alison Wood attended one of the training courses in January and has since used Glow with S1, S3 and Higher English classes. With her first year class she was keen to encourage pupils to tackle more challenging texts. Pupils wrote book reviews, uploaded them into a Glow Group and commented on each others’ reviews in a Glow forum. For her Higher class Alison created a Glow Group, and uploaded notes and past papers for pupils to use at home in the run up to exams. She also used surveys during lesson time for pupils to assess their own knowledge of the set texts. Viewing the survey results allowed pupils to quickly see where their responses differed from those of other pupils. This generated a very valuable class discussion where pupils could identify for themselves where they’d got work to do, and the necessity of going back to revising the text.

With third year pupils Alison has created a wiki to stimulate pupils’ interest in the background of a set text. The third years have been intrigued by the possibilities of the wikis and many have gone well beyond the initial requirements in developing their own pages.

Alison Wood: ‘Poetry and Protest’ wiki created by S3 (1:51) Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

Alison has found the ‘Daily What’ an excellent resource in encouraging pupils to read newspaper articles. She can see a lot of potential for this, and is looking forward to making more use of it in the coming year when she will have a data projector in her classroom and therefore able to use this with a whole class, rather than needing to book an ICT suite.

Alison Wood: Glow enhancing learning and teaching in English (3:32) Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

The full cookbook on Alison’s work can be found here. This includes ‘how-to’ video clips which show how to create wikis and how to make best use of the ‘Daily What’.

Clare Hunt is PTC of Business, Enterprise and Computing at Glenwood. She and her colleagues have begun to use Glow across S1-S6. With first year pupils, Glow offered an ideal place to share the work that pupils had been undertaking in class on a ‘Cyber-bullying’ project. Pupils’ presentations were uploaded to a Glow Group and discussed at home with parents and carers. In class the discussion around internet safety continued with pupils creating avatars and posting comments in a Glow forum.

Clare Hunt: S1 Cyber-Bullying presentations and discussions (1:59) Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

At the end of the year S2 classes created Vokis to record their evaluations of the Computing course. Pupils found this a highly motivating activity, and took great care over their comments, spelling and punctuation, as the Voki’s speech is only as good as the text that’s been entered! The Vokis were then posted into a Glow blog, so that pupils could see each others’ and Computing staff could hear all the feedback on the course.

Clare Hunt: S2’s Computing course evaluations (2:14)Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

The full cookbook on Clare’s work is available here. It includes ‘how-to’ video clips on using Glow forums, and on creating Vokis.

Kim Yapp teaches Modern Foreign Languages. For the last couple of years, the department has run a Culture Project at the end of first year. Pupils are asked to work in groups, create a presentation on a cultural theme and deliver the presentation to their class. Prior to the arrival of Glow in the school, the project, though very successful, presented logistical difficulties, as pupils saved their work to their own network area, which is inaccessible to the teacher or to each other. If pupils were absent, their work could not be added to the group presentation. In addition, when classes were delivering their presentations, accessing the completed group work again caused problems. Either all work needed to be saved to a single location such as a memory stick or each group in turn needed to log on and off the network. Kim was delighted to find this year that using Glow easily solved all these problems! One Glow Group was all that was needed – for pupils to upload their individual work, to save their completed group work and from which to present it to the class. There were unlooked-for benefits too – Kim could monitor progress after each lesson as the presentations were being developed, allowing her to intervene with any pupil not pulling their weight in their group – and pupils could show their work to their families.

Kim Yapp: S1 Culture Project (6:36) Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

Further details on how Kim set up her Glow Groups and ran the Culture Project are available here. This cookbook includes ‘how-to’ clips on creating and customising Glow Groups, and using a Documents web part.

Janet Rutterford

Janet Rutterford teaches English, and as a guidance teacher also has a remit for primary-secondary transition. When Glow was introduced at Glenwood earlier this year, she was interested to look at ways in which it could facilitate transition. As a first experiment, a Glow Meet session was arranged between a first year class and a P7 class at Southwood Primary. Both classes were very well prepared. The P7s drafted their questions and sent them to the high school, giving the first years time to think about their responses. The preparation proved invaluable when the day came for the Glow Meet, as no-one got stage fright in front of the web-cam and all were happy to ask and answer the questions!

On the back of the overwhelmingly enthusiastic feedback from the first year, Janet has continued to develop the transition Glow Group. Pupils generated a wide range of ideas of the content they thought would be useful for the P7s, and Janet was impressed with their skills and confidence with Glow.

Janet Rutterford: using Glow to support transition (2:27)Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

A cookbook on Janet’s transition work will be coming soon. The ‘how-to’ clips will include the basics of setting up and using Glow Meet.

Craft and Design Technology teacher, David Lumsden, attended one of the Glow Basics courses but has since concentrated on using Glow Learn. He and colleagues in his department find this ideal for classwork and class tests. They are also developing a S1 and S2 homework policy which will be entirely delivered through Glow Learn, potentially offering considerable savings in paper and duplicating costs.

David uses Glow Learn to create tests and assessments. A range of question types, including multiple-choice and short answer, can be used and most will be automatically marked. Progress records allow him to see a summary of the class’s performance on all questions. Individual pupil’s responses can also be viewed, marking reviewed and feedback given to the pupil.

David Lumsden: assessments in craft and design technology (2:37)Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

David comments that pupils’ response to Glow Learn have been very positive and the hand-in rate for tests and homework has been much higher than previously.

More information on David’s work, including ‘how-to’ video clips on Glow Learn will follow shortly.

Kayleigh Brown teaches History at Glenwood and has used Glow extensively with her fourth year class to prepare them for the Standard Grade exam. For the prelims Kayleigh has uploaded PowerPoint files and revision mind maps – resources that pupils had used in class and were familiar, but uploading them to Glow ensured that pupils had access for homework and during holidays. Kayleigh has also shared these resources with other History teachers and departments through the Fife ‘Study Support’ Glow Group.

Kayleigh Brown: Standard Grade History (6:36) Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

Kayleigh asks her pupils to submit their homework through the Glow Group. She created a ‘Upload your homework’ web part, which allows a pupil to hand in their work but not to see the work of any other pupil. Kayleigh can see all the work her pupils submit, review it, add notes to it, and give feedback. Both teacher and pupils have found this invaluable. Using a survey to gather feedback from pupils about their performance in their prelim was also a big hit with Kayleigh. The graphical summary allowed here a rapid overview of where pupils felt they needed help, and viewing individual responses allowed her to see any private concerns about their progress which pupils had expressed.

