Interim Review Report 2015

Most importantly the outcomes for the participating learners have been impressive over the first few months of the project. Feedback from pupils, teachers, parents and carers shows that the provision of the devices has ‘motivated and excited learners’ particularly during the transition to secondary school. The approach is deemed to be ‘inclusive’; the provision of the same device in the class for each pupil is one that teachers find easy to manage. The new ICT provision has had far reaching impacts on the life and ethos of the school.

The ICT infrastructure in the participating schools is being monitored in terms of printing outputs, bandwidth usage and server storage. It can be concluded that there has been steady decline in both printing and server storage and although the bandwidth has spiked at odd times bandwidth usage remains at a steady 30-50% of the network capacity. Instant connectivity to the devices is important, fast boot up times retains the learner’s excitement and enthusiasm to use it; teachers have been very impressed at the speed of access to the technology.

The evaluation has strongly demonstrated the suitability of the Chromebook as a device for learning, the devices meet all the expectations of teachers of accessing available browser based software and resources. The additional managed teacher PC in the class works in tandem with the Chromebooks as the Chrome Browser allows the teacher and pupils to work collaboratively in real time.

The use of Google Apps for Education has demonstrated how tools built into the browser can allow for personalised learning and provide evidence for assessment. It is the instantaneous access to these tools in ‘short bursts’ in the classroom that provide the ‘appropriate access to technology’ as per the ICT in learning Strategy.