Online Digital Platforms

Click on the image of your school's platform below to find out more about its features and potential in supporting blended learning.

Key Platform Considerations

  • Staff competency with technology. We have 'Getting Started Videos' on our PDST Youtube Channel as well as a range of Seesaw, Class Dojo, Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 videos sprinkled across other playlists. There is a short 1.5 online course, Introducing Digital Portfolios, on pdsttie.ie.

  • Parental consent is necessary when setting up accounts for learners under the age of 16.

  • For GDPR requirements, please see https://gdpr4schools.ie and http://www.dataprotectionschools.ie/en/

  • Expectations on learner-teacher interactions should be clearly understood. It is best to be consistent with this. This should be documented in your AUP Policy. Information can be found on the Webwise website and should be updated to reflect the school's current blended learning approach.

Synchronous and Asynchronous Learning

Case Studies

Case Study A

The infant teachers in a rural primary school are using Seesaw to reinforce new concepts and skills that have been taught in the classroom. When they teach a new sound, they create a short video within Seesaw to highlight the new sound and show how the letter is formed. Pupils can listen to the video as often as they need and parents can see how the letter is being taught. Pupils then complete follow-on activities including sound hunts and letter formation activities to reinforce this new learning. Some of these activities are completed within Seesaw and some are hands-on activities in class. This gives pupils a number of ways to present what they have learned.

Case Study B

A medium sized primary school has been using Google Classroom as their online digital platform to create and assign learning activities for their pupils. The staff and pupils are comfortable using Google Classroom to date, having received whole school CPD.

A simple example of how one way a teacher used Google Classroom to support pupil learning was by sharing a voice recording of the English poem her class were exploring . The recording of the poem helped parents with English as an additional language to support their children. The teacher also posted a choice of accompanying differentiated activities on the poem to be completed at home. In class, the pupils dramatised a reading of the poem in groups.