A cookbook providing more detail on Kayleigh’s Glow Group can be found here. This includes video clips showing how to create a homework web part.

Drama teacher, Clare Todd, comments that she “was really excited when I first heard about Glow. It was exactly what I’d been looking for.” Clare wanted pupils to be able to access learning resources at home, use a forum to ask questions and discuss what they’d been doing in class. She knew that she didn’t have the skills to create her own website, so Glow’s arrival in the school really enthused her. She now has a Drama Glow Group accessible to all pupils in S1-S6 to give a flavour of what classes are doing in lessons and on trips. There are also separate Glow Groups for S1, S2, Standard Grade, Higher and Advanced Higher classes.

Clare Todd: Drama Glow Groups – part 1 (7:14)Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

Clare Todd: Drama Glow Groups – part 2 (2:29) Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

Like Kayleigh, she asks pupils to submit homework and makes use of surveys for self-evaluations. She’s recently been introduced to Glow Learn by colleagues in other departments in the school and sees this as her next step, as it provides better options when asking pupils for personal responses, and will be easier to monitor and record pupils’ progress.

The cookbook describing Clare’s work in more detail can be found here. The ‘how-to’ videos show how to create and use surveys.

Next steps

Dave Dawson

The use of Glow at Glenwood has grown very rapidly over just a few months – thanks to the hard work of teaching staff and to those responsible for creating the accounts. Glow is becoming well embedded in the curriculum: it’s not viewed as an adjunct, but a tool to be used, when appropriate, to enhance learning and teaching.

The challenge now is to continue to develop. In the new academic year, each department has been asked to have a Glow representative and for Glow to be included in development plans.

Dave Dawson: next stages of Glow development at Glenwood (0:36) Glowing across the curriculum at Glenwood High School

The Topic Evaluation

Judith Lennox was P7 teacher at Coylton Primary School in South Ayrshire and is now DHT in the school. When it came to their topic work on Earth and Space, the P7 pupils at Coylton Primary School had lots of ideas about what they would like to learn about. Judith incorporated all of these ideas into the Glow Group she put together for the topic.

Judith’s Tour of the Earth and Space Glow Group Part 1 (3:40)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

Judith’s Tour of the Earth and Space Glow Group Part 2 (2:45)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

Introduction to the topic evaluation – click to enlarge

This fifth Cookbook on Judith’s Earth and Space Glow Group will focus on the use made of a survey web part in the Glow Group to evaluate the topic through giving the pupils an opportunity to express their opinions. Four further Cookbooks will look at reusing a Glow Group through a template; the use made of embedded YouTube and TeacherTube videos within the Glow Group; the use made of a wiki for pupil project work and lastly on the use of Picture Library web parts to showcase pupil work.

You will find links to the other Cookbooks on Coylton Primary’s Earth and Space Topic Glow Group below as and when they are written:

• Working with a Glow Group template for an Earth and Space Topic
• Engaging videos in an Earth and Space Glow Group at Coylton Primary
• Our Planets Wiki at Coylton Primary
• Showcasing Pupil Work in Picture Libraries

Using the Topic Evaluation – click to enlarge

Judith used a survey with the class at the end of the topic to ask them what they thought about it. It was the first time this class had used a survey and they really enjoyed this and responded well to it. They gave very full answers where they were given an opportunity to respond about what they wanted. Judith was quite surprised at the fact that they had really enjoyed things that she thought they wouldn’t have been as interested in. She was also surprised that aspects that she thought they would all love were not necessarily enjoyed equally by all pupils.

Using the survey was obviously a very valuable tool to aid Judith in her planning, both in further work with this particular class and in running the Earth and Space Topic with the next class. Consulting the pupils, through using the survey, gave them an opportunity to be involved in constructive dialogue about their own learning, an opportunity for Pupil Voice.

Ingredients

What did Judith need to do to be able to set up the Topic Evaluation in her Glow Group?

• Set up a sub-group of her P7 Glow Group for her Earth and Space Topic.
• Set the pupils up with Contributor permission of the Glow Group.
• Create a Topic Evaluation Page.
• Add a text editor web part with instructions about the survey.
• Create a Voki to introduce the survey and make the page more attractive.
• Create a survey to use for the Topic Evaluation.
• Add the survey to the Topic Evaluation page of the Glow Group.

Recipe

The following videos will demonstrate how you can recreate the same steps Judith took to set up the Topic Evaluation Survey:

How to create a survey – Part 1 (4:12)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

How to create a survey – Part 2 (5:03)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

How to add a survey to the page in your Glow Group (1:32)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

How to edit the toolbar of a survey and how pupils will respond (2:50)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

How to change the display settings of your survey (2:25)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

Impact

Judith Lennox

Judith explains how the pupils were “hooked-in” to Glow (0:29)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

Judith speaks about evaluating the topic through Glow (0:55)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

It’s good at a glance. It was interesting to see that some of the things I had assumed they had really liked, only some of them had enjoyed. Also, some things I had thought maybe weren’t as good, they had enjoyed much more than I had thought.

It certainly came across that they had really enjoyed using Glow for their topic.

Their enjoyment was really heightened and certainly their enthusiasm was caught.

Brandon on why he likes Glow (0:29)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

Brandon and Dana

Dana on why she likes Glow (0:23)
Using a survey for topic evaluation to enable pupil voice

These additional links below are to Cookbooks which also demonstrate the use of the survey web part:

Embedding Glow in daily learning and teaching

Raising attainment in literacy in Primary 3

Encouraging deeper learning: pupils creating surveys

Enabling Pupil Voice – using a Glow Survey

These additional links below are to Cookbooks which give further information about using Vokis:

Developing confident and independent learners

All Glow and no action? Pt 3 Vokis in a P6 Joint Literacy Project in Dumfries and Galloway

Burns Supper at Coylton

Judith Lennox was P7 teacher at Coylton Primary School in South Ayrshire and is now DHT in the school.

