DigiLit Leicester Staff Development Awards Programme
This is the first blog post, detailing the applications received in the first term at English Martyrs’ Catholic School. A follow up will be posted during the February half term.
It has been a long and very busy term at English Martyrs’ School! However, a number of Staff have expressed interest in applying for the awards programme, and I have seen a number of openly licenced resources developing well already. Below is a list of the current applicants and their ideas of the types of resources they intend to submit.
Current Applicants
I hope that more staff will engage with the programme this year. It is not too late to submit an idea and make some resources! I offer bespoke training on OER citation, sourcing and development at times to suit staff. All of the resources made should be openly licenced using the CC BY 4.0 licence, and I can help with that too. Please ask me for more details.
This is the first blog post, detailing the applications received in the first term at English Martyrs’ Catholic School. A follow up will be posted during the February half term.
It has been a long and very busy term at English Martyrs’ School! However, a number of Staff have expressed interest in applying for the awards programme, and I have seen a number of openly licenced resources developing well already. Below is a list of the current applicants and their ideas of the types of resources they intend to submit.
Current Applicants
- Viren Patel is a Maths Teacher at English Martyrs' Catholic School. His interests are in developing resources that can be used for students across KS3 and KS4. In addition, he is working on homework and revision material to be used at KS4.
- Ian Sadler is a Chemistry Teacher at English Martyrs' Catholic School. His interests are in developing resources for teachers. He is currently writing and checking a scheme of work for the Atomic Structure for GCSE Chemistry, ensuring all the images are openly licensed or in the public domain. The scheme of work contains PowerPoint presentations and worksheets. Ian hopes that these resources will help teachers of AQA GCSE Chemistry to plan and deliver courses.
- David Nicholson is a Physical Education teacher at English Martyrs Catholic School. He is interested in the design and set up of a functional Physical Education website that can be used by teachers, students and parents to keep updated with sporting success within the school. On this website he intends to inform students of upcoming fixtures, results from games played and any other sporting success that has been achieved. The website will also be used by students to locate homework projects and BTEC Sport assignments at home as well as in school. The overall aim of the website is to promote student success in sport throughout the school and allow easier access to resources for the subject. David has undertaken some OER training already.
- Stephen Harding is a Chemistry Teacher at English Martyrs' Catholic School. His interests are in developing resources for teachers and students for the new GCSE Chemistry courses. He is currently developing a scheme of work for the C4, C6 and C7 topics in GCSE Chemistry, ensuring all the images are openly licensed or in the public domain. The scheme of work contains PowerPoint presentations and worksheets, including homework booklets. Stephen plans to also create and share resources for a Chemistry display board. Stephen hopes that these resources will help teachers of AQA GCSE Chemistry to plan and deliver courses and engage students in the chemistry classroom.
- Karan Islania is the Mathematics Lead Practitioner at English Martyrs’ Catholic School. One of his key skills, which formed the evidence for being awarded LLP status, involves exploring the use of technology in the classroom to aid and inform teaching and learning. He aims to create and develop new resources, using interactive flipcharts to engage and challenge learners. These will be aimed at GCSE Higher and A-Level.
- Lauren Seal is Head of Year 8 and a Geography Teacher at English Martyrs' Catholic School. She is currently working on a scheme of work and resources for the new GCSE specification. She hopes this will enable teachers of Geography to deliver the new specification confidently.
- Mark Flannigan is an Art Teacher at English Martyrs' Catholic School. His interests are in developing resources that promote the development of skills and techniques for all ages of art students. He is interested in inspiring art across the curriculum and enforcing the belief that art skills can be taught and improved, and that art is not just for a few students who have natural talents. Mark has developed a ‘step-by-step’ resource that shows students how to draw a ‘Prism grid’, in order to accurately scale an image. The Prism grid has been devised using four simple steps, with each step having an easily recognisable flag as a symbol. Students can easily grasp the concept of the Prism grid, and learn essential scaling techniques for their future development as an artist.
- Carolyn Watson is a Science Teacher at English Martyrs' Catholic School. Her interests are in developing homework resources for the Year 9 and 10 Biologists as part of their new GCSE. Carolyn has already been trained on using the correct creative commons licences, after attending a staff development training session with Christine Turner to allow the correct symbol and wording to be placed onto the documents. She has also learned how to access openly licenced images should they be used within the HW sheets. The homework sheets will be placed onto the school website. Carolyn hopes that these homework sheets will enable students to improve their scores at GCSE and beyond through regular checking of key concepts.
- Some whole departments are interested in applying for the group award. The RE department may submit a group project focusing on assessment feedback and the English department are interested in setting up a department website.
- The awards programme is administered by myself, Christine Turner, a Chemistry Teacher at English Martyrs' Catholic School. My own interests are in developing resources that promote home and self-learning amongst her Year 12 and 13 Chemists. I am in the process of designing a departmental website to host a range of resources for students to be able to access at home, including videos, worksheets and practise papers. I also intend to set up a departmental Twitter account, which students can follow, to provide links to useful revision sites and interesting Chemistry stories in the news. I hope that these sites will enable students to become more engaged learners at GCSE and beyond.
I hope that more staff will engage with the programme this year. It is not too late to submit an idea and make some resources! I offer bespoke training on OER citation, sourcing and development at times to suit staff. All of the resources made should be openly licenced using the CC BY 4.0 licence, and I can help with that too. Please ask me for more details.