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You’ve heard of wearing your heart on your sleeve? When I was in Redmond at the Partners in Learning Institute, we saw some amazing technologies in the home of the future (which I’m sworn to secrecy about – but I can say that my comment at the end of the tour was, “When can I move in?!”) Just to give...

It’s just over a year now since a change of government and a change of education policies. All sorts of challenges are being faced and without a crystal ball, there is still uncertainty about what the future holds for the curriculum, for school structuring, for trusts/academies, for pensions, for...

Whilst we are in the midst of the Winter weather I am basking in the warm glow of yet another successful UK Innovative Education Forum . With over 160 teachers and educators, 2 keynotes, 6 workshops and 10 award winning teachers, this has been the largest and most successful forum we have held. It...

We are pleased to announce the 10 UK Innovative Education Award Winners who will be presented with their awards, as recognition of their Innovative Teacher status, at our Education Forum in Manchester. (There are still a few places left. sign up HERE ). They join an ever increasing group of UK Innovative...

This was my 6th Worldwide Innovative Education Forum and in my opinion it was far the best. Here are my reasons why:- This event clearly identified itself as an event about learning and not just technology. The projects presented by teachers were diverse, but all focussed on teaching and learning...

Last month I wrote a blog post about Mouse Mischief , unfortunately it appeared on the day they removed the beta version, Whoops! But, I am really pleased to announce that the full version is now available to download for free at www.microsoft.com/mousemischief If you haven’t read my last post and...

I am always amazed at the various professional networks that teachers belong to. When I was teaching, my professional network revolved mainly around the teachers I met on local authority organised training (these don’t happen to the same extent any more ) and a professional subject network, such as the...

Over the past year, the work we have undertaken with teachers and schools has resulted in us creating and collecting a plethora of video resources. We wanted to make sure that we are able share these with as many of you as possible. So we have created our very own YouTube Channel. The UK Partners in...

A while ago I blogged about PowerPoint and highlighted some of the great resources that are available, such as Plex for PowerPoint for example. That gives teachers and students absolutely no excuse to create boring and dull presentations and not to avoid the ‘death by PowerPoint’ scenario. Here is...

Do you believe in the idea that our futures and personalities are governed by Zodiac star signs. Here is an example, which one of these do you think describes myself and Kristen, are you able to identify our personality traits from just our blog posts? (or even from the occasions where you may have met...

Production is running high in creating your videos for the Innovid Competition and with 3 weeks left before the closing date, many of you are ready to begin recording your ideas. So we have had a lot of questions, one in particular has been ‘Can we use Office 2010 in our videos? ’. Not surprisingly,...

For years, Microsoft has been running a competition for university developer and programming students called the Imagine Cup. In the Imagine Cup we challenge teams of students to find and build technology solutions to real-world issues. We encourage the world's most talented software designers, programmers...

During this Summer, we held a unique event for us, the first Innovative Teachers Summer Camp , where we invited 10 of our innovative teachers to develop some classroom resources. Their task was to begin creating short, 3-5 minute videos, to support teachers and educators in the use of technology in the...

We have talked a lot about Dan Roberts, one of our award winners from the Worldwide Innovative Teachers Forum in Hong Kong. He is still very much an active member of the Innovative Teachers programme, and Kristen and I are in contact with him and his school on a regular basis. He has just returned from...

Whilst planning these blog posts the guys at Expression and Blend team at Microsoft have added some great features to Deep Zoom Composer . The application now includes features to add links to images and areas within your deep zoom. If you have been following this series, I described how to create...

Anybody that has taught knows that certain well-known myths are just not true. For example, there is dinosaur living in a lake in Scotland (actually, I believe this one is true), woman are worse drivers than men and teachers do not work in August. Today I can dispel at least one of these myths: teachers...

I have had a number of requests of how to make the the Deep Zoom mosaics I featured in my first workshop post . It's a question I have been asked before, so I have undertaken a little research and this is what I have discovered. Using the information in this post you could easily create these Deep Zoom...

In my previous post I described how I see D eep zoom as a resource for the classroom, rather than just as image design tool for web sites. In this post, I am going to explore how easy it is to create your own Deep Zooms and use them as a medium for visual story telling. To take part in this workshop...

I leave Kristen alone for 5 minutes and she has had a blogging frenzy,now I need to catch up after my summer break. This is the first of a series of posts in what I hope will be an informative and constructive workshop, that you would be able to recreate with student and colleagues. As well learn how...

Did you know that 2009 is the International Year of Astronomy? It’s also 40 years since man first stepped on the Moon. Because of this, in my recent school visits I’ve seen a lot of teachers undertaking projects based around Earth and space. (Incidentally, as a child of the 1960's, I feel really old...

To collect another award of course….. Regular readers of our blog will know all about the Chickenman , aka Dan Roberts . He is one of our most proactive Innovative Teachers and award winners. But he's not just all feathers and eggs; his work is highly motivating for his students bringing Dan a number...

Where will the next Susan Boyle or Leona Lewis come from? Well, with another great application developed by Microsoft Research (the other being AutoCollage – available for free on the Innovative Teachers Network ) it could be from any one of your future lessons! As a primary school teacher, I had to...

Harri is 9 years old and spends most of his time playing football. I know this from the number of times he collects his ball from my garden. He has a digital world, but it is not what you would perhaps expect. He doesn’t use a laptop; the laptop in his family is his sister’s and it's used for ‘ talking...

Planning is probably the most disliked word in the teaching profession (apart from inspection , that is). From my experience it dominates your time as a teacher. You have a variety of planning to undertake: lesson, weekly, short, medium, long and individual, to name just a few. You have endless planning...

It’s that time of year again. You are looking in your wardrobe and last year’s fashion and nothing fits --everything seems to have shrunk over the winter! Surely I haven’t put on that much weight, you think! Then you realise how dusty and tired looking everything is. So before you know it, you're shopping...