Review from Allison Allen,

Director, Outstream Consulting | Vice Chair Governors, Heathfield + La Fontaine, STEP Academy Trust

RiskITWeek is a philosophy, a calculated risk and a tool that virtually guarantees a ‘win’ for schools, their pupils and teachers! Is it easy? – It just requires commitment to effective CPD from school leaders.

This book “RiskITWeek – IT in the Classroom A Risk Worth Taking” provides the necessary knowledge, advice and strategy to make a success of risk-taking, discovery and innovation without fear.

Abderrahmane (Ben) Benjeddi offers this book as a guide to the strategy. It is written with a joyfully light touch and can be read cover to cover or by dipping in and out of the sections of most interest. Seasoned with helpful, robust, education research, the book is full sage advice born out of experience and real-school practical suggestions. Not to be missed are Chapters 5 and 6 about implementing and embedding ICT in the classroom – these chapters are full of really good examples of ICT across all kinds of curriculum areas!

When I first became aware of RiskITWeek, the idea immediately got my attention - I knew so many teachers who were apprehensive of using technology in their subject - frightened that they would look foolish in front of pupils who had grown up with computers or frankly, scared the tools would stop working.

Even now that there is so much focus on the new UK Computing curriculum, many teachers receive training on coding but not in the wider aspects and skills of using education technology. RiskItWeek is a pragmatic idea based on simply providing professional and technical support to teachers without negative criticism. What makes this 'doable' and transferable to any school is the strategy - where teachers take a risk and use new technology or innovate with technology in a culture of support where people learn from each other and celebrate the process made visible.

I wish RiskITWeek had been invented when I was ICT Coordinator! Don’t wait – this little book is a life-changing opportunity for the whole school community.

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BETT Show 2019

Yes, time has come once again to showcase what you have been doing. I am hoping to do another presentation at the Bett show this coming Jan and hope to see you all there.
BETT Show 2019

RiskITWeek

I have also prepared an eGuide to help you run RiskITWeek successfully in your school. the eGuide can also be found here on my blog

if you require any copies please let me know

I would also like to invite one person who run the project successfully in their school to come and talk about it. so please contact me through the website or twitter or even my phone number (all on the website) if you are interested.

RiskItWeek in 2016

First, let me thank all those schools who have taken part in the RiskITWeek this Academic year. Please make sure you send your clip videos to Naace as they will be judging the winner. in the future all participants will get a prize of some sort. we are still in the process of finalising the value and who should get it: the RiskITWeek coordinator who puts all the efforts and energy in organising the whole event or the school. (your views are welcome)

I am also looking for schools who like to contribute images and blurbs to a book that I will be giving to schools throughout as good practice. (free of charge, subject to finance, copies may be limited).

If you are a company and would like to put an ad in the book, then please contact me, as this will help with the printing.

the first book was based on my previous school, you can find the text here. RiskITWeek Book


I have recently read an article on the newspaper about teachers who barely use the technology in classrooms. (the article can be found here technology barely- used by half of teachers.). the simple answer is RiskITWeek.

Here is what Westfields Junior School says:
"I loved the idea of using crumble but
was a bit nervous of the concept as I
haven’t used it before. It is easy Scratch
like block coding and the pupils picked
it up straight away, could debug and
evaluate their program. It is a great bit
of kit and I would definitely use it
again. It was worth the risk."
Teachers name Mr Darren Chapin
Westfields Junior School

"Staff Training" under pressure?

With more and more technology being poured in most schools, the question is what to do with it all? have I missed something? are teachers suddenly proficient in all aspects of the equipment they have in hand?. what about the leadership expectations? what do they want to get from the technology? and one more thing, who decided on the type and nature of the technology chosen? was it a market force? influence from other schools? technical knowledge of the decision maker in the school? cost? BSF inflicted non-negotiable package? or something else?


when it comes to technology in schools, we are still in the "show off" stage, School leaders are always proud to show off the latest technologies they collected, they openly say that they have spent such and such amount of money on new system. some of them write their development plan around the technology, they make the technology as an end not as a mean. This is almost like those schools whose Network Manager dictates what the curriculum should do, and that through laziness the motto of the network team becomes: "if something is not compatible with the network system it should be left alone."
This method puts the technology above the curriculum, it dictates the direction of classroom practices, limits creativity as a result it becomes more of a hindrance than a help, teachers very quickly turn away from it in favour to what they know best or comfortable with.


