How to speed up your marking using School Report Writer

Marking is the only way you can assess that students have achieved the criteria for their vocational qualifications.

Students work on their assignments then we assess the work identifying:-

• criteria passed
• areas that haven't quite met the criteria
• feedback to improve their work to pass the criteria
• supportive comments to help improve their work in the future
• identifying errors in spelling and grammar

all within the constraints of the awarding body.

To help give personalised feedback, I use School Report Writer. Yes, I know I'm not writing reports, but the system is excellent for producing feedback for assignments too.

A huge benefit is that this software is free and completely online.

This YouTube video produced by the team at School Report Writer explains how to use it.

Microsoft Training for teachers

The summer holidays as a teacher

"Time off", "Long holidays", we've heard all the comments about 6 weeks holidays, aren't you lucky. Maybe 3 weeks off, but the rest of the time there is the planning and preparation to do for our new academic year. We are so busy producing materials and educating our students, but it is at this time of year, we have some time to improve our own skills and update our use of technology ready to return and prepare for an excellent Autumn term.

Where do you go to update the skills you need to be an amazing teacher?

There are many ways to update your skills and find new tech to use, from following Twitter #tags such as #ukfechat #ukedchat to being members of Facebook groups about your subject area. Sharing best practice with colleagues at work. Spotting something on Instagram or Pinterest that makes you want to investigate further.

We all have to demonstrate our continued professional development (CPD) as part of our performance reviews and self-assessment reports, so training that is traceable and trackable is also essential.

I always look forward to setting some time aside to work through courses during the summer holidays. As I teach computing, I'm forever updating my skillset whether this is learning new packages, the latest updates to my current packages (oh joy, that means re-recording my video tutorials) and learning new units (not an easy task in computing as the theory updates very quickly and can be obsolete in 2 years).

Microsoft Training

We use Office 365 where I work, it is brilliant, and there are so many different packages available that work well together. In the workplace, our students will be expected to know most of the Microsoft suite for their job roles, so I believe it is essential to give them the most extensive skillset they can through their time in college, gaining confidence through their studies with us.

Where to start?

I use the Microsoft Educator Community training materials to improve my skillset, their introduction states:-

Connect and collaborate, find training and lessons, and earn badges and certificates on this personalized hub created for educators like you.

I especially like the "Learning Paths", these take you through a set of courses that will build to give you a specific skill set.

Have a look and see what you could learn, the following tutorial is a great place to start if you have never used OneNote.
https://education.microsoft.com/Getting-Started-with-OneNote

I've been using OneNote with my students this year and have found this really useful, especially with the Class Notebook add-on installed. It was a great way for students to build an e-portfolio for their graphics project with me, allowing me to access it and check on their progress throughout the course. Using it for note-taking and also distributing tasks and collaboration.

There have been some challenges, students don't read and watch the training built in (for IT students, they need to start to gain self-motivation with new packages), therefore, I need to develop this into early lessons. The other brilliant use of OneNote is capturing content as you research direct from the Browser, via email and direct links with the Office Suite.


If you haven't yet started using OneNote, this is a perfect starting point.


There are also lesson plans available across all subject areas, really worth investigating and video tutorials.

You never know, there may be a lesson already created that you could use this year. Start tracking your badges and downloading your certificates.

Quizlet Live - putting the fun back into learning

There are times when you know there is an assessment/learning system, but haven't quite managed to get round to using it. A quick email prompt from the company about a new development can suddenly change your teaching in one step and motivates both you and the students in ways you couldn't predict.
This happened in the middle of last week, when I received an email from Quizlet about Quizlet Live which is a collaborative learning game.

Quizlet Learn

I was excited to try and start using Quizlet with my Software Developer apprentices and it couldn't have been easier using the search to find study sets to start to revise the topics we had already covered, plus adding in study sets that were new topics and using Quizlet to help them master those topics.

Quizlet Live

This was the icing on the cake, not only did it test the students knowledge so far, but it encouraged the students to discuss the options, work together, generated excitement and compete to win the round. It was great to hear "again, again", rerunning with the same study set, or swapping to a different set.
I've since run Live sessions with other groups and have been extremely impressed with the positive feedback, excitement, wanting to do more, studying without realising, even getting asked to play more games at a different lesson. Yesterday, I managed one of my groups spent 50 minutes on Quizlet Live games on 3 different study sets and I left them wanting more. That was 50 minutes of student centered learning and building communication skills, absolutely priceless.

The video below demonstrates how Quizlet Live works.
https://vimeo.com/161809207

If you want generate excitement in your classroom, encourage students to learn without realising  then this a great tool to try.

How to assess that Learning is taking place!

You walk into a classroom, you set some homework, how do you know that the students have completed this work or how much they remember from your previous lesson.

1. Use the lolly stick method asking random students socratic questions, encouraging others to build on the answer given, but...... that's only tested a couple of the students' knowledge, what about the rest.
2. Use an electronic system to collect the results.

