Personalising learning

Personalisation is a term which is used reasonably frequently in education circles as a goal we should seek.   The ability to provide students with educational experiences which are suited to their needs, abilities and wants.    Technology is helping us progress towards this.

Students can use technology to choose when to learn, using online resources, flip classrooms videos and a multitude of other methods.   Students can choose how to learn or the medium they wish to explore learning through whether this be exploring textual content via Wikipedia, video content from YouTube or audio content via a podcast.   They can also make use of the likes of Skype, Twitter or other platforms to engage in two-way communication and learning with experts, their teachers or other individuals the world over.    This brings us to the global nature of learning in this technological age.    Our learning is no longer limited to our local context.   Instead it can span the earth as I myself know having taken part in a Skype session with a school in Saudi Arabia as just one example of learning across geographical borders.   This opens learners up to new contexts, viewpoints and perspectives which were previously inaccessible, however through technology can easily be arranged.   It also allows them to stretch their own learning and learning experiences beyond that presented formally within their school and by their teachers, exploring those areas which are of particular appeal or interest.

Using technology students can choose the tools they want to use in taking notes during lessons, in revising content and in producing assessment materials.  They can also accommodate for their own specific learning needs using accessibility tools including tools for students with visual impairments, dyslexia or students who are second language learners for example.

Technology is a tool which can have significant impact on learning.   The ability for students to personalise learning and learning content is a key to this potential, putting the learner more in control of their own learning experiences.    It is less about us, as educators, personalising learning for our learners and more about providing them the tools and technologies to allow them to personalise learning for themselves.

 

 

 

Microsoft Bootcamp

Last week I attended a 3-day Microsoft Bootcamp in the Microsoft London offices.   It was a pretty packed programme across the 3 days covering a diverse range of topics however as I sit on the train on the way home let me try and summarise the key points.

Accessibility

The session on accessibility led by Hector Minto (@hminto) is the one that sticks in my mind the most.   In fact from discussing with some others, it stuck in their minds too.    During the session a variety of accessibility tools were demonstrated with the most important factor being that these solutions are already available within Windows 10 and the Office 365 suite.     Some of the ideas where horribly simple;  Horrible in the fact that these simple approaches hadn’t been something I had realised could have a significant impact.    A larger pointer for when demonstrating on screen or a slightly different windows colour scheme were just two of the tips.    Adding Alt text to images in documents and on social media posts was another.    The ability to add subtitles to video via using Microsoft Stream or the use of PowerPoint and inline translation were also discussed.

It is clearly for all of us to do our bit, and generally this only requires making small changes to our normal practices.

The “MEC” or Microsoft Educator Community

I have been aware of the MEC and the variety of resources available within it for some time.   The three-day event however highlighted how the MEC could be used as a vehicle for CPD.   I, myself, have recently seen the power of training codes and badges on motivating people to undertake CPD in relation to educational technology and the event only served to strengthen this view.   One of the keys tasks I believe I now need to undertake is to curate the MEC content which I believe is most valid and will have the biggest impact with staff at my school.

Microsoft Teams

A fair amount of the event was focused on how Teams could be used in schools, colleges and universities.    It was notable that the actual platform used throughout all three days, to facilitate collaboration, discussion and sharing, was in fact Microsoft Teams.   People were posting questions, links and other content so that all attendees could benefit from the shared knowledge and experience of the group.   I can clearly see the benefits of using Teams to support educators from across department, across a school or even across institutions to get together and work collectively to bring about continual improvement and to tackle challenges.

A number of the events sessions included remote sessions delivered from the Seattle and also Glasgow, a reasonably diverse choice in locations.    These highlighted how Teams could facilitate opportunities for learning more akin to that experience by the increasing number of remote workers which now exist.   This also, again, highlighted where Stream could play its part in the recording of such meetings complete with the automatic creation of subtitles which were easily searchable by users.

Microsoft OneNote

A number of individuals shared how they were using OneNote in their institution.   I found a particular presentation by Esam Baboukhanto be very interesting.    Esam pre-prepared regular checklists and review questions in OneNote in order to get students to take greater responsibility for their learning.   He also mentioned the use of review questions which students were required to undertaken to get them to revisit learning in order to aid better memory retention.    The use of OneNote as a tool to aid such spaced retrieval practice was something which I hadn’t considered however I can easily see how this might work well.

Overall

It was a tiring three days with lots going on.   The event itself was specific to FE and HE, whereas my current context is that of an independent school.   I had decided to attend given the large number of students we have which study A-Levels which otherwise they would study in an FE institution.    In hindsight I made the right call as the event was very worthwhile.   I left with plenty of notes and an equally high number of points either for consideration or for action.    All attendees also left with Microsoft Trainer accreditation, thereby able to deliver training and issue training codes via the Microsoft training platform.   For those who are considering attending a Bootcamp I would definitely recommend it.

