I was previously a P6 teacher at Harrysmuir Primary School in West Lothian. After the Headteacher, Susan Mackenzie, and another member of staff received some initial Glow training, all staff were encouraged to use Glow to support their classroom learning and teaching activities. As Harrysmuir school is double-stream, it was initially decided to have one Glow Group per stage, the other P6 teacher and I decided to set up our own groups for each of our classes. All pupils in the school can view all the class Glow Groups.

Context

After initially setting up my class Glow Group, we added various tabs throughout the year as we studied different topics and had different school events. One of the tabs I set up was for Health Week. As a link to our literacy focus in personal writing, I wanted children to keep a diary as a personal reflection on their thoughts and views about the health week activities. I also wanted the pupils to see and comment on each other’s diaries, so I set up a discussion board web part for each day of health week. Also within this group I set up a calendar of events so children would know what is happening and at what time.

How was the Health Tab used with the P6 Glow Group?

There are a number of web parts within the Health Week tab:

Text Editor

In this web part I left instructions to explain to the pupils how to add their diary entry.

Calendar

I used the calendar web part to display a timetable of events for the pupils so they could see what activities they had the opportunity to take part in, and to remind them what was happening on each day. This web part allowed them to check at home what was happening the next day so they could remember the necessary equipment, for example to bring a swimming kit on Tuesday.

Discussion Board

In this tab I had three different discussion boards, one for each day of health week. In these web parts each pupil wrote their personal reflections on the health week events they participated in that day. This allowed me to read the pupil’s comment and leave a reply or question, the pupil could then leave a further reply to answer my question. Giving the pupils the opportunity to reflect on their health week activities enabled me to address some of the literacy and health and well being outcomes and experiences:

LIT 2-26a By considering the type of text I am creating, I can select ideas and relevant information, organise these in an appropriate way for my purpose and use suitable vocabulary for my audience.

LIT 2-28a I can convey information, describe events, explain processes or combine ideas in different ways.

LIT 2-29a I can persuade, argue, explore issues or express an opinion using relevant supporting detail and/or evidence.

HWB 2-01a I am aware of and able to express my feelings and am developing the ability to talk about them.

HWB 2-19a Opportunities to carry out different activities and roles in a variety of settings have enabled me to identify my achievements, skills and areas for development. This will help me to prepare for the next stage in my life and learning.

Ingredients

What did I need to set up the health week diaries?

1. Class Glow Group
2. New tab for health week
3. Text Editor web Part
4. What’s On
5. Multiple Discussion Board web parts

Recipe

In the following videos, we will take a look at the P6B Health Tab and then find out how to replicate some of its structure and content.

What does the P6 Health Week tab look like? (1.36)
Health Week Diaries

How to add a new page to your Glow Group (1.10)
Health Week Diaries

How to add some text in a Text Editor web part (3.37)
Health Week Diaries

How to add a What’s On web part (4.01)
Health Week Diaries

How to add a Discussion Board web part (4.24)
Health Week Diaries

Impact

The health week tab allowed me to have access to the views that the pupils had about the activities they completed. This information was then fed back to the Health coordinator which will help her when planning health week activities next year. It also was an extension of the personal writing tasks the pupils had completed.

Click on the video below to hear the pupils’ views on using the Discussion Board web part for writing their diaries. (0.28)
Health Week Diaries

Click on the video below to hear how the pupils used the What’s On web part. (0.15)
Health Week Diaries

Click on the video below to hear how the pupils shared their learning with their parents. (0.13)
Health Week Diaries

Related Cookbooks:

There are currently four other cookbooks relating to other aspects of the P6B Glow Group in Harrysmuir Primary School.

Click on the link to view each one:

Peer Assessment within 2nd Level Literacy and Language

Incorporating principles of AifL into 2nd Level Numeracy

Incorporating formative assessment and critical skills within 2nd level social studies

Developing Literacy and Presentation skills through use of Glow Meet

Highlighting Relevant Capacities

Overview

Claire Reynolds is Principal Teacher at Holy Family Primary school in Kirkintilloch, East Dunbartonshire. She has responsibility for a P.7 class and is class committed 0.8. As part of school policy each child must complete a PLP involving evaluation of targets for Language, Mathematics and Health and Wellbeing. Following this evaluation new targets for each area are also set.In this cookbook we’ll look at how Claire used a Glow Group and the web parts within it to create a PLP for completion throughout the academic year 2009-2010 with her class. The cookbook will exemplify this good practice and show how to re-create it.