Electronic systems are brilliant, you setup the questions in advance and then each student takes the test and you can identify their current knowledge level.
There are lots of ways of collecting this information.

• A Moodle Quiz - (which takes time to setup, not as easy as it looks, takes time to find the results)
• Kahoot.it - great fun in the classroom, the perfect way to test knowledge, you can download the results and the students love it. Uses mobile/tablet and Internet
• Socrative - another great way to test knowledge, again you can download the results, you can set games using the tests, uses mobile/tablet and Internet.

All of these are great systems, but you cannot easily see the progress of each student also the student doesn't see their own progress.

I've recently discovered Gooru.

This is a very different system and shows the progress each student is making to the teacher and also the student. Great for formative feedback, shows growth and also allows you to go into "reteach" mode and see at a glance which students struggled with each questions, and giving you the teacher the chance to identify the area that you need to go back over to ensure that the topic is covered correctly. This feedback is instant, no further analysis, it happens in the classroom.
The following video explains how Gooru Learning Navigator works.


My students are loving the feedback, they know immediately how they are doing in a subject, if they have weak areas and also that I know where their gaps are in their knowledge.

Do you find yourself repeating yourself?

Students in FE tend to struggle engaging with the materials you are delivering. This is especially true if you are teaching how to use software.

A typical class....
You stand at the front of the class demonstrating a new technique on the Smartboard. How successful this will be depends on what type of learner you have got:-

• the one who sits watching everything you do, absorbs like a sponge, and then imitates every step perfectly
• the student that watches and wants to copy exactly what you do as you do it, of course the student sitting at the pc which involves necks turning at least 90 degrees towards the Smartboard do miss critical steps as they are slower.
• the note taker that then refers to their notes to repeat the steps, gets lost whilst making notes.
• the "I know I'll remember it, oops what was that next step"
• or can you do that again please, I missed the first bit.

Of course, there is also the knowledge and skills of each student at the start of the class, some are complete beginners, others have some knowledge, plus there are bound to be a couple of clever experienced users.

How do you ensure that all students progress and grow at the right speed.
If you teach from the front, you tend to aim at the mid level students. Those that are beginners can then struggle and want you to slow down, those with experience get bored and can get disruptive so disengage as they want you to speed up. This encourages disengagement across the majority of the class.

Differentiation is very wide in my FE classes and I have developed a method of ensuring each student can progress at their pace.

Blending the learning using video tutorials
My solution is to screencast the materials using recording software. I teach 4 different groups of students the same unit, so a little preparation time pays off, the students have the materials whenever they need them, I spend my time working 1-2-1 with students in the classroom helping them with their needs rather than standing at the front. Using these videos allows students to pause and copy, repeat me, slow me down, work in/out of class.
Of course there are those that classically say "can't you just show me", the answer "yes, watch that video".

Which software to use to screencast?
There are online sites such as Screen cast-o-matic which allow you to record the screen, this is great to record your Assignment briefings, theory and also talk over your Powerpoint presentations.
I needed to zoom in on the mouse in my videos, wanted to add questions to my videos, that students have to get right to continue and I wanted to add annotations over the videos, so I invested in my own copy of Camtasia (Education license). The student achievement has increased through this method of delivery and their progress has been higher.

Tips

1. Always test record and check this before going further.
2. Make each video no more than 5 minutes in length. 
3. Clearly identify what is included in each one (I list this on Moodle when adding the video). 
4. Add some hidden information that you can test on later, this ensures all students will watch them.
5. Save them in mp4 format (then they are viewable on tablets, phones and web)
6. Find a good noise cancelling headset with microphone. I must admit to loving my wireless Logitech headset.
7. Don't worry about perfection in your recordings, my students like the natural relaxed sound, the "oops", wrong words (corrected) and noises from the kitchen when the kettle boils. They refer to these recordings as "warts and all", they know it's me.
8. I also tend to record at home, sat on the sofa with my laptop before the family wake up, relaxed with my cup of coffee. This comes across in the videos as being between me and the student, not the class and this makes the students feel relaxed.
9. If using Camtasia. Do all the screen capturing, then come back and edit later. It doesn't matter how noisy it is when you edit.

For students that have very poor Internet connections at home, you can easily copy the videos onto memory sticks or write to CDs, they can then take them home.

There is also an additional benefit of this method, next year, your course rolls forward and the videos are already there, you can add in extra, re-record if necessary, but lots of the hardwork has been done already.

Start with a couple of videos, pick something that the students tend to struggle to understand. Perhaps video your assignment briefings or some homework. What do you spend the most time repeating, start with that!

Enjoy the process, don't be afraid to ask your students for feedback, you are doing this to help them, so make sure they are happy with what you have created.

Time for you to get Blending.

How do you use video tutorials? Can you share any further tips and tricks?