It’s in the news at the moment that British children spend more time on homework than most other European nations, and while we, at Webanywhere, are all for the high educational standards this produces, we have to ask the question of whether or not this time is being used effectively. With our suite of apps on the School Jotter platform, we can make the task of homework more efficient, productive and even fun! We’ve included the ways our apps can help out below, and all these apps are available for trial in the School Jotter app store, or you can request a demo here.
Portfolio
With our Portfolio app, it’s simple for students to create their own online learning journeys, in order to create a digital roadmap of their work. The simple, easy-to-use interface (which will be familiar to anyone who has used our Site platform to build their website) lets students and teachers add text, images and other media to create an attractive, interactive display. Teachers can set work to be completed online, then leave comments on pieces, giving quick feedback. As well as this, parents are able to log in and see what their children have been doing, giving a bit or parental oversight to the whole process.
Learn
Consider this the staff-side version of the Portfolio app. As a teacher you can create Learning Sites within the school website. These act like real websites but are accessible only by pupils and teachers, and content such as lesson plans and homework can be uploaded and displayed. Combining this with our other apps will really help to streamline your homework process.
Blog
Promote social collaboration with your students through our Blog app. Anyone who’s used a blog before will be instantly familiar with how this works – both students and teachers can create blogs and posts, as well as comment on them. Let your students take their group work online and collaboratively produce great content. Particularly good blogs can be shared or posted elsewhere – an added incentive to perform well!
Spellings
Coming soon from Webanywhere is our Spellings app! One of the most universally set pieces of homework in Primary Schools is the spelling test revision. As with any list memorisation there are various ways that each child might go about committing the information to memory, but we think our spelling app will help to make this both simple and fun. Easily create spelling lists for your pupils and embed the app into your school website for access at home. Users are shown a word briefly then asked to spell it out again – the gamification of revision in this way can really take the strain out of homework.
Broadcast allows you to communicate with parents by email or SMS through an easy-to-use web-based interface. One great feature is that you can send and receive SMS messages within the Broadcast app. Watch the short video below to see more.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2gKj7gvW4o
Broadcast simplifies notifying parents. You can select classes of children to send a message to, and that message will automatically go to their parents. Creating customised groups is easy and enables you to target parents of children in clubs or other extracurricular activities. You can even personalise SMS messages by automatically inserting parents’ first or last names into the message.
Broadcast communicates in two ways, SMS and email. If parent doesn’t have a mobile phone, or an SMS is sent but there is a problem with the delivery, Broadcast then automatically sends an email. There are detailed message delivery reports so you can ensure your message is getting out to parents, and contact them by other means if they have not received it.
While sending email is free, topping up SMS credits can be done in two clicks, and you choose the number of SMS credits that suits your situation.
School Jotter now has SIMS integration which means that creating and updating parent and child accounts is automatic meaning no administration time for your staff, and accurate information about your parents and students in Jotter.
Broadcast app simplifies your communications and make for more effective relationships between staff and parents. Try it out now in the School Jotter app store, or request a free demo!
Now that we have worked out the different guises of the tech savvy teacher we are asking ourselves what does Webanywhere do to support that teacher? So the same headings will appear, just as they did in the last blog post, with how we support you.
Your students read your blog
We lead by example here, we have several blogs attracting very different types of audience. We work with different sectors in and outside of education and recognise that their needs are different. So giving you all the same advice is not an option. Blogging is a great way to communicate in a non-invasive way for us and you respond very well to that.
In School Jotter we have created a blog app that allows everyone to write and have their work published on the internet. The blog app is easy to use and what’s more, schools enjoy writing their blogs and receiving comments.
The blogging facility within an open-source LMS is a popular part of many schools VLE. Whether it is a teacher’s blog or a student’s blog it is a great way to keep in touch with students in between tutor group times or lessons.
You instigate your own CPD online
At Webanywhere we enjoy being proactive and it is very much encouraged by the senior management. So we are starting to offer free webinars offering support on using various parts of your school’s VLE or apps in the School Jotter suite. All webinars are recorded and posted online for those who cannot make the webinar live or would like to go over the information again at a later date.
We also hold regular events around the country for e-safety, OFSTED website requirements and how to meet them. We know these are not online but it is another way we can support you with your CPD.
You have made an online PLN
We hope you consider yourselves part of our learning network. You are brilliant at telling us what you think of our products and how we can develop them. We take note of this and we feel this is one reason that our products go from strength to strength.
It was great to see so many customers at BETT this year and get an update of what you are doing and your future plans. Webanywhere has a strong social networking presence and we offer help and advice to all rather than just informing you of our offers and service available.
You share your life with virtual colleagues you have never met
We are lucky and have some very strong relationships with schools and businesses around the country. We definitely share our working lives with you and include all of our customers when breaking good news about the company.
Your weekly schedule involves Twitter chats
Webanywhere does tweet and we do follow and chat with our customers and other interesting organisations using Twitter. But we do prefer a more personal touch, that is why we enjoy talking to our customers directly whether that is a telephone call or an email.
Summer break means ISTE and other conferences
Webanywhere works through the summer, you will be surprised how many teachers take training sessions during the summer break, we are not though as we know how driven you are. We also do large installs and implementations during this quieter period. We are also planning for the new school year just like you. Planning events and offers that will help you to make the most of the technology you are using.
