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BETT Review
him - to send targeted emails about study groups, for example. In an
emergency you can send an email or sms to the entire database, making it
extremely useful in terms of safety and security too.
EInstruction is a US based company that offers classroom solutions designed
to promote daily and weekly learning so that exam results are no longer a
surprise – otherwise known as ‘formative assessment’. “Students today are
21st century learners and this technology helps teachers to drive academic
progress everyday. You can engage every child in class material by creating an
interactive learning environment in your classroom. Students who normally
remain silent in class can now answer every question without fear of
embarrassment. And since you see instant feedback from the entire class, you
know whether to move on or continue teaching a concept,” said senior vice
president Samir Joglecar. Though it could be argued that contributing to class
discussion should be encouraged rather than facilitating its avoidance, getting
questions right over time will undoubtedly help to build a child’s confidence so
that they feel more able to do so in the future. It also good for monitoring the
progress of the quieter students.
Great for debate
Another company keen to talk about its learning response systems was
Classroom of the future
Promethean. Called Activ Expression, it offers a teacher controlled mode of
In its ‘Classroom of the Future’ Panasonic unveiled a complete technology
answering questions, the competitive element of which is effective in bringing
solution designed to improve both audible and visual communication, in a
the fun back in to learning. Not only does the system show who got a
secure classroom environment. Easiteach is an influential and flexible
question right and who got it wrong, but how long it took them to answer it.
software application for creating and delivering motivational, interactive
This enables teachers to tell students to slow down and think about their
lessons. It provides teachers with a wide range of cross-curricular teaching
answer, or if the whole class is struggling, reconsider the way in which they
tools in both primary and secondary contexts. Teachers can use it to
are teaching it. While this system also allows quieter students to take part in
combine animations, videos, flash files, text, hyperlinks or number based
class discussion anonymously, an additional point made at this stand was that
activities in a single document. It can also be used to create personalised
it was useful for identifying both struggling and brighter students, catering to
lessons or resources from scratch and create and prepare resources well in
the needs of both. All this data can be saved and analysed later or used at
advance of lessons or use it as a high-end, narration tool to support
parent’s evenings to discuss a child’s progress. Great for opinion, voting and
lessons.
debate, it is a mobile system and with 32 in a set can be rotated around the
Other examples of Easiteach’s versatility is the function to record voices
school for each class to use.
onto any object at the touch of a button, use the bouncy ball tool to assist
the class in reading text in unison and finally, annotate selections of a page
“BETT has been fantastic for
to emphasise particularly important messages to the pupils.
A demonstration of Panasonic’s Gesture Recognition technology
touching base with contacts
showed how the combination of a Panasonic interactive whiteboard
combined with a camera and PC can control presentations or videos
in the education sector”
through gesture recognition. Other capabilities of the system include
recognising and registering faces and hand gesture.
The Panasonic HD Visual Communication System meanwhile, brings
With such wonderful technology available, the ‘small’ question of funding
learning and world experience together into classrooms and lecture halls
had to arise somewhere, so the Education Today Team set off for a chat with
that are separated from the source by long distances. Another capability of
Philip White, CEO of Syscap, a company that provides finance for the
Panasonic’s HD Visual Communication Systems is PC screen sharing. This
acquisition of ICC. Philip explained: “We make strategic relationships with the
feature allows camera images to be swapped with images displayed on a
sellers of ICC and have a good understanding of products and product
PC during a meeting at the touch of a button on the remote. A
strategy. With a new financial year approaching, schools need to maximise
presentation can take place during a conference to share project work, a
their investment in ICC. According to a poll only 13% of visitors have come
reference video, a website, a PDF or an image. Everyone sees the same
here to look at hardware, most schools are networked now and 75% of
visual on screen, which makes the educational impact and impression clear
spend is on software instead.” Syscap has Trusted Advisor status and
and consistent.
recognises that while some buyers of ICC solutions have the business acumen
We were particularly impressed by the system’s ability to communicate
to make the right financial decisions, others will need more support - after all,
with different locations, while the gesture recognition technology is fantastic
their primary role should be to teach!
for identifying those students that claim to be listening but are not!
We had an interesting chat with Amanda Fallbrown about a package called
Careersetc from VTGroup. A careers portal that offers psychometric testing, it
identifies relevant careers, looks at the qualifications required for a course and
creates blogs so that students can find out if a career is for them. Not only
does it alleviate pressure on the teacher to have expert knowledge in every
field, it empowers the student to explore the options themselves with all the
information they need at their disposal. Amanda said: “BETT has been
fantastic for touching base with contacts in the education sector,” and having
scooped a National Career Award at the Annual Conference for the Institute
of Careers Guidance, theirs was a very busy stand throughout.
Making education relevant
BETT would not have been the same without Microsoft, there to talk about
Windows 7, Office 2010 Beta and its involvement in the Home Access
Programme; while Sony made the case for introducing culturally relevant tools
such as Facebook and You Tube into learning.
As the show drew to a close, it was clear that, far from introducing gimmicks
into education with ‘all singing all dancing’ technology lacking in any real
substance, it had showcased a range of tools that will make education more
interactive, more fun and crucially, more relevant to every day life.
24
www.education-today.co.uk February 2010
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