Taecanet Springboard - "A Wonderful Learning Facility"

T-Learning are very pleased to welcome Carsic Primary School in Nottinghamshire into our teaching and learning community. Although the school have only subscribed recently, they already seem to be reaping the benefits of Taecanet Springboard to help promote personalised learning across the curriculum.

Teacher, Neil Pacheco, commented;

"Thanks for all you have done for our children to enable the whole school to access this wonderful learning facility. I have shown the site to our technician who provides IT support for other schools in Nottingham and he was very impressed and will no doubt pass this on to the other schools".

Many thanks to Neil and his team for their continued support and for implementing their training so quickly. Carsic Primary have raced up to the top of our user stats, becoming T-Learning's 'School Of The Month' for September!

More information on Taecanet Springboard can be found at www.taecanet.com and any email enquiries can be directed to support@taecanet.com

T-Learning Annual School Survey 2010 - Results!

So, the results of T-Learning's annual survey have come in! All schools within our community have been given the opportunity to complete our survey so that we can learn more about trends in usage as well as potential ideas for development.

We received inputs across Primary & Secondary Schools as well as Hospital based education centres who all use Taecanet Springboard to deliver personalised learning resources to pupils from home as well as in school.

A few of the outcomes are noted below, which have been submitted by teachers:

71% of pupils enjoy using Taecanet Springboard.

100% of Primary School teachers agree that Taecanet Springboard has a positive effect on pupil attainment.

64% of teachers think that it is easy to allocate work using Taecanet Springboard and to monitor student progress.

In addition to a number of other uses, 93% of teachers use Taecanet Springboard to deliver homework.

All of these outcomes are very positive and reinforce what we have heard over the years in terms of pupils enjoying and benefiting from the resources. Ease of use for teachers is also at the heart of what we do, which appears to be recognised in this survery which is also encouraging.

What is a little surprising is the significant number of teachers who use Taecanet Springboard to deliver homework.......a staggering 93%. We have heard from teachers that using the service in this way really helps to tidy up and simplify the whole homework process. No more pleas of 'Sorry Miss, the dog ate my homework!' By virtue of the fact that all of the resources have already been created by other teachers, work can be allocated in seconds, and all of the marking is done automatically makes this online tool very homework friendly. In addition, with access to technology (including broadband) becoming more pervasive, it seems this is a real opportunity for schools to work more efficiently by delivering homework online, which will engage students and help to improve attainment.

Many thanks to all of the teachers who took part in the survey. If you would like any more information on the Taecanet Springboard services, please contact chris.davison@t-learning.net or call 0871 288 4580.

Sports Colleges Conference 2010 - Summary

Today was the final day of the Sports Colleges Conference in Telford, which was a great success for all involved. Many thanks to Ian Cawley, and team, from Youth Sport Trust for his great support, and for putting on a good event. You can see our stand (730) pictured left.

T-Learning have been working with YST for a number of years now, and we were at the show to help spread the word about our collaborative project. We have worked together, along with four Specialist Sports Colleges, to produce interactive resources for GCSE & BTEC PE Theory. These are now being used on over 60 schools to help students engage with PE Theory in a new and innovative way, while improving standards both in delivery by teachers, and in attainment for students. By offering access to shared, community generated resources, it seems that all parties are benefiting. If you would like more info on the project, and would like to see the impact that Taecanet Springboard for PE has had on GCSE results, please follow this link http://www.taecanet.com/yst/conference.htm

We had a lot of interested parties visit the stand, and as revision is vital at this time of year, this was the focus of many discussions and demonstrations. Surprisingly, quite a few teachers wanted to explore the other resources we offer (such as Science, History, Geography, RE & Citizenship) as they were so engaged with the offering across PE.

Our community based PE learning network was also represented at one of the 'Sharing The Challenge' sessions where supporters; Tony Downey (Blessed Robert Sutton School), Mick Tizard (The Cavendish School) & Kirstie Hartwell (Charters School) were on-hand to describe the project to interested parties. These teachers have experience of the project, ranging from strategic organisation to building the actual content used within the network. All of these perspectives were valuable when informing teachers about the community and the impact it has had on PE Theory education so far.