I am also looking forward to continuing online discussions via Teams with those who attended the event and with others who have attended previous events.   I suspect, despite what was an excellent event, I am still to experience the true benefits of the event.   I suspect such benefit lies in the network and community of individuals sharing their ideas, resources and thoughts on the Microsoft platform, and on other EdTech following attending a Bootcamp.

 

Keeping students safe when the dark web is so easily accessible.

I just heard about software to allow the easy setup of a website on the Dark Web with little technical knowledge required and no costs other than the requirement of an internet connection.  Simple, easy and instantly anonymous.

Maintaining the safety of students online is a key part of a school’s overall efforts to safeguard students.   When I first entered teaching, this was relatively straight forward.   Students only access to devices in schools was likely to be the PCs in the computer suites where they had limited ability to make changes due to not having administrative access.   In addition, the school would have internet filtering in place to protect the students, where the students main tendency was to seek out games as opposed to any other inappropriate content.   I remember as the ICT teacher in one school, regularly having a look at the schools internet statistics and reviewing the most commonly hit sites for signs of games or other inappropriate content.   It was normally games I would find and therefore games I would block.    For those students who decided they wanted to bypass the schools restrictions the tools available were limited and the required knowledge to make them work was often greater than that which the majority of students possessed.

Fast forward around 15 years, to today, and the students are more aware of the content which is available on the internet, plus the search tools are better.  As such I suspect it is no longer games which are the most prevalent inappropriate website category in schools.     In addition, in many schools, students now come to school with their own device, either a device required by the school or a mobile phone.   The tools available to bypass school restrictions are now easily accessible, numerous and also easy to use.   These tools often aimed at supporting the right to privacy can easily be used for other purposes such as hiding malicious or inappropriate online activity.   I note for example how VPN providers can now be seen advertising their products on TV or heard on the radio.    In the last couple of days, as mentioned at the start of this post, I have also heard of the easy availability of software aimed at allowing individuals to setup websites on the dark web to anonymously share content without fear of it being traced back.

The technical solutions of the past, filtering and monitoring, are no longer sufficient as simply put, monitoring and filtering doesn’t work.    This isn’t just a school problem, this is a societal issue.   The societal issue is beyond the scope of this post however within schools we cannot sit idly by, we need to take action.   We need to take a wide view of online safety which with the removal of the ICT curriculum, somewhere these issues were often discussed and explored with students, has become increasingly difficult.   Time needs to be found to explore the issues around living in a digital world, to explore online safety, ethics, privacy, security, etc however sadly for now I am not sure where there is space for this in the already packed curriculum.    Given this, for me, all schools need to ask themselves what they do in relation to online safety, and what more could they do?   This is a question that should be asked at a senior level.   It is also important that schools get together, not just to share good practice but to collectively work together to ensure we strike a balance between preparing students for the technological world and keeping them safe.  We are all in the same boat and therefore maybe we need to find a collective approach to a collective problem.

 

 

Exams: Why should 1/3 of students fail?

Not so long ago I read of a discussion in relation to whether the GCSE English Language should be scrapped.   Part of the reasoning behind this is identified as being due to the subject identifying a third of students as having failed.    As a headline I think it is difficult to disagree with.  How can identifying a third of students as having failed be an acceptable thing to do.    On reflection my view is that this issue is less about English Language subject and more about the educational system as it is now and as it has been for over one hundred years.

I remember when I worked within an FE college and I was involved in enrolment following the release of the GCSE results.   A-Level and Level 3 BTec courses had clear admissions requirements in terms of the minimum number of B’s or C’s required to gain entry to each course.   This often included the need for a minimum of a C in Maths or English.    I also remember working with students on their university applications, post A-Levels, where once again universities have entry requirements which students must achieve to gain entry.    Once again there might be a need for three C’s to get on their preferred university course.

The issue with the above is that a certain set of grades will gain entry and other lower grades will not result in entry.    It is easy to therefore perceive some grades as being passes and as a result the other remaining grades must be fails.     The education system as we know it is built on the ability to group students in terms of their ability, as described by their grades, and through this identify the opportunities which will be available.     As a result of this, independent of the U, or ungraded option, there will always be a perception as to some grades, those that easily permit entrance to the next level of education, being perceived as being passes and the remainder as being fails.

