Secondary Fronter User Network

The next meeting of the Redbridge Secondary Fronter User Network meeting will take place at Wanstead High School on the 30th November 2010. The meeting will start at 4:15pm and will last for about 1 hour. It is an opportunity for staff to share news, experiences, highs and lows of managing the Fronter MLE in their environment. The meeting will be chaired by Wanstead High School. If you would like to attend please see your MLE project manager or email me directly.

Alex Rees
alex.rees@redbridge.gov.uk

Fronter training in Redbridge

We have once again pre-arranged Fronter trainers to be in Redbridge throughout this academic year. They are running courses on Fronter Administration (Basic/Intermediate/Advanced) and Webfronter - the tool that enables schools to create public websites using the Fronter system. (It is always valuable to have several trained administrators in a school to provide backup in case of illness.)

Most of these courses are charged to schools at the subsidised rate of £95 per delegate. To book onto them please use the Teachers' Centre website http://www.redbridgepdc.org.uk/.

Alex Rees
alex.rees@redbridge.gov.uk

Fronter Training`Hands On`@ RTC

Fronter Training (Primary and Secondary hands on workshop )– Tuesday Oct 12^th, Teachers Centre

• The course will run from 9. 15am -3.45pm at the Redbridge Teachers Centre.
• The training is for teachers with all different levels of experience in using Fronter.
• Please go to www.redbridgepdc.org.uk to book your place.
• The workshops will be ran by Mina Patel (LGfL). Rosemary Hunt( Fronter), Rob Spriddle ( Redbridge Primary) and Alex Rees (Redbridge LA).
• The day course will consist of four different hands on workshops where you may choose which workshop to attend.
• Please bring your own lap tops with you to enable you to access the wireless internet connection at the Teachers Centre.
• Agenda below:

Time	Trainer	Title
9.15 – 10.30 (session 1)	Rosemary Hunt	Using Fronter for Foundation and Early years
	Mina Patel	Using LGfL content and Fronter
10.30 - 10.45 BREAK
10.45 -12.00 (session 2)	Rosemary Hunt	Using Fronter Learning Paths
	Rob Spriddle	Using Fronter for Literacy
12.00 – 12.45 LUNCH
12.45 – 2.00 (session 3)	Rob Spriddle	Using Fronter in Maths
	Alex Rees	Using Fronter for Heads for Department
2.00 – 3.15 (session 4)	Mina Patel / Rosemary Hunt	Primary Lesson Plans( KS2 )
	Alex Rees	Using Fronter for Student council
3.15 – 3.45 ( END)	Rosemary and Mina	Show and tell & Fronter Tips and Tricks

Attend a 30min Fronter Webinar

Fronter are putting on some free webinars over the next few weeks.

08/09/2010 - How to...create a test

14/09/2010 - How to ...create hand-ins

15/09/2010 - How to ...use the new ILP

22/09/2010 - How to...use the new Goal Tool
29/09/2010 - How to....use Fronter and Elluminate for learning games and competitions

06/10/2010 - How to....use Creaza for shared multimedia projects

13/10/2010 - How to....run effective Fronter forums

20/10/2010 - How to....use Fronter and Elluminate for creative writing projects

They take a bite-sized 30 minutes of your time for a Fronter trainer to take you through some of the Fronter tools online and after school. For more information click here.

Alex Rees
alex.rees@redbridge.gov.uk

The app-store for Fronter?

Following the recent presentation at the Primary ICT Subject leaders event, the Resource Gateway, from Pearson, is now available for our Fronter schools.

The Resource Gateway provides a straightforward new tool to access and use digital resources within our Fronter platform. There is the opportunity to work with free resources and a useful preview of hundreds of other assets to support teaching and learning across the curriculum. Think of it as the app-store of the Fronter world - your school can add professionally made resources and share them with staff and students to access from home and school. If you already have licences for some of the resources in CD-ROM format, Pearson will give you access to the online versions for no extra cost.

To find out more, please open the Fronter e-newsletter: http://www.fronter.info/uk/news/UK_Resource_Gateway2.html

Getting Fronter ready for the end of the school year

During the summer term a number of schools will be in the process of updating their MIS system to prepare for the next academic year. To ensure that the Fronter MLE does not reflect those changes in advance of September, Fronter strongly advise disabling the import of data until such time as a school wishes their next year’s rooms to be created.