Judith Lennox

Judith explains the Burns Supper Enterprise Project at Coylton Primary (0:53)
Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

Primary 7 pupils at Coylton Primary School used a Glow Group to help in the planning of an interdisciplinary enterprise event. This event was the organising of their annual Burns Supper.

P7 pupils took responsibility for all aspects of planning this event, which involved:

• writing newsletters to parents
• inviting special guests
• selling tickets
• handling cash and cheques
• rehearsing songs, poems and dances
• writing and learning speeches
• publicising the event in the school community.

All 60 P7 pupils took on a role in organising the event, as well as having an ‘on the night’ job.

Glow Group Pages

Co-ordinating this number of pupils, from different classes, who were all completing different tasks, was made easier by the great idea of using a Glow Group for communication. This meant that pupils were able to communicate easily between the 2 classes by using various discussion boards, a moderated chat room and a Glow Meet room. The pupils made use of these both in and out of school. Using Glow enabled class teachers to oversee the planning process, whilst allowing pupils to work independently. It meant that the teachers didn’t have to keep bringing the 2 classes together and disrupting the school day. Teachers were able to answer queries as they arose and challenge pupils’ thinking by contibuting to the discussions in the Glow group.

The Coylton P7 Burns Supper

On the night, pupils chaired the event and provided high quality entertainment for their 90 guests.  After the event, pupils continued to use the Glow Group to celebrate their success. They were able to discuss their favourite memories and look at photos of the event which their teachers had uploaded.

Judith’s Tour of the Burn’s Supper Glow Group (3:14)
Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

This Cookbook will focus on the use of the Glow Group as a planning tool for the P7 classes.

Ingredients

What did Judith need to be able to allow the pupils to use Glow as a planning tool for their enterprise event?

• A Glow Group built at school level in Coylton Primary School
• Pupils from a both P7 classes set with Contributor permissions
• Use made of a general discussion board
• A Job Discussions page created
• Additional discussion boards created on this page to aid different teams of pupils in their planning
• A chat room
• A Glow Meet room
• A Page Viewer web part with the World Burns Club website
• An additional Page Viewer web part with Address to a Haggis
• A Memories page with photos and an additional discussion board for pupils to comment on the event

Recipe

Discussions in the Group

In this Cookbook we have chosen to focus on creating the Jobs Discussions page and additional discussion boards.

In the videos below you will be able to see how Judith did this.

How Judith created a new page in the Glow Group (1:47)
Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

How Judith created additional discussion web parts (2:47)

Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

How Judith added these web parts to the page (1:03)
Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

Impact

Judith explains why she wanted to use Glow for the project (0:32)
Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

Judith explains why she thinks using Glow was successful (0:49)
Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

The Burns project worked really well. The pupils were extremely enthusiastic. They had only just got their Glow log-ons and they were really keen to use Glow as much as possible. They were logging in at home quite a lot and also in school they were given a chance to log in whenever they had any free time.

The discussions worked really well. It was a good way for the pupils to collaborate without having to be in the same room as each other. Because it was 2 classes working together, it meant that we could do that without any disruption to the school day.

Brandon and Dana from P7

Brandon on why he likes Glow (0:29)
Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

Dana on why she likes Glow (0:23)
Burns Supper – Using Glow to support an Enterprise Project

Alan Jenkins

Alan Jenkins is a music teacher at St Aidan’s High School in North Lanarkshire. After receiving a small amount of training in school Alan could see that he wanted to make use of it. He wanted to use Glow to share instrumental performance videos with his pupils. Alan felt that pupils will have pieces of music demonstrated to them in school but then this moment is gone and it is difficult for the pupils to remember what to do. He feels this is an issue that Glow provides a solution for.

Guitar Course

The intention was to let all pupils hear how a piece of music should sound but also to be able to follow along with hand positions and fingering and be able to replicate this themselves at home. This is available in guitar, keyboard and drum-kit. The original films have been captured straight-on but Alan plans to film from different angles to get better views of hand position and fingering.

Some of the videos can be quite large and sometimes this causes problems when uploading and playing within Glow’s document libraries. Alan is considering using Glow wikis as a development from his current work.

This Cookbook will foucs on how Alan has started to make the instrumental performances available to St Aidan’s pupils and his tour will take you through what he has currently set up in the Glow Group. The how-to videos in the Method section will focus specifically on how to link to a document from an image in a text editor web part. There are further videos in the Impact section where Alan discusses his motivation and his future plans.

Ingredients

What did Alan need to do to allow his pupils to make use of the Instrumental Performance Videos Glow Group:

• A staff Glow account within St Aidan’s High School
• Pupils provisioned and allocated their Glow usernames and passwords
• A Glow Group created at school level
• S3 pupils set up with at least Readers with Disucssion membership of this Glow Group
• Audio and video files uploaded to folders within the document library
• Various pages with text editor web parts and images linked to the audio and video files
• A Discussion Board started to encourage pupils to ask questions about the videos and the performances
• An alert set for Alan on the Discussion Board

You will be able to see the whole Glow Group in the Virtual Tour video in the Method section below.

Discussion Board

Alan thinks that the Discussion Board is an essential part of the Instrumental Performance Glow Group. He feels it is very important for the pupils to be able to ask questions about the pieces of music that they may still have after viewing the videos and when practising themselves. Alan has an alert set for the discussion board so that he will be sent an email when a pupil asks a question even if it is during the school holidays.

Recipe

In the first video below, Alan takes you on a virtual tour of his Glow Group. The following videos will show you how to replicate what Alan has set up in his Instrumental Performance Glow Group.

Alan gives a tour of his Instrumental Performance Glow Group (7:08)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

Adding a text editor web part to the page (1:12)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

Working with a large image file by uploading it into Picture Library (1:42)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

Inserting an image into a text editor web part (1:01)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

Copying the link from the video file in the Document Store (1:04)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

Adding the link for a document into the text editor (3:57)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

Setting an alert for a discussion board (2:07)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

Impact

The following videos are interviews with Alan where he speaks about different aspects of Glow. Although this is early in St Aidan’s High School music department’s use of Glow, Alan is already getting favourable feedback from the pupils about his Glow Group.