Many thanks to everyone who was able to visit the stand. We hope to see you all again very soon and I would encourage any interested parties to contact chris.davison@t-learning.net

Bridgewater School See Benefits Of Mobile Project

Bridgewater School in Manchester (http://bridgewater.publishpath.com) are taking part in the mobile learning project, supported by T-Learning, 1000Heads & Nokia.

The School were recently trained on how best to use the devices by Nokia expert Phil Campbell and it seems the students are fully up to speed already, capturing valuable content for the project.

Science teacher, Chris Percival, commented;

"We are working on the learning journeys. We have videoed a great debate about nuclear power which was a whole lot of fun. We hope to plan a field trip too!"

It seems that mobile devices are very useful at capturing content in a number of different formats which can be used to enhance education. The real benefit will come when we have been able to share the resources with the other schools involved.

For more information on this project, please contact chris.davison@t-learning.net

Sports College Conference, Telford 2010

T-Learning will be attending the YST Sports Colleges Conference 2010 at the International Centre, Telford on stand 730.

Here, we will be showcasing the output of the collaborative project between T-Learning, YST, and 4 Specialist Sports Colleges. Taecanet Springboard for PE is helping students to improve motivation and results in GCSE PE Theory by providing access to shared learning resources.

Following the roll out of the project in 2008/9, 80% of Sports Colleges who took part in the project reported improvements to their GCSE PE results.

More information on the project can be found at http://www.taecanet.com/yst/index.php, and you can follow the link to the Conference 2010 information.

Furze Platt School - Mobile Revolution Continues

We have been working with Furze Platt School in Maidenhead (www.furzeplatt.com), as part of a mobile learning project. By enabling students to use Nokia devices to create and share valuable learning resources, we hope it will engage and motivate students, as well as producing some great content that others can use to help with their teaching and learning.

Furze Platt Science teacher, Jill Heales, had this to say about the familiarisation session with Nokia expert Jay Montano, as well as the project in general;

"The session with Jay motivated the pupils, and gave them a good idea of what they need to do to capture and upload content. The project is going great but the only thing holding back our progress is a lack of time to meet regularly and agree how to move forward, as school life is so busy. That being said, all of the students are really enjoying what they are doing".

We are really pleased that everything is going well, and we really look forward to seeing what intersting content the schools come up with later this month.

Jay Montano's blog can be found at http://mynokiablog.com . For any further information on this project, please contact chris.davison@t-learning.net

Independent Schools Begin Nokia Challenge

Both Bridgewater School (Salford) & Claires Court (Maidenhead) Schools have now been trained as part of the T-Learning Mobile Learning project. This means that three out of the four schools now have the capability to begin creating and sharing educational content.

These sessions took a familiar theme with representatives from T-Learning and 1000Heads hosting the session. However, the main part of the training saw Nokia experts train the pupils and staff on how to capture and share valuable resources.

At Claires Court, Steve Lichfield (pictured left) was the nominated expert, and he was able to show the pupils all they needed to get up and running. By using Vodafone as the network provider, access to Ovi Share worked seamlessly, and pupils were able to upload content during the session. Steve's blog can be found at http://www.allaboutsymbain.com/

The Bridgewater session was run by Phil Campbell. Again, the group were taken through the major 'capture' functions of the phone, and how to upload to Ovi Share. Phil went into detail about the various applications, which can be used on the devices to further prepare the students and encourage innovation. Phil's blog can be found at http://blog.me.dm and a specific post on the project can be found at http://blog.me.dm/nokia-loopback-bridgewater-school

It looks like all the fun work begins here for these schools! Thanks to Steve & Phil for their time and expertise.

Please contact chris.davison@t-learning.com for any further information on this project.

Mobile Project Gathers Pace!

Students from Furze Platt School in Maidenhead are now officially underway. There are definative plans afoot for content creation, and the students are really engaging with the Nokia N85 handsets, which are being used for the project to create valuable Science resources.

One of the students from Furze Platt commented;

"I'll be making a video of a reaction, probably cutting it and slowing it down in Final Cut. I continue to be amazed by the phone; with it's WinZip compatability, the FM transmitter and the WiFi".

We are so pleased to be working with such motivated individuals, and we look forward to the final results in a few weeks!

