I might have been guilty lately of an oversaturation of our new uber themes – they aren’t the only thing we offer! That said, they do look absolutely lovely, and I get to pick the Website of the Week, so we’re doing another one – welcome to Alfreton Nursery School’s stunning new website.
Alfreton have been a Jotter user for a long time, and their old Jotter site was often held up as an example of how School Jotter sites can be used and designed effectively. I was certainly planning on featuring it at some time in the coming few months, so imagine my surprise when I got the notification that they’d had a redesign! Continue reading →

We’ve got another of our fantastic uber themed websites this week, taking us to Furze Down School in Buckinghamshire. A SEN school focusing on communication and interaction, Furze Down features one of the latest examples of our modern, accessible themes. It really does manage to capture everything a school website needs, from relevant information at the very top through an intuitive menu system to a large, glossy slideshow to really get a feel for the school.
Furze Down is certainly a non-traditional school, featuring a small selection of just over 100 pupils, but it manages this with aplomb, garnering Outstanding Ofsted ratings at its most recent assessment in 2014. It stands to reason that such a school would need a great website, and we were more than happy to deliver.
Probably my favourite part of the website is the tiled buttons at the top. These stretch and adapt to fit your screen size, and their iconography is intuitive but basic. It really is a great and novel way to set out a menu, a far departure from the all-too-common list of links. I really like how the areas of the pages are defined using blocks of colour as well, rather than harsher lines.
For its clean lines, modern approach and clear attention to the needs of its pupils, staff and parents, Furze Down is our Website of the Week!

It’s not really fair to call this post a “school website” of the week – instead we’re going to be looking at Great Heights Cluster, a group of eight primaries and one secondary in Bradford, from areas including Queensbury, Great Horton and Clayton Heights – the cluster name comes from the combination of the latter two. Continue reading →

This week’s Website of the Week comes to us from Bangor in Northern Ireland, just outside of Belfast. Kilmaine is a modern school, evidenced by its buildings and outlook, and needed a website to reflect this.
It’s a bold, clean design which quickly establishes a colour pallette – the child-friendly blue and orange – and puts the school’s motto of “Everyone Counts” front and centre. The “ring-binder” effect down the side of the main body of the site also underlines its educational intent, and adds a little something extra to the overall feel of the site. Continue reading →

Welburn Hall School in Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire, is a SEN boarding school catering to a wide variety of children from ages 8 to 19 years. It goes without saying, therefore, that this isn’t your typical School Jotter primary website.
The theme itself is nice enough, making good use of the school’s colours and particularly nice use of the gallery feature to show off a slideshow of images from the school. It’s really easy to get a sense of the school’s ethos as a caring, rural school for some of the more vulnerable members of society.
What I’d particularly like to draw to people’s attention, though, is the site’s accessibility options. These are available as an optional extra on most Jotter themes, but are surprisingly rare as far as implementation goes. As basic as they are, the abilities to increase text size and switch to a high-contrast display are undoubtedly lifesavers to those who might struggle to read the standard-sized text. The change only alters the body copy, the the normal usability of the site isn’t affected – an elegant happy medium between design and accessibility.

We’re very proud of our work with SEN schools, and being able to provide these bespoke services to Welburn Hall really does demonstrate the versatility of the School Jotter platform. It doesn’t matter what your requirements are, whether you’re a rural, residential SEN school or an inner-city primary, we can help!

“Is that one of ours?” I asked our delivery tech in disbelief, seeing the website for Woodlesford Primary on his monitors. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that School Jotter websites are unattractive, but they certainly have a style to them, and not one Woodlesford fits. Here’s a website that demonstrates just what’s possible from our designers, developers and our software – I think I honestly have a new favourite website (sorry Warden Park, you still look fantastic though!).
What Woodlesford represents is a fantastic fusion of both photography and graphics, presented beautifully through our uber themes, the overall effect being modern and professional, yet also uniquely a primary school website. The bright colours and bold text are enticing to children, while also being useful and informative for staff. Everything is clearly labelled and information is easy to find – there’s even a Google Map embedded at the bottom of the page.
The school maintains an active calendar as well, demonstrating the power and versatility of the School Jotter Calendar app (included free with all School Jotter products), with colour-coded and informative notes on upcoming events and meetings. What we will point out, though, is that there’s also the potential here for some more use of the news features – another free app included with Jotter Site. Rather than PDF downloads, a proper feed of news items can be provided and automatically updated.
Overall, we’re really, really impressed with this website, and especially proud that it’s a local school too (our head office is just a few miles down the road in central Leeds!). Congratulations to Woodlesford Primary, here’s to many more years as happy customers!