Why Alan wanted to use Glow (1:04)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

What the pupils use Glow for (0:55)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

How the pupils have reacted to using Glow (0:52)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

The Discussion Board in Glow (0:54)
Sharing Instrumental Performance Videos at St Aidan’s High School

You may wish to visit other Cookbooks written about St Aidan’s High School:

• St Aidan’s High School Transition – Interactive School Map
• Using a wiki as an evidence store for pupil e-portfolios

Irene Stewart

Irene Stewart is a Principal Teacher of Music at Bellshill Academy in North Lanarkshire. She began using Glow quite recently, encouraged by her own son’s use of Glow in primary school. She saw the potential for her secondary pupils to be accessing materials from home and also to be able to ask questions on Discussion Boards for help with their homework. Her son’s obvious enjoyment of using Glow made her think that her pupils would be motivated by using it.

This is the second of 2 Cookbooks which will look at how Irene has started to use Glow with her Standard Grade classes but mainly with S3. This second Cookbook on Irene’s use of Glow will focus on the pupils using a wiki to upload project work for Standard Grade Music.

The first Cookbook can be found here: Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface.

Glow wiki

Glow wiki

Wikipedia describes a wiki as:

a website that allows creation and editing of any number of interlinked pages … wikis are often used collaboratively by multiple users.

Glow itself describes wikis as:

online, collaborative spaces that can be used for almost anything. From class topic work, to school working groups, wikis are extremely flexible websites with infinite uses.

wiki web part

front page of the SG Music wiki

In a Glow Group there is a separate web part you can bring in and then use it to create a wiki within your Glow Group. You can choose to have this public facing, even though it is a part of your Glow Group, or you can choose for it to have the private membership of your Glow Group.
In her Standard Grade Listening Glow Group she has created a Glow wiki to allow the pupils to upload their group project work. This also allows them to see  and comment on what other groups have uploaded. Irene was keen to use the Glow wiki so that the pupils would be able to quickly upload larger files. She was also keen that it was easy to allocate each group their own page within the wiki and yet allow them to have access to all the pages where other groups had uploaded their project work.

The project has different groups of pupils researching jazz. Each group of pupils have created a page which can be accessed from the menu at the side. They have then uploaded their presentation files and any appropriate images and audio files to go along with them.

Later, the pupils will be able to use the comment facility on each page to comment on each other’s work.

wiki group page – click on this to enlarge

Ingredients

What did Irene need to do to allow her pupils to upload their work to the Glow wiki:

• A staff Glow account within Bellshill Academy
• Her pupils provisioned and allocated their Glow usernames and passwords
• A Glow Group created at school level
• S3 pupils set up with at least contributor membership of this Glow Group
• A Glow wiki web part added
• A Glow wiki created
• The front page edited with instructions for pupils about uploading their projects
• Pages created within the wiki for each group of pupils

You will be able to see the whole Glow Group in the Virtual Tour video in the Method section below.

On the Noticeboard page there is a Glow wiki web part containing the link to the Standard Grade Music wiki. Once clicked this opens in a new window and the pupils are able to upload their projects to share with each other.

Recipe

In the first video below, Irene takes you on a virtual tour of her Glow Group. The following videos will show you how to replicate what Irene has set up in terms of a graphical interface and hidden pages in her Glow Group.

Irene’s tour of the Glow Group – (3:33)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

Creating a Glow Wiki (4:24)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

Editing a Glow Wiki Home Page, adding text and images (4:44)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

Adding pages to a Glow Wiki (4:33)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

Adding links to a Glow Wiki (7:39)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

Leaving a comment on a wiki page (1:39)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

Impact

When she first started her training on Glow Irene felt there was a lot of information to get through and that this could be off-putting. But once she got started with Glow she found she really enjoyed using it and it was generally easy to use.

Irene feels that the pupils really enjoy using Glow, even at this early stage. They have been particularly interested in the discussion forum, being able to do their homework online and being able to upload and share their project work.

View the following videos to get an idea of the impact that using Glow has had on Standard Grade Music in Bellshill Academy.

Why Irene first decided to use Glow (0:40)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

How Irene found it when she first started to use Glow (0:36)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

What the pupils thought of using Glow (0:50)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

How Irene uses Glow with her pupils (0:40)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

How Irene would like to take Glow forward (1:00)
Standard Grade Music – Using a wiki for project work

For further help, information and examples for Glow wikis visit the following links:

Welcome to Glow Wikis

Getting Started with Glow Wikis Cookbook

Scotland’s Schools Wiki

Irene Stewart

Irene Stewart is a Principal Teacher of Music at Bellshill Academy in North Lanarkshire. She began using Glow quite recently, encouraged by her own son’s use of Glow in primary school. She saw the potential for her secondary pupils to be accessing materials from home and also to be able to ask questions on Discussion Boards for help with their homework. Her son’s obvious enjoyment of using Glow made her think that her pupils would be motivated by using it.

This is the first of 2 Cookbooks which will look at how Irene has started to use Glow with her Standard Grade classes but mainly with S3. This first Cookbook on Irene’s use of Glow will focus on the use she has made of hidden pages and a graphical interface. The second Cookbook will focus on the pupils using a wiki to upload project work for Standard Grade Music.

The Topics Page – Graphical Interface

In her Standard Grade Listening Glow Group she has made use of a Graphical Interface to cut down the visual complexity for the pupils. There are many topics within Standard Grade Music and Irene was attracted by the potential of simplifying a Glow Group by using hidden pages and placing links within a graphic for the pupils to access different web links and materials. The Glow Group is set up to be used both in class and at home for the pupils. For example, on Irene’s Voices page she will want the pupils to use this in class to get an idea of the different voices by following the links to different web sites with examples. However, Irene has also placed links to examples for the pupils from You Tube and the pupils will be able to access these from home where they cannot get access to them in school. The pupils will be able to go home and consolidate their learning by using the links which demonstrate the concepts from the Voices topic.

Ingredients

What did Irene need, to be able to use a Graphical Interface Glow Group with her pupils:

• A staff Glow account within Bellshill Academy
• Her pupils provisioned and allocated their Glow usernames and passwords
• A Glow Group created at school level
• S3 pupils set up with membership of this Glow Group
• Several hidden pages created
• A text editor web part with a graphic and links set up to the hidden pages
• Several graphical interfaces also set up on some of the hidden pages
• New links and documents web parts created for each hidden page

The Noticeboard Page

You will be able to see the whole Glow Group in the Virtual Tour video in the Method section below.