Keep up the good work, I say!

Nokia/Ovi Announcement - Free Nav!

Nokia's worldwide unveiling is now over and the major announcement for Nokia/Ovi is that they are now offering free mapping/navigation services through their devices!

This will be a big blow to external sat nav providers and gives further proof of the inevitable convergence of disparate services onto mobile devices. For more info on this, you can visit the official Nokia site at http://events.nokia.com/ovimaps/index.html

For more informal information and opinion on this release, please visit http://www.womworld.com/nokia

This seems a fitting time for T-Learning to be running our mobile elearning project. By enabling students to capture and share valuable learning resources through mobile devices we hope we can add real value to education by utilising technologies, which are prolific throughout the younger population. Mapping and navigation could be a valuable assest here.

Mobile Learning Project Underway!

We have now completed the first training session for the T-Learning mobile learning project, which took place at Furze Platt School in Maidenhead.

This school has been handed six Nokia N85 devices and has created a 'team' of 5 students and one teacher. This team was trained yesterday afternoon by Nokia expert Jay Montano, who travelled all the way from Cardiff to help get this project underway. Many thanks to Jay for his help! Jay's blog can be found at http://www.mynokiablog.com

Over the next month, this school team will be using the devices to create valuable educational resources linked to Key Stage 4 Science. The devices will be used to capture and upload content, which will then be used to create 'learning journeys', which can be shared amongst our community of schools. Three other schools will also be partaking in this project, working on different Scientific areas, and I will post updates on progress in due time.

T-Learning are experts in the creation of online learning communities. This project underlines our focus of providing shared user generated content as a way of helping students to engage with education. By helping to share best practice, we also hope to make life a bit easier for teachers.

Further updates will be available through http://www.womworld.com/nokia . For more information on this project please contact chris.davison@t-learning.net

Hackney School Rewarded After Completing Online PE Homework!

T-Learning will be presenting a prize at Hackney Free & Parochial School in London on Thursday 17th December. This is to commemorate the fact that a student within this school completed the 3,000,000th Taecanet Springboard learning journey on 8th November 2009 at 9.56pm.

The school will receive a financial donation from T-Learning and the pupil in question will also receive enough iTunes vouchers to keep them occupied for the next few weeks!

This caps a great first year, following the release of our PE elearning resources, which over 60 schools are now using. The first year has proven a great success, with 80% of Sports Colleges partaking in the project, reporting improvements in GCSE PE results.

T-Learning have teamed up with Youth Sport Trust and 4 Specialist Sports Colleges in order to produce interactive learning resources for GCSE & BTEC PE. For more information on the collaborative project, please visit www.taecanet.com/yst/index.php or contact chris.davison@t-learning.net

PE Resources Score Big For Schools!

Following our collaborative PE project with Youth Sport Trust (YST), our schools have been prolific in their use of the KS4 PE resources so far. Over 100,000 learning journeys have now been completed, which equates to over 3,500 hours of extra tuition across the 60 schools involved. What was the result of all of this activity?

Students completed work both inside and outside of school online, and feedback suggests that they were motivated to learn, which matches feedback from our other subject areas. Teachers also saw significant improvements in attainment with 80% of the Sports Colleges involved reporting improvements over last years GCSE grades. Although these stats are unverified at present, we are very encouraged by this initial release.

We have also seen evidence of improved results across other KS's & subject areas, which strengthens our belief that Taecanet Springboard can motivate pupils and improve attainment through the provision of personalised learning.

T-Learning are experts in the creation of sustainable elearning communities. Our PE community was established some months ago with the help of YST and 4 Specialist Sports Colleges, in which teachers produced the resources which now populate the service. Schools are now beginning to see the benefits of this project. For more information on this project, please contact chris.davison@t-learning.net or visit www.taecanet.com/yst/index.php

T-Learning Deliver 1 Million Learning Journeys In 7 Months!

So, we have come to the end of another school year. We have reached some interesting milestones while helping schools to deal with key objectives such as personalised learning, assessment, inclusion, intervention and home access.

Within this school year, our community of schools have completed over 1 million learning journeys! This is testament to how useful schools find Taecanet Springboard in helping with the above factors and for continual learning, revision and extension work across the curriculum.

