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School-led conferences can inspire positive change
Gail Jones from Broadgreen International School describes her experience of the National Learning Platforms Conference 2009
 Over 400 UK secondary school leaders congregated at the third annual National Learning Platforms Conference in Manchester last term as interactive workshops led by visionary schools promised to inspire them to transform their own schools. Gail Jones, Faculty Leader for Technology & E-Learning at Broadgreen International School, Liverpool, attended for the second time. She describes how this conference was like no other in how it educated leaders about successfully embedding learning platforms, the whys and why not’s, together with the tools and inspiration to achieve exceptional results. She explains how it has cultivated networking opportunities and brought fresh ideas to her school.
 Growing community links
Being classroom-based can isolate teachers from other schools so events to convene should be embraced. Having attended the conference last year, I was enlightened by the way schools are shaping their Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs). It opened opportunities to link with other schools, share resources and ideas and work within a community that mutually benefits all schools and their students. Attending this year was eye-opening as schools networked with each other and exchanged ideas.
Understanding why parental engagement matters
Broadgreen is among only 67 per cent of UK secondary schools using a learning platform. Already set to meet the Government’s real-time reporting target by 2010, we have had access to a parental portal since 2008 and conduct training for small groups of parents at times to suit them. Peter Banks, a member of our senior management team, has worked with Becta to develop parental engagement – an initiative for which we pride ourselves on being a leading school. As it is a fairly new initiative, I attended the conference to see how other schools are working to improve links with parents.
 I attended a Becta-led workshop at the conference which reiterated that the key to ensuring that parental engagement improves learning outcomes is to improve the dialogue and partnerships between parents and schools. Hard-to-reach parents in particular may feel threatened to come into school to talk about their child’s education, so we have had to adapt for them. Parents are often criticised for lacking responsibility for their child’s education, however, they have voiced a preference for informal methods of dialogue over formal mechanisms, which presents schools with a plausible solution in itself. The challenge is how best to deliver it.
Enhancing parental engagement and securing school improvement
Dominic Tester, Assistant Headteacher, Costello Technology College, Basingstoke, ran a seminar about the ways learning platforms can enhance parental engagement. He explained his school’s firm belief that transformational change derives from small steps leading to big changes and that educated risks are occasionally fundamental for progress. His steps to successful implementation include setting up a parent focus group to shape requirements, engaging with stakeholders to secure their vision and key performance indicators, staff training and reviewing current working practices.
 In order to engage with parents we already go beyond simply gleaning information from the school’s Management Information System (MIS). We allow parents to personalise the information they want, when and where they want to view it, through interfaces they are comfortable with. One parent’s information needs may differ from another’s. At any given time, one might want an update on their child’s attendance, whilst another might want to track their child’s progress in maths or appreciate knowing when their child contributes well to a class discussion. The answer for Costello was to provide parents with access to information they want such as booking parents’ evening appointments online, making online payments and booking school facilities - we are considering implementing such features at Broadgreen.
Integrating learning platforms into the school community and beyond
I also attended a presentation by Kevin Dukes, ICT Manager, The Dukeries College, Nottinghamshire. He logged in to his learning platform as one would in class or at home to show us how his school uses it. As Broadgreen is an international school with strong links with schools abroad such as Norway and India, I was fascinated to hear about the international links that The Dukeries has forged with schools in Brazil, Poland and France. At Broadgreen we have found that our pupils can complete their school work whilst they are on trips to link schools, rather than waiting until they have returned.
We have also started to forge links within our community and have set up a governor’s page and community page to support this. A governor has been trained on the learning platform, has their own login and will soon be responsible for updating the page with meeting minutes, newsletters and other useful communications. We already have links with our feeder primary schools and now feel optimistic about our plans to extend to a wider catchment area to attract students from further afield.
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Social networking is becoming ubiquitous
Paul Hynes, Specialist Schools Academies Trust (SSAT), ran a presentation titled ‘Getting under the hood(ie) of the 21st Century student’. I found his presentation very useful as he highlighted the behaviour patterns of students today whereby social networking is becoming ubiquitous – school leaders, teachers and learners all expect information at their fingertips. Virtual learning environments and Web 2.0 can equip schools with creative tools to personalise the learning experience for students. Applications that were previously only developed by programmers can be created by anyone with basic word-processing skills. As with the explosion of computer-generated graphics in movies in the early 1990s, suddenly a new world has opened up to schools, enabling students to stretch beyond boundaries and reach their full potential. |
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This mirrors how Broadgreen is re-shaping our VLE to promote how the school has developed and to implement courses, activities, games, assignments and forums that benefit all students. Forums are giving quieter students a voice that would not have happened without the virtual environment. It has helped to infiltrate a ‘can do’ culture whereby staff and students adopt a positive view about what the school has achieved and what it hopes to do in the future. Students are developing new designs and seem to be running it themselves, making it their own. We have monitored that on average each student uses it to chat about homework for up to six hours per week. We have attributed this to the flexibility of the system which allows students to fit their work in around their lifestyle. This has proven more successful than keeping them behind after school as it empowers them to take responsibility for their own learning and to choose when and where they work.
Changing attitudes towards technology
This year’s conference has boosted our confidence, reassuring us that other schools are thinking along similar lines with their VLEs, although each has put their own stamp on it. I found it interesting to discover that attitudes towards the use of technology are changing across the board. Students are becoming more technically-minded and schools are adjusting to support them to take ownership over their own work and development. For example, students can opt not to attend homework club if they take responsibility for completing it at home. Students are also becoming increasingly proactive – if a file fails to upload they flag it early, not using ‘technical failure’ as an excuse for unfinished homework. On the contrary, they want to know why something does not work and what they can do about it. This is what ownership is encouraging and I believe this is the way forward for education.
Broadgreen International School uses the Frog Secondary Learning Platform. If you missed the last conference you can watch some of the main workshops. Visit: http://www.frogtrade.com/conference. The next conference takes place in June 2010.
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July 2010
May 2010
March 2010
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FrogTrade Ltd
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