After a brief introduction on the Noticeboard page the Glow Group moves on to the Help Page where there is a discussion board set up for the pupils to use for Standard Grade Listening. Currently the pupils have been making more use of the Discussion Board in the Standard Grade Music Homework Glow Group that Irene has set up. But she feels they will also begin to make use of the one in the Standard Grade Music Listening Glow Group next session.

In addition to creating the hidden pages and linking to them from the image on the Topics page, Irene has created new web parts to contain documents and web links for each of these topic pages. She will continue to add materials to these web parts for the pupils to access in the new session.

The third page of the Glow Group is really the main page – the Topics page (see screenshot above). This is the page the pupils will use to access the other “hidden” pages within the Glow Group for each of the topics. The names of these pages do not appear in the page tabs at the top of the Glow Group but clicking on the links from the Topics page will still take the pupils to these pages. This saves the Glow Group from being cluttered with many page names along the top.

The top part of the Voices hidden page

On the Voices hidden page Irene has created a second Graphical Interface with links to various web sites with examples. Some of these are You Tube videos which the pupils will be able to access from home. When the pupils click on these they will open in a new window which the pupils can then close when they are finished to return to the Voices page.

Recipe

In the first video below, Irene takes you on a virtual tour of her Glow Group. The following videos will show you how to replicate what Irene has set up in terms of a graphical interface and hidden pages in her Glow Group.

Irene’s tour of the Glow Group – (3:33)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

Building the Graphic (4:59)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

Creating the Hidden Pages (4:56)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

Saving the Links into a Word Document (3:12)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

Adding the Links to the Graphic (8:13)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

Impact

When she first started her training on Glow Irene felt there was a lot of information to get through and that this could be off-putting. But once she got started with Glow she found she really enjoyed using it and it was generally easy to use.

Irene feels that the pupils really enjoy using Glow, even at this early stage. They have been particularly interested in the discussion forum, being able to do their homework online and being able to upload and share their project work.

View the following videos to get an idea of the impact that using Glow has had on Standard Grade Music in Bellshill Academy.

Why Irene first decided to use Glow (0:40)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

How Irene found it when she first started to use Glow (0:36)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

What the pupils thought of using Glow (0:50)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

How Irene uses Glow with her pupils (0:40)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

How Irene would like to take Glow forward (1:00)
Std Grade Music – A Glow Group using a Graphical Interface

You may also find these 2 Help Sheet articles from the Glow Blog useful:

How to add hidden pages to a Glow Group – Part 1

How to add hidden pages to a Glow Group – Part 2

Building the Curriculum 5

From the recommendations contained within Building the Curriculum 5 Jennifer Richardson then South Ayrshire’s Curriculum for Excellence Assessment Team Development Officer, had decided to initiate a pilot project to use Glow to help schools meet the requirements. The documentation states that,

“children and young people should agree learning goals and should record them in ways that are meaningful and relevant.”

It also calls for the creation of a Learner Profile which should include targets and goals with information on all areas of the curriculum and wider achievement and a range of evidence of learning. It states that learners should have opportunities for reflection, sharing and dialogue.  Maintaining an electronic portfolio within Glow could provide schools and pupils with the ongoing information required for a Profile.

In this cookbook we will focus on work done in Barr Primary School in South Ayrshire as part of this pilot process.

Originally South Ayrshire were interested in some work done in East Ayrshire using Glow Groups as e-portfolios. However, since their introduction in the summer of 2010, Glow blogs have become an increasingly important tool within Glow. It quickly became obvious that they would be an excellent opportunity to provide an e-portfolio solution which would have many advantages over using a Glow Group.

Jennifer was originally keen to go ahead with using Glow blogs for this purpose as she saw the following benefits:

• they provide an accessible, electronic and manageable method of storing different types of evidence in one central place
• it can be accessed by both the learner, teachers, parents and peers (optional)
• learners can independently access and update their e-portfolio at any time and from anywhere with an internet connection
• teachers, parents and peers could comment on the learners work
• the e-portfolio can automatically transfer with the learner from class to class and from primary to secondary school.

Nation e-portfolio Glow Group

National advice and access to templates and helpsheets is available from the National level Glow Group here. The advice is given that the e-portfolios are created in a Glow Group in the pupil’s My Glow area. The My Glow area is chosen so that the pupils can have more ownership of the process but also because as the pupil moves to secondary school, if they are correctly identity matched to the same account, then they retain their My Glow and any groups within it. Rather than simply creating the blog on their My Glow it is created in a Glow Group so that membership can be set for teachers in the Glow Group without giving access to the pupil’s My Glow area. When a pupil enters secondary school membership can be reset for all teaching staff for the secondary in the way it was originally set at the primary.

Context

Barr Primary

In South Ayrshire we decided to build a template for schools to use, although local authorities are now able to work with the National Team to design a ‘Theme’ which can be used across the whole authority. Towards the end of 2010 South Ayrshire asked for volunteer schools to come along to a twilight training session. Both primaries and secondaries were keen to be involved. Fraser Baird came along from Barr Primary to find out how to get started with his pupils and kicked the process off with them when he returned to school.

Barr Primary School

Barr Primary were initially keen to use Glow Groups for e-portfolios and had already got started with doing this but then opted to give the Glow blogs a try instead. They began with creating them with the senior pupils in P5-7 but then set them up with the junior pupils as well. All pupils in P1-7 at Barr Primary have their own Glow blog to use for an e-portfolio.

To put the project in context click below to see Brian from Barr Primary take you on a tour through his e-portfolio blog:
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Ingredients

The prcess the South Ayrshire schools went through to create the e-portfolios was as follows:

• Pupils created a Glow Group with their own name as a title in their My Glow Area using the Glow Light interface.
• They added this Glow Group to their favourites.
• The pupils used the Advanced Settings link to add staff as Administrators of their Glow Group.
• They added the Glow Blog web part to the Glow Group
• They created a Glow blog, naming it with their Glow username, in order to keep the blog name unique.
• The pupils applied a template to their blog but this would now be done by adding a theme decided on by the local authority
• The pupils created their own header for the blog.
• A Glow Group was created by their teacher at school level.
• Pupils copied the URL for their blog and added this to a web links web part in the school-level Glow Group.