You know the vocabulary
This should possibly read know our products and services, the vocabulary will then follow automatically. Every educational establishment and business is different, they have different requirements and need varying levels of support. Understanding that we know that what we did for one organisation will not necessarily work in another.
You turn to colleagues in other countries in times of need
We do have colleagues and people in our PLN that are in other countries and they are an invaluable source of information. But we also turn to our customers and ask for their help. In March we took some new School Jotter apps to a local event and invited schools to attend. We had headteachers, teachers, teaching assistants and administration staff. We showed them our new apps and listened to them as they fed back. This was an amazing session and the developer we took with us had a good list of quality suggestions to take back to the development team to work on. An update at the end of June included many of those ideas.
You are a digital citizen
Gosh, we hope so. We strive to be role model digital citizens and if ever we let you down please tell us. As we have always done, we stretch beyond with our enthusiasm and willingness to go further. We are still in front of market needs and we go beyond what’s expected to deliver a truly positive experience for our customers.
You are always hungry to learn, try and tinker with new tech
This goes without saying, it is part of who we are.
The App Store is where you can find out more about the Webanywhere education apps currently available. You can also use the App Store to set up a free trial of any of these apps.
To make using the App Store easier, we’ve created a tutorial video, which you can watch below.
If you don’t have access to the App Store, just take a free trial via any of our product websites, such as School Jotter, Jotter Learn and Surveys. Requesting a free trial for any of these products will mean you’ll get access to the App Store, where you can set up further trials yourself.
If you need further information about any of our education apps, or the App Store, get in touch here.
e-Portfolio systems are becoming increasingly popular schools, because they allow pupils to display their work in one safe, secure online location.
Webanywhere was one of the very first e-learning companies to introduce an e-portfolio system, when Student Jotter was launched back in 2008. Since then it has been honed, improved and adopted by hundreds of schools around the world – changing its name to Learner Journey in the process.
Now, after launching a brand new range of education apps in February this year, Webanywhere is evolving Learner Journey to form part of this suite.
We will continue to offer Learner Journey for the foreseeable future, and anyone who purchases it or has purchased it will still receive full help and support for the duration of their contract. But the new incarnation, Portfolio, will soon be available as its eventual successor.
The Portfolio app will integrate with existing apps like Learn, Blog and Merits, and will allow users to create a mini website to display work and achievements, as opposed to what is currently more like a social media profile, and these can be shared with peers who can view and comment on the content.
There are other significant differences between Learner Journey and Portfolio: in order to make the new app more versatile and to meet customers’ needs better, the social networking feature and the portfolio element have been split. Now, the portfolio part of Learner Journey will be the Portfolio app, whilst the social networking element will be represented by another all-new app, Social, which will be available to buy later this year.
Therefore, those who do not favour a social networking system can stick to the Portfolio app only; those who want to promote safe social networking in schools but have no need for a portfolio system can simply go with Social.
Look out for more announcements regarding Portfolio and Social, as well as the other apps currently available and in development, by keeping an eye on this blog and our Twitter handle (@webanywhere_ltd). If you would like to talk to us about any of the education apps available or forthcoming, get in touch here.
Blogging is becoming more and more popular in schools. At Webanywhere, we’ve often had teachers asking us if we could help them with creating blogs that their school could use. So, we’ve developed a brand new app, Bloganywhere, which makes creating blogs and writing blog posts easy for both pupils and teachers.
The Bloganywhere app is part of our Jotter Suite – which means pupils’ blogs can be accessed via one log in page within your school. We’re also developing the app so that, in the next month, it will allow you to post your school’s best blog posts direct to your School Jotter website.
Blogging itself ticks many curriculum boxes – from improving literacy and typing skills to encouraging online collaboration and reflection. Find out how your school can benefit from blogging by downloading our free guide, 7 Reasons Why Schools Should Blog here.
You can read about Bloganywhere, our featured app over at schooljotter.com, here.
Or, if you’re ready to get blogging straightaway, book a Bloganywhere demo here.
To celebrate the launch of our Learnanywhere Primary Learning Platform we’re giving away a FREE Apple iPad to one lucky school.
Primary Schools now have another exciting reason to buy Learnanywhere, the innovative easiest-to-use learning platform designed specifically for primary school communities of teachers, students and parents.
As proof that Webanywhere customers benefit from educational learning platforms that are built on more cutting-edge technology, every school that orders a new Learnanywhere Primary Learning Platform before the end of October can enter into a competition to win an Apple iPad 16GB, worth more than £400.
Just think about the potential uses that your school could have for an Apple iPad. Your ICT team could use it as your school’s remote content management device, ensuring that courses, events and digital assets are uploaded to your learning platform wirelessly in near real time. It could even be used as an incentive to teachers to reward individual teaching staff.
To be entered into the prize draw for the Apple iPad, Primary Schools need to complete the simple sentence below and make sure that they sign up for Learnanywhere by October 31.
HOW TO ENTER
To enter the prize draw, simply sign up for Learnanywhere by midnight on 31st October 2010 and complete the following statement in no more than 15 words:-
“Learnanywhere is the best choice for primary schools because…
To submit your entry please visit the link below and paste your answer into the ‘message’ box.
Competition to win a £400 ipod
The winning entry will be drawn on November 5th.