At T-Learning, our model is simple. We collate knowledge and resources from hundreds of teachers, and share that with the wider schools population. This means that ALL teachers can get involved (no matter what their ICT capability) and easily involve themselves in the provision of ICT to enhance education. The ease of use from the teacher's point of view is matched by the pupils ability to log on 24/7 and complete motivational and interactive learning journeys with rewards throughout for good work. All of this student activity is tracked and reported to the teachers in order to help with personal or whole class intervention.

As well as the cross curricular learning community, we have also recently undertaken work to set up a sustainable online PE learning community with the help of Youth Sport Trust (YST). This work has now been completed and enables both BTEC & GCSE PE teachers and students to benefit from a similar formula as described above. Within this school year, over 60 schools have completed around 100,000 learning journeys in PE, which is really encouraging.

For more info on T-Learning's innovative services, please contact chris.davison@t-learning.net

Calling All 'ISA Affiliated' Independent Schools

This is a call to arms!

T-Learning are working with the Independent Schools Association (ISA) and a number of it's member schools to help create an Independent Schools learning community designed to share resources and distribute best practice. T-Learning are experts in the creation of community learning initiatives, with an existing state sector project involving hundreds of schools. Thus far six subjects have been created in this space at KS1-KS4 through teacher generated content, providing over 5,000 Learning Journeys for students or teachers to access immediately helping to save teachers time and to improve school standards.

We would encourage any ISA school to join this community as it will provide an invaluable resource to help teachers improve standards, and to deliver personalised learning to students.

To help teachers join in, there is an online social network which is live today! This is a free provision, currently available to all ISA members. For an invitation, please contact ian.nairn@t-learning.net or James Wilding head@clairescourt.co.uk with your email address and school details.

James is the Principal of the Claires Court group (http://www.clairescourt.com/) and one of the founder members of the ISANet community. All new members will be given a warm welcome and have the opportunity to network immediately with existing members. Already, blogs, videos, photos and more are being shared. There are also different groups being created all the time, so ANY subject specialist should be able to find like minded colleagues to converse with.

Come on down!

Help Us To Help You!

Our attempts to quantify whether Taecanet helps to improve student attainment continue. We now have much feedback and case study material attesting to the fact that learning on Taecanet Springboard does help to improve results, as well as helping student motivation levels.

We have recently heard from Ian Fergus, Headteacher at Woodside Primary School in the Forest of Dean (SW England). The school is very small, with only 100 students and Taecanet Springboard was originally implemented in 2006 to help support teaching and learning in Science. Initially, Years 5/6 were the main users, but since then, younger students have begun to use the service across different subject areas as well. They really enjoy using the service and seem to have a real appetite for all things Taecanet, which is great news! Teachers also find the service a great help for class work, in terms of finding and utilising content for whole class sessions.

So what was the impact on learning?

Results at KS2
06/07 100% L4 Science 35% L5 in a group with 33% SEN
07/08 100% L4 Science 66% L5 much more able group but still exceeded targets.

This seems quite a marked improvement, even taking into account the factors stated. Even the 06/07 stats show Taecanet can be used to help students with varying levels of ability to achieve.

For any schools who wish to know more about improved results and general school feedback, please visit http://www.taecanet.com/casestudies.htm or email enquiries@taecanet.com. We are very proud of our contribution at Woodside Primary, as well as all of the other schools we are currently helping.

Thanks to Ian Fergus and his team for their continued support.

Middlesbrough ICT Event

Many thanks to everyone who attended our stand (above) at the Middlesbrough ICT Event at the Riverside Stadium last week. It was a great venue, and a pleasure to see some of our existing customers, as well as some new faces. I have to say that the food was great too!

We have a number of subscribers across Middlesbrough (as well as the rest of the NE), and events like this give us the chance to spend some face to face time with these schools, as well as introducing our service to new parties. Feedback from the event was that local schools think Taecanet Springboard offers an easy-to-use service, which is helping students to learn in a way that suits them. Personalised learning allows students to learn as individuals by working at their own pace. The fact that teachers and students can access the service online means that 24/7 learning can be achieved for students, and planning and preparation is completely flexible for teachers. Students really enjoy the activities and are highly motivated while using it. Teachers can save hours in terms of planning & prep and even marking, by tapping into our teaching and learning community. The service has been created BY teachers FOR teachers, therefore meeting teacher's needs.