Recipe

If you go to the National E-Portfolio Glow Group mentioned above you will see videos and Helpsheets taking you through all the stages required for schools to set up e-portfolio with their pupils.

Brian shows us how pupils access their e-portfolios to make a post (1:22)

e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Brian shows us how to move from the dashboard to the e-portfolio (0:20)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Impact

The senior pupils at Barr Primary School

Barr Primary are very pleased with how the e-portfolio pilot is progressing and the pupils appear to really enjoy this way of working. They were generous enough with their time to let me go into the school and film their opinions on using their e-portfolios. Click on the videos in the sections below to find out what firstly, the pupils thought of various aspects and then what their teacher, Fraser Baird thought:

Introductions to the pupils (0:39)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

The pupils on creating the e-portfolios (0:51)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Pupils on why they’re using the e-portfolios (1:37)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Pupils on what they post on (2:04)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Pupils on using your blog as an evidence store (1:05)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Pupils on how to post (1:37)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Pupils on using vokis on the blogs (0:52)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Pupils on using it from home (0:30)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Pupils on getting comments from teachers (0:32)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Fraser on the decision to use blogs (1:13)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Fraser on getting started (1:27)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Fraser on e-portfolio for measuring pupil progression (1:09)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Fraser on the advantages of blogs over traditional methods (0:49)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Fraser on the pupils and blogs (2:21)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Fraser on what and how often the pupils post (1:05)
e-portfolios using Glow blogs at Barr Primary, South Ayrshire

Northern Lights is an expressive arts project involving schools in three local authorities in Scotland and partner schools in Norway and Russia.

In this cookbook Irene Pandolfi of North Lanarkshire Council and Ron Cowie of Stirling Council explain the background to the project and show examples of pupils’ work shared through the Northern Lights Glow Group.

In the Ingredients section you can find information about creating Glow guest accounts if you’re interested in setting up similar links with schools abroad.

Context

Irene and Ron were amongst a number of delegates who in 2009 participated in a study visit to Norway, organised through the Scottish Continuing International Professional Development (SCIPD) programme. The focus of their interest was a national initiative, the Cultural Rucksack, which gives all pupils in Norway access to professional arts and cultural activities in addition to the basic expressive arts curriculum.

As a result of the SCIPD visit, and the relationships established with Norwegian schools, Irene and Ron created the Northern Lights project. The projects links schools in North Lanarkshire, Perth and Kinross, and Stirling with partner schools in Norway and Russia.

The aims of the project are to develop pupils’ skills in expressive arts, in literacy and in peer assessment, and to encourage pupils to learn about and appreciate other cultures.

In order to encourage collaboration between all the partner schools, the Northern Lights Glow Group was established. Guest accounts were created for pupils and staff in the Norwegian and Russian schools to give them access to Glow.

Irene Pandolfi and Ron Cowie talk about the Northern Lights project
Northern Lights: an international project

Organisation of the Northern Lights projectNorthern Lights: an international project

The Northern Lights Glow Group provides a welcome area, news updates about the project, and links to useful tools such as online translation facilities. A ‘Help for teachers’ page provides background information about the project, its aims, suggestions for learning and teaching activities, and guides to using Glow features, such as the discussion boards.

The group then contains a number of sub-groups, each named after heavenly bodies, such as Comets and Shooting Stars. Each of these sub-groups links a smaller number of partner schools across the local authorities and countries.

Christmas – Norwegian style. Click to enlarge.

In each of these sub-groups, staff and pupils have found a whole host of ways to communicate, discuss their culture, exhibit their work, and give feedback to one another. Pupils have used discussion boards extensively – to write simple introductions, messages and greetings, to give feedback and to write poetry. In the Documents area pupils have uploaded presentations, describing, for example, how they celebrate Christmas. This has led to interesting comparisons about the similarities and differences in traditions between the countries.

Art from nature. Click to enlarge.

Pupils undertook an ‘art from nature’ activity, creating images using materials from the environment. Photographs of the images have been uploaded into the Documents area and shared with the partner schools. Other schools have created video clips, such as short dramas, and audio broadcasts, all also uploaded to the group and shared with an audience across three countries. Pupils have been very motivated by having their work seen and reviewed by a far wider audience than it might typically receive.

Some schools have also used Glow Meet to communicate with their partner schools, adding a whole new dimension to the opportunities to practise literacy skills, share work with an audience and learn about different cultures. Glow Meet is an area that many of the schools are keen to pursue further as the project develops.

Irene and Ron describe the project as having been ‘free-flowing’ and ‘growing arms and legs’ this year. Each school has taken the original idea, developed their own areas of interest and been creative – which indeed was the central aim of the project!

Ingredients

The Northern Lights Glow Group was created on the National Site in Glow. This was to ensure that all staff and pupils in the Scottish schools would be able to see the Group listed on their ‘My Glow Groups’ page. (This would not be the case if, for the example, the Group had been created on the North Lanarkshire site, in which case only the NLC schools would see it on their ‘My Glow Groups’ page.)

If you are interested in running a project which involves schools across a number of authorities, then a suitable Glow Group can be created on the National Site for you. Contact the Glow Admin team (glowadmin@ltscotland.org.uk).

In order to give access to Glow to the pupils in schools in Norway and Russia, guest accounts were created. Such accounts can be created by the Accounts and Services Manager (ASM) for your school or local authority. If you are interested in using Glow to communicate with a school abroad, check with your school’s ASM to see if there is a policy about guest accounts already in place. If not, talk to your authority’s Glow Key Contact who will be able to give you further advice. A list of the Key Contacts is available on the GlowScotland website.

Three documents about guest accounts have been created by Learning and Teaching Scotland and are attached here. Schools and local authorities may wish to use these for reference and adapt them as appropriate: Glow Guest User Account conditions of issue, Glow guest user AUP, Guest Account Application Form.

Recipe

The ‘How-to’ clips below show how to replicate some of the features used in the Northern Lights Glow Group and its sub-groups.

* How to add, rename or remove pagesNorthern Lights: an international project

* How to post messages on a discussion boardNorthern Lights: an international project

* How to change the display of the Discussions web partNorthern Lights: an international project

* How to use Text Editor to display a set of world clocksNorthern Lights: an international project

Impact

Feedback from Norway. Click to enlarge.

