Blogging for Assessment

Today’s society and culture is awash with technology - mobile phones, email, social networking applications and digital cameras help form the fabric of the environment of learners. At Forgandenny we are very aware that technology is part of today’s pupils’ experience and we aim to use such technologies to help share and celebrate pupil achievement.

Staff and pupils at Forgandenny have been using the blogging features embedded in Glow to share teaching, learning and assessment experiences by creating a variety of online portfolios recorded in class including individual, class, whole school and enterprise group blogs, eg Eco Group blog and Health Promoting Group blog.

Our students upload examples of their work, reflect on their learning, invite peer feedback and share work with parents who have the opportunity to continually comment on the portfolio as it develops with the child. As educators we felt this helped the school to address some of the aims of BtC5 while allowing parents to provide quality, supportive feedback and to contribute to the next steps in their children’s learning.

This transparency of assessment allows our pupils to get feedback from a variety of sources while enabling them to build up a portfolio experiences which will stay with them throughout their school career and in the end make a difference to their learning.

‘It’s an easy and fun way to keep track of what you have done in school’ P6 pupil
‘It’s good to know that you are in control and that you can personalise you own page.’ P7 pupil

This seminar will share how the use of blogs and e-portfolios has evolved at Forgandenny Primary  School and how we currently share the work we do in school.

There will also be practical demonstrations of blogging by staff and pupils of the school to help bring our story to life.

Graham Donnachie, Headteacher, Forgandenny Primary School

Graham Donnachie has been teacher at Forgandenny Primary School for three years the last two years as Headteacher. Prior to that Graham has had an interesting and varied Educational experience.

Graham taught for 8 years in Auckland, New Zealand where he was a class teacher, senior teacher, school rugby coach (very important in NZ!), ICT director of a large primary school and for a brief period worked in Early Childhood Educational Management in the corporate environment.

Prior to working in New Zealand Graham spent 4 years teaching in a four stream multicultural Junior School in the East End of London where he began his teaching career. Graham trained at Northern College of Education (Aberdeen Campus) and is currently working towards achieving his Scottish Headteachers' Qualification (SQH) with the University of Stirling.