Taecanet Springboard has a positive reputation for helping schools to improve results. For more info on this, please visit http://www.taecanet.com/casestudies.htm. For a free guest account, or to arrange a visit, please email chris.davison@taecanet.com with your request.

Thanks again and I hope to see you in the coming weeks, if not, next year!

More Schools See Exam Improvements Using Taecanet!

Feedback is key to any service related business, in order to help improve standards. Taecanet is no different and we are now receiving feedback from many different schools. One such school is Blessed Sacrament Junior School in Liverpool, and their feedback on our online elearing service is as follows.

Following an initial familiarisation session, teachers now get together to discuss and set appropriate Units of work for students. Multiple Units are set at one time, usually a mix of subjects.

Their main focus is home use and students who cannot gain access at home are allowed into lunch clubs. They use this technique to reinforce class learning. Parents have reacted very well and like the fact that they can play a role in the education of their child. Some parents have even brought PCs based on how much they are beginning to see the benefits of learning through ICT. This is a very encouraging shift, as it shows the transparency that using ICT in education can provide across both school and home. Teachers report that lessons are more productive when Taecanet work has been completed. Science results were 8% better than LEA guidelines and teachers were very candid in suggesting Level 4 SATs improvements were down to Taecanet! Another example of improved knowledge was when a student in class told the teacher a fact about Henry VIII. The teacher was not aware of this fact and when quizzed about where they learned it, the student suggested it was on Taecanet Springboard. The teachers attest to the fact that students learn even more than they need to on the service, and more than through text books because of the wealth of info contained on Taecanet, which leads to a more rounded learning experience.

Teachers use the teacher centre to track student Reports online from home, so that they have prior knowledge when they return to class the following day. This gives them a distinct advantage over traditional homework. Teachers and parents like the focused nature of the service, meaning increased safety and less distraction for pupils. They even suggested that Taecanet helps to improve the family unit, as there is more shared info across the family as well as more collaborative tasks such as homework. Even though some teachers in the school have limited ICT skills, they are still able to use the service. Even teachers who were initially resistant are now accessing the service, and taking that valuable ‘first step’ into using ICT, thus improving their skills. The school are now interested in booking further training to help staff reach the next level of competency.

The above feedback suggests that Taecanet Springboard is doing what we set out to do! It helps to: engage pupils, improve results, open up access outside of school and help teachers....to name but a few things. We look forward to hearing back from more of our schools in the future.

To find out more, please visit www.taecanet.com where you can apply for a free guest account. Please contact enquiries@taecanet.com if you have any questions.

Some Good News For SATs Results!

The vast majority of people involved in education have the same goal; to help students learn, improve and achieve as best they can. A key requirement to facilitate this is to provide both students and teachers with a comprehensive tool set, which meets the needs of the parties involved. As teachers are increasingly busy, ICT is now playing a valuable role in helping schools to modernise education, provide teachers with excellent interactive resources, and giving students increased ownership of their own learning. With ICT giving teachers so many options, and by giving students a platform on which they enjoy learning, student motivation is increased and results can be improved.

Taecanet Springboard provides teachers with a live online teaching and learning community, and by sharing best practice, both teachers and students can thrive in the ways described above. Students can benefit from personalised learning, engaging materials and the fact that they can access the service online, 24/7. Teachers can benefit by having access to a pool of resources from hundreds of teachers, as well as time saving features, such as automated marking (making it easy to spot strong/weak areas) and the rapid release of work, meaning that a Unit of work can be released to a class in about 30 seconds!

Year on year, we have received feedback from schools suggesting that Taecanet Springboard has helped to improve results and in some cases, massive improvements have been witnessed. To see case studies relating to this, please visit http://www.taecanet.com/casestudies.htm. We have most recently heard from Woodside Primary School in Gloucestershire (http://www.woodside.ik.org/).

In the case of Woodside Primary, not only did they achieve their best ever results for Science (100% Level 4 & 66% Level 5 - against predicted results which were 94% Level 4 and 54% Level 5) but they also for the first time achieved 100% Level 4 for Literacy & Numeracy, with Taecanet making a positive impact on Literacy through improved reading levels.