Context
Personal Learning Plans were introduced several years ago at Holy Family PS and are completed by all stages from P2-7 termly. Each child is required to set targets for literacy and numeracy as well as Health and Wellbeing and Personal and Social Development.
The PLPs are continually reviewed and adapted in terms of content in order to include curricular changes and in particular the impact of Curriculum for Excellence (CfE).

CFE Outcomes and Experiences met through this process are,

I can spell most of the words I need to communicate, using spelling rules, specialist vocabulary, self-correction techniques and a range of resources.
LIT 2-21a
Throughout the writing process, I can check that my writing makes sense and meets its purpose.
LIT 2-23a

By considering the type of text I am creating, I can select ideas and relevant information, organise these in an appropriate way for my purpose and use suitable vocabulary for my audience.
LIT 2-26a

Opportunities to carry out different activities and roles in a variety of settings have enabled me to identify my achievements, skills and areas for development. This will help me to prepare for the next stage in my life and learning.
HWB 2-19a

Each child is issued with a paper copy of the PLP which they should complete through the year. With the support of the class teacher in a personal interview the targets for literacy and numeracy are set. The child then takes the PLP home to share this with their parent/carer and to agree these targets with them. With their parent/carer they also agree Health and Personal and Social Development targets for the term. PLPs are then returned to school and referred to on a weekly basis to ensure that each child is on track to achieve their targets. At the end of each term the PLP goes home and with their parent/carer the child evaluates their progress on each of the set targets.
While this system has worked well the potential of Glow in order to provide this support for each pupil was recognised by Claire. The ideas were discussed with the SMT to agree to Claire using Glow for session 2009-2010 with her P.7 class for PLPs. The children had been using Glow for at least one year and were familiar with some basic web parts.
While the initial introduction to using Glow for PLPs would take some time and instruction with her class the life long skills the children would acquire would be transferrable to other Glow projects and in their use of the internet when uploading and downloading documents/files.
Claire introduced this project to her class in August 2009. Children who did not have access to the internet at home were very keen to use Glow and would use a relatives or library computer. Where this was not be possible the paper copy would be sent home.

Ingredients
What did Claire need to do to create the elements of the Glow Group and the PLP structure?

1. A Glow Group
2. Access to Glow Group for all pupils.
3. Pupil familiarity with uploading and downloading from My Glow
4. E-mail accounts for all pupils, in this case, Glow mail.
5. Access to a word processing package in school and at home.

It was necessary to ensure pupils had Contributor rights within the Glow Group to enable them download the PLP, complete it and upload it to their My Glow.

In the next section, we’ll take a look at the ‘Staff Communications’ Glow Group and learn how to recreate elements within it.

Recipe
The video below shows the ‘PLP’ Glow Group. The videos that then follow show how these elements can be recreated. Details are:

*What does the PLP Glow Group look like?
Using Glow for Personal Learning Plans – PLPs

*How to remove a page from a glow group.
Using Glow for Personal Learning Plans – PLPs

*How to design a page in a glow group.
Using Glow for Personal Learning Plans – PLPs

*How to rename a web part.
Using Glow for Personal Learning Plans – PLPs

*How to send targeted news from a Glow group.
Using Glow for Personal Learning Plans – PLPs

*How pupils would download and upload documents using My Glow.
Using Glow for Personal Learning Plans – PLPs

*Teacher Video on Impact of Glow
Using Glow for Personal Learning Plans – PLPs

Impact
The impact of using Glow to create and complete PLPs as well as share them with parents has been very effective.
The pupils have gained many skills in using Glow through this project and are now much more confident in uploading and downloading items to and from Glow. This project has also helped to develop parental involvement in Glow activities and raised their awareness of some of the functionality and uses purpose of Glow as a Learning Platform.
There has been the obvious impact in terms of Eco School status and financially in terms of colour printing and paper. There has been real and purposeful use of ICT and Glow and it has been a good way to motivate the children to complete and evaluate their PLPs regularly. It has been found that the children are eager to use Glow and ICT for this task in comparison to paper copies.