Feedback from the schools involved in the project has been very positive, with all keen to continue it into the new session (2010/11). The key benefits have been inclusion: large numbers of pupils in three local authorities and two other countries have been able to access and contribute to the same project; pupils from the traveller community have participated and pupils who may be otherwise been disengaged from learning have also been enthusiastically involved. 

The project has developed Scottish pupils’ expressive arts and literacy skills and motivated a desire to learn about their own culture and to share it with others. Norwegian and Russian pupils have benefited tremendously through engagement in the project, developing their English language skills, and the opportunity has been much valued by schools and parents.

The impact of the Northern Lights projectNorthern Lights: an international project

Future plans for the Northern Lights project
Northern Lights: an international project

Overview

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away (well, in Bathgate, West Lothian) the Primary 1 and 2 teachers in Windyknowe Primary School set themselves a huge task. They embarked upon a ‘Joining the Learning’ Fairyland activity that involved every one of the 100 Primary 1 and 2 pupils taking part in an Enchanted Forest project which culminated in them having a Glow Meet with a dragon!

Context

The teachers were keen to provide an engaging and enjoyable learning experience for the pupils and so did a lot of preparation and planning in advance of embarking on the 6-week project. Firstly, they visited other schools who had already been involved in the project to get advice and ideas from them. This allowed them to clarify the things they would like to do themselves.

They decided then that they would like to mix up the children from the P1 and P2 classes to enable them to select the activities they would like to take part in and so provide opportunities for personalisation and choice.

A letter from a Dragon!

The project started after the Easter holidays with a letter arriving from a dragon! This was accompanied by dragon dust (which strangely resembled glitter!), footprints on the floor and scorch marks on the letter itself. All of the 100 children were gathered together to be read the letter from the dragon. Immediately they were captivated.  In his letter, the dragon asked the pupils to turn the rooms into an Enchanted Forest. He left articles for the children and these were then used as a basis for the themes that the classrooms were given.

Initially the children went away and thought about the items that the dragon had left. They were asked to consider why he might have chosen these things. Each group of items was linked to a different classroom and each classroom had a different theme and colour scheme, so the pupils had to think about how the rooms and the items were linked. After learning more about the items, the pupils selected which room they would like to work in to find out more about that theme. They picked names for their chosen room, to reflect its theme. The rooms were then named The Armoury Room, The Waterfall Room, The Cottage, The Royal Room and the Great Hall.

The entrance to the area where the P1 and P2 classrooms are was transformed into an Enchanted Forest, just as the dragon had requested. In addition, the pupils then decorated their chosen room to reflect its theme. They undertook different activities in their groups within their chosen room throughout the week and in addition there was always one joint community activity each week.

Hear the pupils talk about the dragon and some of the different rooms in the following video clips:

Signs of the dragon (1:39)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
Which rooms were there? (2:19)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
The Armoury Room (0:43)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
The Royal Room (1:21)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
The Waterfall Room (0:36)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
Making Cinderella’s cake (1:01)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
Being a knight (1:01)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
 

Curricular activities

Each week, a new letter arrived from the dragon and this letter introduced a new fairytale to the children. The first was “The Princess and the Pea” by Hans Christian Andersen. To link with this, every pupil made a fabric square which the staff then lovingly sewed together to form a patchwork quilt. Each story that the pupils read was accompanied by a joint activity. For example, when they read “Snow White and the seven dwarfs” by the Brothers Grimm, they made a woodland freeze for the Cottage Room;  for “Cinderella”, each group made one tier of a cake which they then assembled to form one giant cake.

Other activities were also undertaken and used to embed learning from all curricular areas. For example

• The children wrote stories. The teachers were amazed at the length of the stories and the level of vocabulary that the children were using.  It was clear that they had picked up language from the fairytales that they had read.
• Spelling included words from fairytales – such as beanstalk!
• There was a huge amount of ICT usage incorporated throughout the range of activities – the children took photos and filmed what they were doing, as well as using the internet for research. They also became familiar with video conferencing and web cams through using Glow Meet.
• They learned about castles and in particular looked at Edinburgh and Stirling castles.
• In the Waterfall room, the children learned about the lifecycle of frogs
• The 7 dwarfs were used to help pupils learn number bonds as part of their numeracy learning.
• Outdoors, the pupils worked together in groups to build castles
• There was a lot of drama and role-play, with the children frequently dressing up as knights or princesses

There were some large-scale activities planned for the children too. There was

• a ‘Ball in the Hall’ where the children learned to dance
• a Knights challenge where the pupils who had chosen to work within the Knights room took part in tasks to becomes a knight. This then led to a knighting ceremony.
• a ‘Sleeping Beauty’ Assembly presented to the rest of the school
• an open day, when parents were invited in, by Royal Decree, to visit the enchanted forest. Over 200 parents and siblings visited.

 Who is this dragon?

Throughout the weeks, the dragon mysteriously visited the school and the children frequently spotted signs that he had been there. Tell-tale signs were seeing dragon dust, or footprints in the enchanted forest, or scorch marks in the playground!

The children were extremely intrigued by the dragon and whilst there were initially a couple of sceptics, after a while all of the children were hugely engaged in trying to discover more about him. They used books and the internet to research different types of dragons and the Primary 2’s even interviewed the staff to try to find out more. They were desperate to know if the dragon was a boy or a girl (as dragon dust had been spotted in both the girls and boys toilets!).

The pupils regularly declared that they had caught a glimpse of the dragon, either at the window or flying up in the sky. However, during the Ball in the Hall, the dragon finally did in fact make a real appearance! For just a second, he peeked in through the hall window. He was spotted by a few of the children, and the excitement that this generated amongst the entire P1 and P2 cohort was tangible. The teachers had carefully arranged it so that it was clear to the pupils that the dragon was not one of the teachers, as they were all present at the time he was spotted, and traces of dragon dust were placed outside by the support staff to confirm his presence.

Meeting the dragon

As it was nearing the end of the 6 week project, the teachers decided that now was the time for the pupils to finally see the dragon.