This is brilliant news, and to this end, we would encourage more schools to get involved to see if we can help in the same way. Please visit www.taecanet.com to apply for a free guest account, or call 0871 288 4580 to speak with the team about how we can help in your school.

We have also previously outlined feedback from Claires Court School in Berkshire, describing how using Taecanet Springboard has helped their students to achieve fantastic results in the new 'SOSCA' online assessments. For more information on this, please see the blog article below this one.

We would like to thank all subscribing schools for their on-going support, and also welcome interest from new schools and other interested parties. We will be detailing other 'good news' stories in the near future and look forward to continuing this trend of improved results next year!

Content Overload! Help Needed

Many millions of people use the internet every day, and it's potential power as a tool in the educational sphere is unquestionable. Almost any topic is available in milliseconds, but when it comes.....it comes in droves. This brings up somewhat of a quandary for us all. The content is all there.....probably in it's entirety! But do we want to, or do we have the time, to sift through this mass of content to find what we are looking for? The answer is more than likely 'no'.

As a worker in the education field, I typed '1066' into Google as a test, and I got over 50 million hits! If I were a teacher, or even a student, where would I start? If teachers can easily harness the good aspects of the internet, and filter the bad, then it makes the internet a unique and very exploitable tool. That is where Taecanet comes into play, as we have taken the concept of filtering the internet so that educators can benefit. For more information on how Taecanet is helping schools, visit www.taecanet.com

'The Filter' is a service, taking this concept to the entertainment market. Advertising has already adopted this technique to target specific interest groups, and The Filter aims to learn your taste in entertainment and deliver appropriate content directly to you. This is decided by a mathematical approach of probability, based on your designated preferences. Please visit http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/7489345.stm for the article.

As it happens, Peter Gabriel (ex Genesis), is one of the backers, and he commented on web content;

"You feel like you're drowning sometimes - there's just too much stuff, and you really want the good stuff, the stuff that's going to excite and inspire you......filtering is coming in a big way".

It just goes to show that content delivery is getting smarter along with the daily growth of the internet. At best, this tool is an invaluable facility making exciting multi-media content available at the touch of a button. At worst, it is like sifting through a skip to find something you may wish to use. Thankfully, with innovative 'filtering agents' like Taecanet and The Filter, coming to the fore, we can expect more of the former!

Easy Personalised Learning for PRUs

Last week saw the National PRU Conference at Eastwood Hall in Notts (pictured above). The venue and event was a great success, and we would like to thank Neil Finbow for his organisation and assistance. There were a range of suppliers exhibiting, offering educational board games to online learning. Taecanet offered a workshop on Friday detailing how PRUs can improve the provision of personalised learning for students, which seemed to go down very well. For more information on this workshop or for a copy of the presentation slides, please contact david.holden@taecanet.com

We met a number of people from various centres around the country to tell them about Taecanet and how we are helping to connect teachers and provide an easy way of sharing in best practice, saving teachers' time, and offering personalised learning for students. We also saw some existing customers as well, which is always a pleasure.

Taecanet's ethos is simple. We combine the knowledge of hundreds of teachers, so that other teachers can benefit! By doing this, we have created a vast network, which is helping teachers to deliver effective online elearning that can benefit whole class work, as well as individual work plans for students. On this basis, we are attracting sustained interest from PRUs (and groups of PRUs) due to the fact that we can help engage students, and give teachers assistance in setting work for individual pupils in a matter of seconds. If this sounds too good to be true, please call 0871 288 4580 to find out how.

Taecanet offers a range of services designed to meet the needs of mainstream schools, as well as PRUs, and we have a special pricing structure for PRUs which makes 24/7 personalised learning affordable to every PRU in the country. To find out how PRUs are benefiting from Taecanet, please visit http://www.taecanet.com/casestudies.htm where you can find a PRU case study at the foot of the page.

Following on from the event, we would like to welcome the Compass Centre PRU, Bolton, into our teaching and learning community, and we look forward to getting the centre up and running early next term.

Please contact chris.davison@taecanet.com for more information on Taecanet's services for PRUs, or for more general information please go to www.taecanet.com