There’s a common debate amongst our consultants over the best style for a school website. Some prefer a more traditional, child-friendly approach, with bright colours, illustrations and simple fonts; others look towards a more modern, professional style, with an emphasis on clean lines and elegant designs. The design of Orchards Free School’s website manages to show that the two are not mutually exclusive.
The bright colours reinforce its primary school status, while the layout and overall design give a more professional air, suited to a 21st-century institution. The use of cartoons and illustrations befits the institution – it won’t have any photos until its opening in 2016 – this is a school that’s proactive and future-thinking.
One of the first interesting features that jumps out is the presence of clickable areas in the site’s banner, clearly labelled and surrounded by child-friendly graphics. The theme of green and purple as contrasting colours helps the differently-shaded buttons to stand out. Scrolling down the page, text is kept to a minimum.
Additionally, it’s very clear what the school’s aim is – to provide SEN education as part of a wider multi-academy trust – this is something mentioned often, so parents know exactly what they’re getting. As the school hasn’t actually opened yet, this is important. We can also see a good usage of the School Jotter signup forms feature on the “register your interest” page, encouraging prospective parents to sign up to be notified. This will notify the school staff automatically with any relevant information. Elsewhere, forms are also used on the consultation page, in order to canvas opinions – a great use of the tool.
Overall what we’ve got at Orchards is a well-designed, clearly-laid-out school website that’s modern, welcoming and a joy to use.

One of our Primary Website Consultants always talks about the importance of being able to “read” school websites. What can you tell about the school’s location, situation and ethos just from looking at the design and layout of the frontpage of a website. When the notification came through that Brunswick had gone live, I clicked through and instantly I knew this was a school from Brighton – and proud of it. The iconic pebble beach, the sea lapping at the footer of the page, the regency promenade and buildings – it’s Brighton through and through.
This is a great example of a bespoke theme truly reflecting the uniqueness of every school out there. This is no one-size-fits-all, slightly-modified theme we’ve slapped onto a template, this is a theme where care has clearly gone into what the school wants and needs, and this is really reflected in the design.
Part of what has made this site so unique is the circumstances of its formation – Brunswick is a brand new Primary school, combining the previous Davidgor Infants and Somerhill Primary schools – both Webanywhere customers. This has meant that we’ve been able to start with a fresh slate, creating something from the ground up, with new content and ethos.
Another thing you might notice if you view the website (and not just the static image up top) is its animated portions. These subtle accents, done using HTML5 rather than animated GIFs, comprise the children in the image waving and a seagull flying overhead in another nod to the school’s maritime location.Too often animation looks tacky, but here it’s actually used to pretty good effect! Additionally, hover your mouse over the streetlights to see the menu items illuminated.
Overall, a great website and we look forward to many years working together with Brunswick!

Kiwi Primary School is, at first glance, a strange name to give to a British primary school from Wiltshire. In fact, when I first read about it, I assumed it was one of our New Zealand customers, the kiwi not being a particularly diverse species on the Salisbury plain. In looking into it though, I found some truly interesting things out.
The school’s name comes from the Bulford Kiwi, a chalk figure etched into the hillside above Bulford Camp, less than four miles away from Stonehenge. It was created by New Zealand soldiers after World War One (there’s the New Zealand connection!), recuperating in the English countryside. Initially an infant school, Kiwi was merged with a junior school in the 1960s and the more distinctive name was retained.
The antipodean roots are clearly visible in the school’s website, from the smiling cartoon kiwi figure in the header to the names of the class events listed in the event-packed calendar. Every effort has been made to create an attractive, welcoming and informative website. Given the nature of the school’s situation in a military camp, a large number of the children at the school are from military families, so providing information is crucial for a frequently transient population.
Kiwi’s “About us” page is invaluable for anyone who needs to know key information such as enrolment and times – too often features either missing or hidden from school websites. All the information is clearly laid out and easy to find.
Overall, a fantastic website for a truly unique school!

Now, I’ll admit, this one is a little bit cheeky – Schoolanywhere is one of our own websites, dedicated to promoting the Moodle VLE. Earlier this year, faced with an outdated, non-responsive theme and the potential changes from Google’s “Mobilegeddon”, the decision was made to redesign Schoolanywhere on the School Jotter platform, utilising our new uber themes.
We did this for a number of reasons, the most prominent being that companies should “eat their own dog food” – if a product isn’t good enough for us to use ourselves, why would we expect customers to pay us for access? This would therefore be the perfect opportunity to put School Jotter through its paces as a business CMS, to see if it could replace the old WordPress-based theme. Continue reading →