TM4T Using Your System 3.4.5 - Technology: Electronic Filing

Your electronic filing should follow the Goldilocks principle; it shouldn't be too simple, it shouldn't be too complicated, it should be just right. Follow these guidelines to make your life easier in school:

a) As a rule of thumb, your school filing should be no more than two levels deep (ignoring 'wrapper' folders (see below)

b) Use folder names like !to do to get important stuff listed first (the exclamation mark comes before a-z in alphabetical order)

c) Standardise on your folder names (eg if you call one folder Resource – KS3 and another folder KS4 Resources then these folders will be a long way apart in alphabetical order, and things will be harder to find)

d) You should have a standard folder structure, but be prepared to have exceptions to the rule. For example, the only thing at the top level which is not a folder should be a PowerPoint presentation called Lesson Scripts.

Having a simple filing system like this means that you must be disciplined in your naming conventions - if you do not have separate folders for Y8 Business Studies and Y9 Business Studies, you need to name all your documents sensibly, for example: Y7-BS-Unit 3-Worksheet 2. This will ensure that your Year 7 resources are listed together, even though they are in the same folder as other years.

Obviously, the detail of your naming convention will vary depending on the structure of the courses that you teach. However, the basic idea remains the same: you should not have to go in and out of folders to do routine tasks, and you should not have to open documents to know that they are.