Mind the Gap is a national programme aimed primarily at schools to raise awareness of the importance of getting every school-age child online at home. Schools who believe that this is already the case are invited to be recognised as a “Digitally Inclusive School”; whilst schools that are not quite there yet but agree this premise is important can register so that we can direct resources and support to help ensure that each of their pupils is online at home to aid their homework, revision and research.
The Foundation set up Mind the Gap because we know that children with internet access at home have a greater chance of achieving their full potential at school as well as developing the same skills, interests and networks that their peers enjoy. With statistics indicating that more than 500,000 children are still not online at home, we want to see this gap filled as quickly as possible and encourage schools, parents and other organisations to do what they can to help us to do this.
Schools increasingly expect children to use the internet at home for homework, research, revision, collaboration and independent study. Yet 8% of all schoolchildren are currently excluded from doing this due to limited or non-existent resources at home.
We need to help children whose families do not have the means to afford internet access. We are committed to helping them by giving them what they need to access all of the online resources that are available and that can help them to expand their learning time and increase their school results.
The e-Learning Foundation was very pleased to have been chosen to represent the UK in a major 2 year EU project investigating and developing innovative teaching and learning scenarios involving the use of tablets in and out of school.
The project conducted a series of trials to collect evidence on the implementation, impact and up-scaling of 1:1 pedagogical approaches using tablets. The evidence collected will enable policy makers to make more informed decisions. The project ended in mid-2015 and involved nine Ministries of Education across Europe and 45 teachers and classrooms are already making use of tablets. The final assessment of the CCL project was conducted by the Executive Agency and scored very well with a global score of 9/10.
Research Schools & their Lead Teachers were coordinated by the e-Learning Foundation in the UK and included:
- Phil Spoors, Lead Teacher, from Cramlington Learning Village in Northumberland
- Craig Bull from The Skinners’ Kent Academy in Kent
- Jonathan Else from Gracemount High School in Edinburgh
- Lisa Cowell from Penwortham Priory Academy in Lancashire
- Stephen Lea from The Williamson Trust in Kent
What is the Creative Classrooms Lab project about?
The 1:1 computing paradigm is rapidly changing, particularly given the speed with which tablets from different vendors are entering the consumer market and beginning to impact on the classroom. Over the next few years policy makers will face some difficult choices: How to invest most efficiently in national 1:1 computing programmes? What advice should be available to schools that are integrating tablets?
To address these challenges, the Creative Classrooms Lab project carried out a series of policy experimentations to collect evidence on the implementation, impact and up-scaling of 1:1 pedagogical approaches using tablets. This evidence will go on to enable policy makers to take more informed decisions.
Lessons drawn from the policy experimentation also:
- Provided guidelines, examples of good practice and a training course for schools wishing to include tablets as part of their ICT strategy.
- Supported capacity building within Ministries of Education and regional educational authorities encouraging them to introduce changes in their education systems.
- Enabled policy makers to foster large-scale uptake of the innovative practice observed during the project.
Who was involved?
The overall project was coordinated by European Schoolnet, a unique network of 30 Ministries of Education in Europe and funded by the European Commission’s Lifelong Learning Programme. The nine Ministries of Education or organisations nominated to act on their behalf as project partners:
- Belgium (Flanders & Wallonia)
- Czech Republic
- United Kingdom
The observation and documentation of innovative practice in participating schools was led by the University of Wolverhampton and an expert Pedagogical Board oversaw the project. Chris Foreman from Homewood School in Kent was selected as a member of that Board.
What did the project do?
The Creative Classrooms Lab project (CCL) brought together teachers and policy-makers in eight countries to design, implement and evaluate 1:1 tablet scenarios in 45 schools. The project produced learning scenarios and activities, guidelines and recommendations to help policy-makers and schools to take informed decisions on optimal strategies for implementing 1:1 initiatives in schools and for the effective integration of tablets into teaching and learning. The project, funded by the European Commission’s Lifelong Learning Programme, was coordinated by European Schoolnet, involved 10 partners and ran from April 2013 to May 2015. Specifically the project:
- Acted as an ideas lab bringing together policy makers, innovative teachers and technology suppliers to jointly develop innovative pedagogical scenarios on how tablets can support new learning and teaching methods.
- Conducted action research pilots based on these scenarios in 45 classrooms that are already equipped with tablets.
- Focused on how practice is changing as a result of tablets being used for collaboration, personalisation and active learning.
- Explored how tablets can be successfully integrated with classroom technologies already in mainstream use.
- Provided capacity building workshops to support ministries in introducing changes in their education systems in order to foster large-scale implementation of innovative practice involving 1:1 computing approaches.
- Provided a Literature Review on the use of tablets in classrooms across the world.
At the completion of the 2nd stage of the UK project the following video was produced by the e-Learning Foundation to demonstrate the impact at one of the participating schools; The Skinners’ Kent Academy in Kent.
There is an extremely good website with lots of material, videos and advice on many aspects of introducing 1:1 tablets programmes into school and into class.
This website also has a superb MOOC called Creative Use of Tablets in Schools and is designed to inspire teachers across Europe in using tablets to innovate their teaching. The course can be directly accessed here too.