Fronter issue guidelines directly to every school explaining sensible steps to ensure the correct data is being used, and to ensure that teaching resources are not lost and ready for next year. It is, in many ways, a digital equivalent of organising your classroom for next year.

In Redbridge there are several opportunities to get support on this procedure.

1. At the 7th July Fronter Hands-On training session there will be a 30 minute workshop for teachers relating to end of year (EOY) procedures.
2. On the 21st July there is a EOY workshop for Fronter Administrators to attend. The workshop will be run 3 times to enable administrators to attend at either 8:30am, 11am or 1:30pm. Book on at the www.redbridgepdc.org.uk website.

Alternatively please email Tina Pennells in order to request an additional copy of Fronter's EOY advice sheet.

Alex Rees

Could you be Lead Fronter Primary School 2010-11? (Funding available)

We are looking to expressions of interest from Redbridge schools to be the lead Fronter primary school 2010/11. The successful school will currently be demonstrating strong practice within their own organisation and be confident supporting other primary schools in building their own practice. This role was expanded last year to include a day a week of funded time for your MLE project leader / ICT Coordinator to support the activities listed below.

As the Primary lead school for Fronter you would:

• Demonstrate and disseminate good practice within your own school
• Hosting 2 termly after-school cluster meetings for other Redbridge primary schools to enable the sharing of good practice
• Issuing half termly update communications supporting schools on the implementation journey
• Managing an MLE room to enable sharing of good practice
• Represent Redbridge schools' views at the annual Fronter regional forum

As a associate consultant:

• Guided by the LA contact individual schools to discuss support requirements
• Training groups of staff in schools as required
• Supporting other schools strategically providing models of ensuring good practice is developed across the school, exploring how they could work in context.
• Supporting other schools tactically guiding decisions on how certain educational benefits can be effectively achieved on the Fronter MLE system (e.g. sharing school calendars, gifted and talented collaboration, literacy enhancement, etc.)

(funding for guaranteed until Easter 2011)

Previous lead schools have been:

• 08/09 Lead school HIghlands Primary
• 09/10 Lead school Redbridge Primary

If you are interested in this role please contact Alex Rees by 24th May to discuss it further.

Alex Rees
alex.rees@redbridge.gov.uk

The Webfronter course is back!

By popular demand the 'Fronter Advanced Administrator' course on the 18th June has been changed to a 'Webfronter' course. The 'Webfronter' course will go through how you can design and publish your own school website within the Fronter system.

Please book onto this course via www.redbridgepdc.org.uk which will be updated shortly to reflect this change.

Alex Rees
alex.rees@redbridge.gov.uk

Fronter: what works well?

LGFL are pleased to announce that a range of examples on how schools are using the London MLE, collated by the LGfL Curriculum Consultant team, is now available online at: http://www.goodpractice.lgfl.net/


These examples will be supplemented by a growing range of presentations, media clips and virtual tours. Along with a section for sharing room templates, these examples are intended to complement those already available from Fronter at http://www.londonmle.net/


Mina Patel works in Redbridge as an LGFL Curriculum Consultant and she will be collating further examples of good practice in discussion with schools, and selected rooms will be hosted online in Fronter’s own demonstration site. If you have a good idea that you would like recognised as such please get in touch.


Alex Rees
alex.rees@redbridge.gov.uk

Virtual Teaching and Learning for 2 Weeks!

Press release:

Can a Managed Learning Environment (MLE)really create an online learning environment that both teachers and students can call their “Virtual School”? Loxford School of Science and Technology in Ilford, Essex are about to find out at the end of March 2010.

The Virtual School

Loxford School is part of a major building project funded by the Partnership for Schools building programme B.S.F (Building Schools for the Future).

Students will be given access to lessons via Fronter MLE whilst the school is moving to its new building. Students can continue their school work and learning whilst at home. They will collaboratively do work, take part in discussions, and complete tasks as they would do in the classroom. Teachers will be able to give them feedback and monitor the students activity and progress. Hopefully it will be school as normal for the students without a teacher in sight. You can see more about the new Loxford School by visiting http://www.loxford.net/ and clicking on ‘Our New School’.