An alternative is to have qualifications which allow all students to pass.   From the headline point of view, improving from only two thirds of students passing to one hundred percent of students passing sounds logical and a success worth celebrating.   The issue is that it is unlikely to result in any real change.     FE colleges will still need to set requirements, meaning some passing grades will permit entry while others will not.    Universities will also set their requirements and again some grades will allow students to pass onto the next level whereas others will see their application fail to get them in.

The above alternative continues to be based on an education system where students pass through the system based on their age.    Given this there is a need to differentiate the students hence assigning grades to students based on their exams and coursework.

If we are to consider a system where all students are to achieve, we need to acknowledge the students learn at different rates.   We therefore need to allow students to progress through education at different rates.    The different rates of progress can therefore be used to differentiate students and identify when they are ready to progress to the next educational level.   Again this seems like an enviable solution in that students either complete or can be considered as having not yet completed or achieved.   They haven’t failed as the opportunity to complete always exists, being available for them at a time that suits their learning and rate of progressions.     The issue here is once again perception in that quickly there will become a view as to what the expected rate of progression will be.   This might be that by the age of 18 students will progress to university.   Instantly with this perception the media will be able to quote the percentage of students who proceed on or ahead of this target and therefore the percentage which do not.    Again we have those that progress as normally expected, those which pass, and those who progress at a slower rate, and therefore have not passed;  those which are perceived to have failed.

I don’t like the idea of one third of students failing.  It simply doesn’t feel right.   That said it is difficult to find an alternative solution that wont simply see us back in the same position a couple of years in the future.

 

Some thoughts on web filtering

Have been given school based web filtering some thought recently with a particular focus on how lots of things in life are part of a continuum, where the polar opposite extremes are often viewed as what we want to achieve, or not achieve, yet are impossible to actually get to.   We tend to end up achieving a position somewhere in the middle.

Take web filtering, which is all about safeguarding;   we clearly want to achieve total safety for our students online, one extreme, and want to avoid putting them in a situation where they a presented with everything inappropriate, and potentially damaging, the internet has to offer, the other extreme.  I don’t expect anyone to be able to argue with, or to want to argue with, the above.   Why wouldn’t we want to achieve safety online for our students?

The issue is this isn’t possible without preventing them from having any access to technology and the internet, and we want to provide students access to tech to help in preparing them for the world we all now live in, a world filled with tech.   Now I know some schools ban devices however I believe this simply shifts the problem in that students either will do their experimentation at home or will do it in the next phase of their education or life, in Further education, Higher education or in the working lives.   We therefore won’t have prepared them or equipped them with the skills to remain safe, which I think is a key element of safeguarding.    We won’t have prepared them for the future and in fact we may be setting them up for problems when they suddenly find themselves outside the insulating bubble of the school, and having to deal with technology, social media, etc, all on their own.

Let’s assume that we have decided that preparing students for a technological world is important and therefore we allow them ready access to mobile devices, computer labs, etc, around school.   Now how do we approach the filtering situation?

One approach might be to have aggressive filtering and monitoring with a view that this will make students safer.   Sadly, this isn’t as easy as it once was.    Technology designed to support privacy of data including HTTPS and VPNs, to name but two, make it increasingly more difficult to monitor activity.    It is now more difficult to argue with students as to why they shouldn’t be using a VPN when VPNs are now routinely advertised on TV and radio as a measure to protect personal data.   This issue is even more evident where devices belong to the students and the organisational control which can be exercised on school owned devices either cannot be applied or can be easily removed by students.   We also have the challenge of student mobile phones which can be used as a personal hot spot for internet access via the phone service provider thereby bypassing the school network and its protective measures.   There is also the potential issue of devices, such as iPads, with 4G capability in addition to normal Wi-Fi and with the introduction of 5G this is also on likely to become more common.

The other concern I have with filtering is that it might be viewed as a compliance issue and therefore once set up some may consider the issue of online safety addressed.  Internet filtering is however never perfect, plus some of the tools available which are generally positive, can be misused leading to negative outcomes.  There is also the issue that the internet services which are available are constantly changing.   This therefore requires ongoing review along with a more holistic view of how online internet safety is managed including awareness, support for students and support for, and engagement with, parents.

The need to keep students safe online is clear and something few can disagree with.   The challenge is how we actually implement this safety.   This is not so simple.    It isn’t a simple compliance matter of blocking certain categories or sites.   We want to provide students access to the internet and its services so they can learn the skills they will need for the future, so we can’t block everything, yet we want to block as much inappropriate content as is possible, in a world where monitoring and blocking is becoming increasing difficult and/or ineffective.