So the question is how can we make the technology "invisible"?, by that I mean, how can we use it as a mean to an end, how can we make it work for us?

First, there are some simple steps to take:
- you do need a confident network team, people who understand Education and classroom pressures.
- you need a person (coordinator) who has technical knowledge and of course must be a teacher. This post is not suitable for a deputy head teacher or a non teacher. they must be practitioners and have the time to listen to teachers' needs and be able to convert that into action. they also must be able to support teachers and be prepared to lead the network team and make sure they understand is needed from them and the direction they need to take when designing/updating the network.

The Coordinator need to run a tight "Fault" reporting system with rapid turnaround with log keeping. faults must not be repetitive and long term solution need to be a priority.

Finance: this is always a contentious issue, the Coordinator "must" have access to the decision makers and no one should represent them at the table when the budget is being decided. they must have a say in the decision making, as long as they are following the school development plan and priorities as outlined by the headteacher.

That leaves training and innovations. Although this is THE most important part of the equation, it is usually misunderstood,  neglected or done half-heartedly just to tick the box. "Continuous training is the key to a confident school.

Over the years I have run countless training sessions to staff, most of them were successful, however some were not, but how do we measure the success or failure of a training programme?

 Any training must benefit students directly or indirectly. The majority of CPD or SDD days do not benefit students directly. they are usually reserved to outline the school vision, or policies or some big change but they are also used for "information giving" and paperwork.

The best and most effective training is the one that challenges teachers, boost their confidence and creativity, it is the one that benefits students.

But how can you achieve all that? as I said earlier on, I have done a variety of training strategies, but I come to fine the one that not only hits the above points but changes the whole culture of the school is where staff take the risk in a controlled environment. that is why I came u with the RiskITWeek idea. Already successfully used in many schools, it allows staff to learn new things in the class with students, and if students know how to use the equipment then they become active teachers and learners at the same time.

the RiskIT Strategy (please see full details at www.riskitweek.com ) is much more than just training, it brings teachers, students and leadership team together.

Academy Award? Year 7 student !!!

This week, a year 7 student created her own award in class. She learned programming in Kodu as part of the lesson I was teaching them,  once she learned to add the score and penalties, she also added some tricks that made it more interesting. she designed a game in Kodu and run a completion in class.

from home she analysed the score and selected the top five scorers in class. the following week she asked me if it was ok to present the winners with a certificate and a prize.



It was a much appreciated ceremony that beats the Oscars.

BETT Show 2016

Some schools have been using the RiskITWeek strategy as an integral part of their school life. RiskIT is about more than just changing the mind set of the stakeholders in the school, it is about changing the culture and giving students the best of everything they deserve.

Most schools have invested lot of money on new technologies, some have new buildings too. unfortunately staff training has not matched this investment in most schools. and as staff move from one school to another, you find yourself faced having no funding nor time allocated to train all staff again.

With the pressure on time and money, RiskITWeek offers the best CPD there is. RiskIT is about building confidence in teachers to using new technologies and experiment with new ideas.

This year, we have presented the first RiskITWeek Award to Tunstall School. We are looking for more school this coming year.

we are also looking for some school to share their experiences at the BETT Show 2016.

 

 strategy is sponsored by http://ncstechnology.co.uk/

and supported by @Naace

 

What are we doing at our school for RiskIT this year?

As we have been implementing RiskIT strategy for many years now, this is year we are focussing on the impact of these innovative ideas on the curriculum. I am trying to explore various ways to measure the impact on the learning. this is done through a variety of ways, from  collecting  opinions from students and teachers to looking at quality of the work. as well as doing a comparison  with the alternative.


 I will share with you the outcome of this experiment buy the end of November or soon after.
hope your RiskIT will be successful and enjoyable.
please do not forget to register here to take part.