The smart board is back in action!

Hooray, we finally have a working IWB again. Unfortunatly the teacher used it when i was on my Better Reading course so all i saw as i was walking out of the class were the children drawing all over the board while the teacher was talking to a parent! Fingers crossed next week will be better.
Had a lecture on how to use powerpoint in Uni last week. Can't believe how much its changed in the 7 years since i last used it. It's very much all singing and dancing and i'm looking forward to having a fiddle around with it and seen what i can do.
As for my IT useage at home it only seems to revolve around email and occasionally Facebook. I did do some online shopping this week, but have yet to see if i did it right. I guess i'll find out when and if the order turns up!
Got my GSCE Physics practical exam tomorrow so everything else as taken a back seat. Hope to get back intothe swing of things this week. TTFN

Time!

After signing off i wondered why it always showed my post's at a different time than i had sent them. After a fiddle and a bit of luck i discovered the time setting. I'm now on London time and not Pacific time. Mind you, with this freezing weather that we're having i think i'd rather be in the Pacific!

And yet another call to Baglan!

Well i don't know how the teacher feels about the ICT equipment in Nursery but i am getting more frustrated by the day. On Thursday she did some lovely number work with the children, which was to be followed up by work on the IWB board. No such luck! For some reason although the IWB was powered on and showing some icons it wasn't been interactive with the laptop. Hence while she was trying unsuccessfully to get it to work the children were very quickly losing interest and starting to fiddle and mess about on the carpet. Sadly the number work appeared to be rapidly forgotten about and the chidlren's attention was gone. Our school clerk (my ICT co-ordinator is on maternity leave till at least April so not much help for this assignment) tried to resolve the problem but was defeated so we are now waiting for the lovely man from Baglan to come and fix it. What i find more frustrating than it not working is that the teacher didn't realise it wasn't working until she was ready to do the activity. If she had known then she could have planned something else and the childrens attention would have remained focused on the activity for longer. A valuable lesson i have learned over the last couple of years in Nursery is that if you plan to do any work on the IWB you need to check it beforehand on the day you plan to do the activity.
It was also very frustrating trying to get the children's computer turned on for them to use independantly. No matter how many times you tell them not to press any buttons until you say so they always do and it always seems to be the on/off button! It's such an old computer and takes so long to turn on and run through all its scripts etc that they don't have the patience to sit there and just wait. If i'm waiting with them they're fine but as soon as you get called away to do something else or distracted by another child or incident they press the on/off button to try and get it to work and we have to start the whole process all over again. The computer is a really popular piece of equipementt and there's always six or seven children sitting around it waiting their turn. I just wish something could be done to enabel the start up process to be quicker. I've even covered the off button but they just remove whatever's there and press it anyway. Eh oh, moan over!
Although i was very clever in downloading Text Ease thats as far as i've got. I did try and have a play for an hour but can't seem to remember how to do the majority of the things Mandy showed us. Once my GSCE Science practical exam is out the way next Monday i'll hopefully get back into the swing of Textease. TTFN

Textease!

Well at the grand old age of thirty..............  i have downloaded my first piece of software or whatever the term is called these days. It was very scary as lots of things kept happening that i wasn't expecting! I thought i would just open the page that Mandy gave us, would find a help button and eh presto!! No such luck. Anyway the Textease Icon is on my desktop and i've impressed myself further by remembering how to get 2 objects floating around the screen! Think this will be lots of fun and looking forward to learning all about it alongside my 6 year old son. He was very impressed when he saw my floating stars!!

Getting there slowly

Wow, i've surprised myself! Not only have i uploaded a photo and edited my profile but i've also been able to move things around on my home page. What i mean by that is my 'About Me' was at the bottom and i've managed to put it at the top!! Gosh, i'm clever! For someone who struggles to use facebook i think thats quite an acheivement.
So, another week into the Module and i'm pleased to announce that the computer did get turned on this week! The teacher used the IWB (interactive white board) as a teaching aid to support the childrens learning in the 'All about me'  science topic. The website used was www.crickweb.co.uk/ks/sciencehtml . The aim was for the children to firstly name the body parts and to then click and drag the labels to the required part of the body. The lesson didn't quite go as planned as the IWB wasn't configurated properly and the children were unable to click and drag as needed. The laptop is very temperamental and isn't helped by the children fiddling with it before the lesson starts. No matter how many times you ask them not to touch it as soon as your back is turned there's always at least one pair of little hands pressing lots of keys. In fact the lap top is only a couple of months old. It had to be replaced as last years Nursery children pulled off the tops of the keys and it couldn't be fixed. As much as i fully support the Foundation Phase i firmly believe that the ICT equipment should only be used by the Nursery children if an adult is supporting them. They need to be taught how to use it properly and how to look after it. In a class of 30 children leaving it unattended and the children to play with it themselves can be a recipe for disaster. Lets see what the next week brings. Until then TTFN

7th Nov

Hooray!! Finished PSE assignment!! Can now start on ICT one ( boo hoo)!
The plan for my blog is to keep a record of our ICT useage in Nursery. Unfortunatly i have to record NO useage this week. The computer wasn't turned on at all, the Tuff Cam has done a disappearing act and there's no batteries in the recording microphones!! Great start eh! It can only get better. TTFN

My First Blog

Hooray!! i've made a blog!! Will i keep it up? You'll find out by Easter!!