For me, it is up to schools to decide the best approach for their own setup, their own infrastructure, students and culture.   It is also key that schools continuously review their approach to assume it keeps pace with changes in student habits and in the technologies available.   Although there isn’t one single solution for all schools, for each school there is a solution.

A VR Conference

Attended my first ever event in VR on Saturday evening, listening to Steve Bambury discuss his views on VR in education.

The Engage platform used for the session was reasonable intuitive to use with a limited set of controls to get used to.     You can easily wander around within the presentation environment or can make use of the ability to teleport as you can in lots of VR apps.    Engage also comes with a short tutorial, which I made use of, to help you get used to how things work.

Within the platform the event organiser has the ability to display slides which in the event I attended were displayed on a big screen towards the back of the environment.   The organiser can also mute or unmute attendees which is useful in avoiding audio issues and in particular audio feedback.

My Selfie in VR

Through their controllers attendees are easily able to make use of common hand gestures including raising a hand to ask a question, waving and pointing at objects or people as needed.   You can also bring up a virtual tablet device which allows you to capture photos from the session, or even a selfie or two, as well as take notes and access your settings.

For me one of the key takeaways from the session was the ability to collaborate across distance.  In this case Steve was in the UAE while I was in the UK.  Am not sure where some of the other attendees were from however I suspect some US attendees may have been present.   Clearly VR allows people to discuss or work collaboratively independent of distance although time zone would need to be considered.      Another advantage I can see was the openness of the environment which to me would facilitate students exploring locations, ideas and concepts with a degree to freedom which is not easily replicable in the real world.

It should also be noted that VR allows you to replay previous events, such as being able to step back into the presentation at a later date, viewing it from a different perspective or just revisiting or revising the content.    This might be useful in terms of reviewing a session, its successes and challenges, prior to identifying next steps or areas for improvement.   Additionally, just prior to the session, I explored some of the pre-prepared content which comes with Engage, such as a David Attenborough presentation focussing on Dinosaurs.    There appeared to be lots of content to view being a mix of proper VR experiences and 360 degree videos.   I expect with a bit more time I will explore some of this content.

Overall I enjoyed the experience and can see how it might be useful for CPD and for collaborative activities with students.   I think my next step will be to play with creating my own event and how this would work, with a particular focus on how students might interact and work together within a Engage environment.

 

 

 

 

 

CIO Summit 2019

Interesting day at the CIO Summit down in London yesterday.   This was my annual visit to an event focusing on IT in the wider, including corporate, world rather than within the education sector.   I make an effort to do this simply to try and get a wider view of IT, digital transformation and digital innovation to help provide some context to my work in school.   There were four key messages which definitely resonated with me.

Its about the problem we are solving, not the Tech.

The CDIO of HMRC, Jacky Wright, outlined the importance of focussing on the problems you are seeking to solve rather than coding, or the technology you have available.   This is a message I have often heard Mark Anderson (@ICTEvangelist) state in relation to education, in that it is not about the technology, it is about Teaching and Learning.   In a more recent post I think he hit the nail on the head when he said its not really #edtech after all, its simply #Ed.  It would seem that this need to focus on the end outcome or product and not be distracted by shiny or new technology is something which impacts on the wider IT world rather than just education.

Culture eats strategy

The importance of organisational culture was stated by a number of presenters.   Like a focus on the problem being solved, mentioned above, a focus on culture was identified as being more important than the Tech being used.   I liked Rackspaces mission of providing a “Fantastical Experience” as both setting the tone and culture which they seek to achieve within the organisation.   I wonder whether schools could be a little more inspirational in the missions they set rather than the usual “developing the best learners” or “preparing students to the future” style of mission which we commonly see.  At the end of the day the culture of an organisation is key in what it achieves or does not achieve.   The people, the leadership team and the staff, shape the culture.

Sustainability

A number of presenters discussed the issue of sustainability in relation to technology.   This is a challenging area given that technology may be both part of the solution and part of the problem.   In being the problem, as we consume more data, use more technology and even personally have more devices, we need more power.   We also consume valuable resources in the manufacturing processes plus make use of valuable metals in the various tech products.   This all adds up to using more energy at a time when we want to be using less.    Thankfully tech can also be the solution here in using AI to match availability and demand, in harnessing greater amounts of renewable energy with greater levels of efficiency and in supporting remote collaboration reducing energy consumption associated with travel.     A particular area of discussion in relation to sustainability was that of the supplier chain.   It was highlighted that organisations need to be aware of the energy consumption of the third parties they use rather than treating this as an issue for the third party.  If you are using Microsoft or Google cloud services, the resultant energy usage associated with their data centres, as used to store and process your data, needs to be considered in thinking about your organisations carbon footprint and energy usage.   In addition, looking at devices, including PCs, printers, etc, we also need to consider how suppliers source their resources, manage energy use during production and also to what extent their devices can be recycled, refurbished or reused.