Another letter arrived from the dragon, suggesting that he would like to speak with the children. He explained that he was very familiar with Glow and that he would therefore like to use Glow Meet to see and speak with them.

One of the teachers arranged for her son to play the part of the dragon.

Since he had been hearing all about the dragon and the adventures that had been happening in the Enchanted Forest at home, he enthusiastically agreed!

A leafy backdrop was created in an area of the school separate from where the P1 and P2 classrooms are, and ‘the dragon’ sat there to do the Glow Meet.

The pupils had prepared questions for the dragon beforehand and took turns to speak to him during the Glow Meet. They even sang ‘Puff the magic dragon’ to him!

At the end, the dragon explained that his Kingdom was now ready for him to return to and that he would be leaving the children to move back.

This brought the entire project to a fitting end.

(The children did add one more activity of their own though, by making Goodbye cards for the dragon!)

Watch excerpts from the Glow Meet with the dragon in the following videos:

Question and Answer session with the Dragon (8:47)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
Singing ‘Puff the Magic Dragon’ to the Dragon (2:44)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
 One pupil tells us her thoughts about meeting the Dragon (0:19)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
 

Curriculum for Excellence Experiences and Outcomes

The topic enabled the teachers to cover an extensive range of Experiences and Outcomes with the children. Amongst many others, they covered:

Literacy and English

LIT 0-01b / LIT 0-11b I enjoy exploring and choosing stories and other texts to watch, read or listen to, and can share my likes and dislikes.
LIT 0-01c I enjoy exploring events and characters in stories and other texts, sharing my thoughts in different ways.
LIT 0-04a I listen or watch for useful or interesting information and I use this to make choices or learn new things.
LIT 1-20a / LIT 2-20a I enjoy creating texts of my choice and I regularly select subject, purpose, format and resources to suit the needs of my audience. 
LIT 1-21a I can spell the most commonly-used words, using my knowledge of letter patterns and spelling rules and use resources to help me spell tricky or unfamiliar words.

Mathematics and Numeracy

MNU 0-03a I use practical materials and can ‘count on and back’ to help me to understand addition and subtraction, recording my ideas and solutions in different ways.  

Expressive Arts

EXA 0-01a / EXA 1-01a / EXA 2-01a  I have experienced the energy and excitement of presenting/performing for audiences and being part of an audience for other people’s presentations/
EXA 1-02a  I have the opportunity to choose and explore a range of media and technoligies to create images and objects, discovering their effects and suitability for specific tasks
EXA 0-10a  I have opportunities to enjoy taking part in dance experiences.
EXA 1-10a  I am becoming aware of different features of dance and can practise and perform steps, formations and short dance.
EXA 0-12a I have the freedom to choose and explore how I can use my voice, movement, and expression in role play and drama.
EXA 0-16a I enjoy singing and playing along to music of different styles and cultures.  

Technologies

TCH 1-03b I can access, retrieve and use information from electronic sources to support, enrich or extend learning in different contexts.
TCH 0-04a I enjoy exploring and using technologies to communicate with others within and beyond my place of learning.
TCH 0-04b I enjoy taking photographs or recording sound and images to represent my experiences and the world around me.
TCH 1-04a / TCH 2-04a I explore and experiment with the features and functions of computer technology and I can use what I learn to support and enhance my learning in different contexts. 

Ingredients

The teachers used a school Glow Group called the Enchanted Forest to host their Glow Meet. Assisted by another teacher in the school, Laura Gingell, the Glow Meet web part was added to the Glow Group and a Meeting Room created within it.

In order to provide the experience of the Glow Meet with the Dragon, the teachers needed the following:

• A Glow Group
• A Glow Meet web part added to the Glow Group with a Meeting room created in it
• Web cams – for the dragon and for the room where the children were congregated
• The computer in the children’s room to be connected to a projector to display the Glow Meet on a whiteboard for all to see
• Microphones, for the dragon and for the children
• Speakers for the dragon and the children

In the following videos we will learn how to replicate some of the elements of the Enchanted Forest Glow Group, in particular, the Glow Meet elements:

How to set up a Glow Meet in a Glow Group (5:36)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
How to join and take part in a Glow Meet (3:38)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
How to use the video, audio and chat facility within a Glow Meet meeting room (6:19)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
How to record a Glow Meet (2:09)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic
How to play back a previously recorded Glow Meet (3:22)
Glow Meet with a dragon!- Early Years Fairyland topic

Impact

There were many benefits realised from this project, both for the pupils and the staff:

- The children developed in confidence, mixing easily with pupils from the other P1 and 2 classes. This was evident during the school concert when they performed in front of an audience with far more confidence than they had previously
- Their ability to work in groups and share was improved and they played together very well, as they had to get to know one another.
- They became more independent
- There was more of a community feeling within the P1 and P2 area in the school as they worked as one, rather than as separate classes
- The children had the benefit of regularly working with a range of teachers instead of just their own class teacher
- The pupils were very engaged in their learning
- The inclusion of the dragon was an extremely motivational element throughout the project. Any mention of the dragon sparked great interest and proved to be a great way to encourage the pupils to do things – they were happy to do it if the dragon asked them to!
- The language work that the pupils produced was incredible. The length of the stories they wrote and the vocabulary they used was far beyond what the teachers would normally see from P1/2 pupils.
- When a new letter arrived from the dragon, the pupils were very good at suggesting ideas about what they should do to meet his requests. 
- Their interest in reading has been sustained and the children regularly choose to read a fairytale from their reading corner.

During the project the six P1 and P2 teachers all worked extremely well together. They all offered and shared their ideas and planned joint activities as a group. Through their discussions, the ideas evolved that were then implemented throughout the project. All of the staff loved the experience of the project and were completely enthused. This enthusiasm was most certainly passed on to the children. One of the teachers involved in the Fairyland topic, Michelle Skene, said of the project: “we’ve loved every minute of it, maybe even moreso than the children!”

The Glow Meet itself had a great impact on the project. It gave a way of bringing the topic to a conclusion and allowed the children to see the dragon that had consumed their thoughts for the previous six weeks.

The children still talk about the dragon now, weeks after the end of the topic. They also still incorporate other areas of their learning from the Enchanted Forest into their everyday work.

The staff and pupils all loved the project and having a Glow Meet with a dragon is something they would most definitely recommend!