About Loxford School

Loxford School of Science and Technology in Ilford, Redbridge have 1624 pupils. Loxford achieved a 5+ A*-C pass rate at GCSE of 79% in 2009 (with 54% of students gaining 5+ A*-C grades including English and Maths). Maintaining a record of 100% of the GCSE cohort gaining 5or more A*-G grades. These are the school's best ever GCSE results. This has been accomplished while facilitating an £44 million rebuilding programme at the Loxford site as part of BSF project.

The school was judged to be "outstanding" in an OFSTED good practice survey inspection of literacy and numeracy at the school in December 2008. They have also just been redesignated a DCSF Training School (Nov 2009) and become a regional hub for the Schools Specialist and Academies Trust, with a responsibility to develop future school leaders. Loxford has been presented with the Investors in People Award, the International Schools Bronze Award, the Investors in Careers Bronze Award, the Healthy Schools Award and the Quality in Study Support Award. The school has also become the lead centre for Fronter (Managed Learning Environment) for the borough of Redbridge.

About the LMLE ( London Managed Learning Environment)

The London MLE is an integrated learning management system powered by the Fronter Platform. Offering a range of tools for learning and collaboration online, the London MLE was selected in 2007 by London’s local authorities, working collectively as The London Grid for Learning, as the preferred platform for London schools.

Deputy Headteacher comment

We are dedicated to helping our students to achieve to their highest potential. The new building will offer an exceptional learning environment. Moving over the Easter holidays has presented many challenges, especially as this means an extended break for some students in the run up to their final examinations. The Virtual School will reduce the effect of this break, enabling all students to continue with learning activities. Teachers have developed tasks which students complete alone or collaboratively with forums to support progress. Our use of Fronter has evolved greatly over the last 2 years and we are grateful for their support in enabling us to realise our vision of a virtual school. This will continue and be built upon as we take advantage of our new ICT equipment.

For further information contact:

The London Grid for Learning is a consortium of the 33 London Local Authorities which provides a filtered broadband connection, network services, a common learning platform, online content and support communities for all schools across London.


Mina Patel - mina.patel@lgfl.org.uk
Curriculum Consultant
London Grid for Learning Trust


Tanya Hurst - tanhurs@loxford.net
Director of E-learning
Loxford School of Science and Technology

Fronter Administrators - how good are you?

Fronter have designed a self-readiness assessment designed for MLE users who wish to book onto an intermediate administrator course. To access the assessment please go to:

http://fronter.com/ukusers

The username and password to access the assessment are available from Tina Pennells (tina.pennells@redbridge.gov.uk).

Redbridge provides a variety of Fronter courses available for administrators and teachers:

Fronter Training Hands On: 24 March 2010
Fronter Adminstrator: Intermediate 11 June 2010
Fronter Administrator: Basic 15 June 2010
Fronter Administrator: Advanced 18 June 2010

(The 24th March course for teachers does not carry a charge whilst administrator training does. )

Please go to http://www.redbridgepdc.org.uk/ to book on the courses or contact Tina Pennells for further details. We are also able to offer tailored support for Redbridge Fronter schools. Please get in touch if this is of interest to you.


Alex Rees
alex.rees@redbridge.gov.uk

Fronter's 2010 conference and implementation awards

When: 23 April 2010
Where: York Race Course – more info
Time: 10:00 – 16:00
Cost: £75 (£90 for non-Fronter users)

Fronter UK Implementation Awards 2010
The Fronter Implementation Awards celebrate good practice and innovative approaches to implementation of Fronter. There are 3 categories for which schools can enter. Winners will be announced at during the National Conference - enter here.

• Primary Implementation
• Secondary Implementation
• Special School Implementation

Fronter Training`Hands On`@ RTC

Fronter Training (Primary and Secondary hands on workshop )– Wednesday, March 24th

• The course will run from 9.30am -3.30pm at the Redbridge Teachers Centre.
• The training is for teachers with all different levels of experience in using Fronter.
• Please go to http://www.redbridgepdc.org.uk/ to book your place.
• The workshops will be ran by Mina Patel (LGfL). Tanya Hurst(Loxford High), Rosemary Hunt( Fronter), Rob Spriddle ( Redbridge Primary) and Alex Rees (Redbridge LA).
• The day course will consist of four different 1 hour hands on workshops where you may choose which workshop to attend.
• Please bring your own lap tops with you to enable you to access the wireless internet connection at the Teachers Centre.
• Agenda below:

