The development of e portfolios in our schools was a key objective of our project which we proudly achieved.

The four primary schools all worked together with the support of the PDST advisors over the past four years to set up Seesaw and G Suite for Education. St Nathy's have established Microsoft Office 365 for staff and students since the start of this project, again with input for the PDST. The use of various e portfolios was a vital resource to track the development of the fundamental movements skills of children over a number of years. It was particularly useful for students to develop ePortofolios and the required digital skills associated for the new Physical Education Leaving Certificate subject. This is a key assessment tool used in the new Physical Education Leaving Certificate subject. Our project has developed the ICT skills of our students and teachers which is of everyday benefit to all subjects of the curriculum not just PE.

During the school closure period in the middle of this project, the benefit of working as part of a technology cluster then became evident. Due to the project, our school was familiar with, and already utilising Seesaw before school closures, which made the transition to remote learning a smoother one at what was an extremely challenging time in education.

Expert training, especially at the beginning of the project, and continuous input from PDST has meant the teaching staff have upskilled and gained confidence in the area of digital technology from participating in the project. Also, the pupils have really enjoyed using technology as part of their learning. They, too have developed their digital skills especially in areas such as recording and editing.

The support and professionalism of the cluster members, exemplified by the cluster leader, meant the project was quickly back on track after lockdown. Working in a cluster was one of the many benefits of the project. It helped to create a link between the schools involved and allowed for a sharing of ideas and expertise.

Improving pupils’ fundamental movements skills was at the core of our project. As practitioners, we had noticed over the years that pupils’ fundamental movement skills were not as developed as would be expected at certain stages.

While fundamental movement skills in the past were probably more naturally developed outside of school through everyday activity, modern lifestyles may not always lend themselves to creating such opportunities. The Move Well Move Often programme, developed by the PDST provides a graduated and comprehensive approach for children to develop these skills and is an excellent and most welcome resource to help address this issue.

By digitally recording themselves performing fundamental movements such as running, skipping, jumping etc. our project allowed pupils to utilise technology as an extremely valuable assessment tool to monitor their own and their peers’ progress in these skills. That children could assess their progress through watching recordings, has been a key factor in making this project so beneficial.

It has been argued that technology has played a part in children being less active than previous generations were. This project has allowed us to marry technology and activity and in our opinion the outcomes of doing so have been really worthwhile.

I think the skills learned by these particular students from participating in the project will be extremely beneficial as they complete junior cycle PE, and even more so for the students who opt to take LCPE for their leaving certificate. The use of video technology has been an invaluable form of assessment in our PE classes. Students are regularly recording each other when introduced to new skills, sports or activities and this allows them to peer or self-assess. A student being able to see themself performing a skill, playing it back multiple times, being able to pause or slow the video down is very beneficial in identifying areas of weakness and helping them to improve.

The students enjoy using video technology in PE class. They love assessing their peers and giving 'constructive feedback'. When asked what they liked most about it they said the following:

'it helps you see what you are doing right and wrong'

'I like to see if I am doing something properly'

'It helps me to improve'.

We have thoroughly enjoyed our time taking part in this project. We have got to learn so much and also to explore so may different areas using the iPads in and out of the classroom. We set up new Seesaw accounts and all learned to use this new platform and this was very useful when school was closed during lockdown.

We used the iPads regularly during PE when we were learning a new skill. We used it to record and provide feedback to people and this was a great learning tool for us in school. It was a challenge at first to get used of the iPads being used and to forget someone was recording but we got used of it very quickly and we will continue to use them.

Overall, this has been a fantastic experience for our school and we are very thankful to have been afforded the opportunity to take part.

Quotes from the kids:

“Using the iPads has made our learning very interesting and I love that we can use them ourselves to research new areas we are learning about”

“I found it hard to forget about being recorded in PE at first but I liked being able to see my mistakes on the iPad. This helped me to learn a new skill quicker”

“It was just so much fun taking part and we love all the new things we learned. I also like having my work saved on Seesaw and being able to look back at it all whenever I want”

“As a staff, we learned so much ourselves and learned new ways of doing things. The use of online platforms such as Seesaw made storing, accessing and assessing work much easier and allowed instant feedback to be given to the kids. The kids enjoyed receiving oral recorded feedback on Seesaw and loved the interaction of it. This has been a very enjoyable experience”.

This project has been of huge benefit to the children in my class. We focused on developing the children’s fundamental movement skills, using the fantastic games in the ‘Move Well Move Often’ books. I could really see the value of specifically teaching each skill. This also made the children very aware of skill they were working on, and they were often observed on trying to use the skill during break times too.

The iPads were a valuable asset for self and peer assessment by the children as they assessed their progress on the various fundamental movement skills through video footage. Through the use of Seesaw, there was an important link to the home as parents were aware of the skill the children were working on and could also see their progress. The children love to look back and reflect on their videos from last year and make observations on how their learning in PE and all subject areas has progressed.

The children at Brusna NS really enjoyed their time working and developing new digital skills, by being involved in this project. As teachers we have seen an improvement in the childrens’ knowledge of the Fundamental Movement Skills and their ability to show other children the skills involved in each element - either orally or by videoing their progress. They really enjoyed the fun games we played from the ‘Move Well, Move Often‘ booklets which reinforce FMS. As a school we had introduced Seesaw as a digital link with parents and as a digital platform to showcase the FM skills the children were learning at school. It became a very important tool during Lockdown. The older classes used Google for Education, another positive digital platform introduced to us through this project, which was also used during school closures. The children have become more digitally aware by being able to explore and use the ipads. We appreciate the opportunity of being part of this project and the huge benefits it has brought to our school community.