Time	Trainer	Title
9.30 – 10.30 (session 1)	Rosemary Hunt	Using Fronter as a Collaborative tool
	Mina Patel	Using Video in Fronter
10.30 - 10.45 BREAK
10.45 -11.45 (session 2)	Tanya Hurst	Coursework Management
	Rob Spriddle	Using Fronter for Language enrichment
11.45 – 12.45 LUNCH
12.45 – 1.45 (session 3)	Rob Spriddle	Using Fronter in Maths
	Alex Rees	Using Fronter for Heads for Department
1.45 – 2.45 (session 4)	Rosemary Hunt	Using Fronter for Early years
	Mina Patel	Using Fronter as a Staff communication Tool
2.45 – 3.30	Rosemary and Mina	Show and tell & Fronter Tips and Tricks

Mina Patel
mina.patel@lgfl.org.uk

CPD opportunities in Redbridge

The following events are all confirmed to be running during the Spring term 2010.

If your school is committed to ICT then the "Whole School ICT Issues" workshops will be focused on Learning & Teaching (element 3) and ICT resources (element 7). You can register your school formally as "committed to ICT" by digitally signing the Next Generation Learning charter at https://selfreview.becta.org.uk/.

The last Redbridge Technicians forum was a tremendous success and the programme has been put together to make the 11 February 2010 a valuable day for all those involved in managing or fixing the technology that is in use within our schools.

The Primary ICT Subject Leaders/Coordinators meeting will continue next term, ably led by Nic Hughes (ICT Coordinator – Nightingale Primary / AST ICT) with some supporting acts. This meeting will now be for the morning of the 11^th March – not the whole day as originally advertised.

Fronter are also running three courses aimed at those members of staff who administrate either the Fronter system or the school's website.

Central training events run by Redbridge ICT team:

Getting KS2 NQTs off to a Good Start in Primary ICT	13 January 2010
ICT for Primary TA's Day Cohort 2 day 3	14 January 2010
Whole School ICT Issues Workshop - Element 3	26 January 2010
Whole School ICT Issues Workshop - Element 7	26 January 2010
Redbridge Technicians ICT Forum 2	11 February 2010
ICT for Primary TA's Day Cohort 2 Day 4	04 March 2010
Primary ICT Subject Leaders/Coordinators Termly Meeting	11 March 2010
Teaching and Learning using the MLE	24 March 2010

Courses run by Fronter trainers:
(there is a charge for these courses)

Fronter Adminstrator: Intermediate	06 January 2010
Fronter Administrator Advanced	27 January 2010
Webfronter	03 February 2010

All these can be booked on http://www.redbridgepdc.org.uk/. If there are bespoke courses you would like to set up in your school do get in touch to discuss possibilities.

If you are not in a Redbridge school and would like to take advantage of these training opportunities we are happy to put you on a reserve list and will contact you nearer your chosen course if places are available.

Alex Rees
alex.rees@redbridge.gov.uk

Technical Forum and Fronter Network Meetings

 

Just a short entry to pass on details of our Technical Forum and The Fronter Users Network.

A message from Alex Rees about the Redbridge Technical forum

(or to put it another way coordinators meeting for technicians)

 

 

 

Redbridge Technical Forum

 

“Switched on and networked for learning.”

This conference is the first in a series of events set up for technical staff supporting and administrating the computer systems within Redbridge primary and secondary schools. The programme is designed to ensure that whatever previous experience you have – whether as an expert systems engineer or as someone completely new to the role – you will find the RTF of real value with relevant information and fresh ideas you can apply easily within your own school.

Friday 16^th October 2009
Redbridge Teachers’ Centre

Morning

9am Welcome & Coffee

1. Hardware trouble-shooting
Some practical help with some real issues that are being encountered daily within our schools.

2. LA news
An update as to the ways the LA is currently supporting the work in schools.

3. Best practice
Using the current best practice guidance mixed with practical experience-driven common sense to give you a clear idea of how to replicate best practice in your school.

Lunch

Afternoon

4. New technologies
A series of short presentations on the latest technologies schools in Redbridge are implementing and the issues surrounding them.

5. In my school…
A case study of experiences from a colleague’s school. The obstacles, the solutions, the bit where everyone is smiling in the end!

6. Did you know?
Some ‘free’ or ‘almost free’ resources that you could use in your own school.

3:45pm

Close with Q & A

Booking Information

Redbridge Technical Forum is a no-cost event run by LBR but to ensure catering is planned for you do need to register your intention to attend. Booking can be completed online at www.redbridgepdc.org.uk or by emailing tina.pennells@redbridge.gov.uk.

 

Booking Information

Redbridge Technical Forum is a no-cost event run by LBR but to ensure catering is planned for you do need to register your intention to attend. Booking can be completed online at www.redbridgepdc.org.uk or by emailing tina.pennells@redbridge.gov.uk.

 

Fronter Users Network (North Group)

 

 

Rob Spriddle, our associate consultant for Primary MLE/ICT Subject Leader at Redbridge Primary School , writes the following about the Fronter Users Network:

There is a Fronter Network Meeting (North) –

Thursday 8th October 2009

4:00pm – 5:00pm

Venue:

Redbridge Primary School, College Gardens, Redbridge IG4 5HW

This is the inaugural network meeting for the new school year. We’ll be:

• Sharing good practise
• Top tips to embed Fronter usage into school life where appropriate
• Interesting projects (reporting back and initiating new ones)

The following schools are in the Northern part of Redbridge and therefore are invited to attend this meeting:

• Oakdale Juniors
• Nightingale Primary
• Redbridge Primary
• Parkhill Juniors
• Churchfield Infants
• John Bramston Primary
• Gearies Infants
• Gearies Junior
• Fullwood Primary
• Fairlop Primary

There will be a Network Meeting for schools in the South of the borough during the second half term.

Many thanks,

Rob

Fronter Ideas and Updates

Just a couple of updates from my Fronter dabbling that I feel maybe of value.

Ideas - or things to stick in Fronter

In a bit of a break from the norm, why not try these sites for custom web 2.0 buttons and headers, rather than the now cliche and very annoying sparklee text that lingers on many a bad Fronter page.


http://www.web20badges.com/ - allows you to create buttons rather like those seen on blogs.


http://www.freshgenerator.com/ This Web 2.0 graphic generator enables the user to create neat text boxes for headers or buttons, these can easily be re sized to fit a page or blog header.


Here is an example where the web 2.0 badges have been used as buttons and the graphic generator has been used for the header. I must add this has all been done using the insert image container for each image, rather than the more cumbersome mode mentioned in training, which involves the creation of a text container followed by the creation of a table and then the insertion of images. The use of picture/image containers leads to a lot more aligned look and feel and it means things can be moved around a lot more easily.

The Ceop -Report Abuse Button - I got this idea from @ebd35 via a phone/twitter Fronter sharing session today. In her Fronter rooms she has the CEOP button displayed clearly. I think I'd like to promote this for pages that involve un moderated forums and as a way or reminding children about its existence and function for when they are on other site such as MSN, Beebo or Facebook.






Flickr slideshows - for showcasing images - other tools do exist of course but this is my personal favourite a si have so many pictures on Flickr. It is also worth looking at Photopeach and ... ( let me know of any others that work nicely in Fronter.




Teachmeet 08 on PhotoPeach



Monitor Resoloution

Many of us work on 1024 x 768 resoloution and build our rooms in this size, yet many schools set their resoloution at the old 600 x 800 size. I can see why this is done, but it does make for a very squashed up Fronter Room and means users have to scroll along and up/ down to see the full extent of the content.


Fronter Rules

Anca Pauwells from Highlands Primary has been one of our stars of Fronter this year and earlier last year she created some Fronter rules to help teachers and children use the site safely.

These are quite simple and obvious to some, but others may want to use and adapt these.

Fronter Forums

Other Fronter Rules

Verison 92 Updates

I am looking forward to the updates that we'll see in Fronter 92. It will be particulalry interesting to see just how customisable the new Webfronter template will be,as currently there are just a few significant niggles with RSS and arranging things into a layout that suits you. Also looking good in v92 is the room copy tool, this should make things a whole lot easier.


Here is the document that you can also find on LGFL and the Fronter support site that outlines the changes coming.

London MLE F92 (2)