Cyber Security

This topic was always likely to arise as part of discussion.   I found the presentation by Brigadier Alan Hill particularly interesting in discussion his views.   The key issue is ensuring that the risk associated with cyber security is understood at a board level and then working on constant review, testing and preparation for cyber events.      As he identified any plan made won’t survive an encounter with the enemy however the act of having and more importantly testing a plan will at least make you and your team as prepared as they possibly can be for when, and not if, a cyber incident happens.

This was my 2nd CIO Summit event and once again I found it to be useful and informative.   Towards the end of the event the importance of sharing ideas and best practice with IT peers was discussed and for me attendance at this event is a key part of this.   Our best chance for innovation and for security is collaboration and cooperation;  we are all in this together.  And so as I write this on the train on the way home I look forward to reviewing my many pages of notes and identifying the actions to take as a result of this event.   I cant wait for next year.

A bit more VR

Once again decided to experiment with the VR this week, this time trying two new apps although both this time were paid apps.   The apps in question were Gravity Sketch and Masterpiece VR.    In both cases I didn’t have too long to experiment with them so the below are just my initial impressions.

Starting with gravity sketch, the first thing I found was that the app seems to be very powerful and with that comes a complex set of controls.  This is an app you would need to spend some time with to properly get to grips with it before being able to confidently use it.    I found myself quickly able to draw various shapes and models reasonably easily however I think trying to make a larger product from these shapes would take me a greater among of time.   I particularly like the tool that allowed me to extrude a shape.   I found myself quickly making the body for chess pieces, something which isn’t quite as easy to do when you are limited to primitive shapes as you are in some other apps I have tried.   I can see this app having great potential in Design Technology lessons in particular.

Masterpiece VR, I felt, wasn’t quite as powerful in terms of the tools available when compared with Gravity sketch however as a result it has an easier user interface to get to grips with.   I was quickly working with virtual clay and making a sculpture.  I could easily edit my sculpture cutting sections away or moulding areas to suit my needs much in the same way I would envisage you would work with real clay.  Note: I have little experience of working with clay sculptures so I may be totally wrong on that point.     Now I do not attest to being an artist in any shape or form, however I was easily able to create the start of a basic sculpture.  As such I believe this app could easily be used by students in art lessons to develop much more impressive creations than anything I might be able to achieve.   This is definitely an app where experimentation could be encouraged without the need for significant training in advance.

In both of the above apps the tools are provided to help students get to grips with the ability to create within a 3D virtual space.   As this kind of working becomes more common within the creative, the design and the entertainment industries I think it is useful to introduce students during their format education.

 

 

GDPR and third party solutions

I have previously written about third party related cyber risk in relation to data protection and GDPR but I think it warrants a little bit of a further discussion.    To start I will state what I believe is the key message:

A third-party system in use by your school, such as a cloud hosted MIS or Learning Platform doesn’t mean that data security and data protection isn’t your problem.   Its still your data and although the third party might be processing it for you, you are still the controller.   You are still responsible for the data and for ensuring that adequate security measures are in place, and that you can prove that they are in place, or at least have received reasonable assurances to the fact they are in place.

There is also a second key point which I feel needs making in that cyber security and data protection decisions should always use a risk-based approach.    The approach and level of detail required in impact assessment for a learning tool where student emails are the only personal info and for a school management system containing name, address, medical, academic, pastoral and other personal data, are totally different.    The greater the risk the greater the time and effort required to ensure that an appropriate assessment and appropriate decision making has taken place.

So, let’s take two different scenarios and look at them.   The first scenario is a good old cloud hosted solution while the second is the one which is often overlooked, being a locally hosted solution using a third-party product.

A cloud hosted solution

I feel this is the more accepted and therefore easier of the two scenarios.   Here we have a school using a cloud hosted MIS for example.   The data is held on hardware outside the school on a third-party platform.    The school must therefore ask a number of questions relating to how the third party keeps data secure, how they will provide the data in the event the school requests it and how the data will be deleted should the school cease using the service, to list just a few.     Most of this info will be outlined in the terms and conditions or any contract which was signed so it is relatively easy to get the information.   There will also be questions related to how the third party tests its security through penetration and/or vulnerability testing as well as what their process is should a data breach occur.      I often ask vendors to confirm when their last penetration test took place and, in higher risk systems, ask them to provide a summary of findings.    The answers to the above questions will help the school to establish a view on the risk associated with the platform plus to document that appropriate consideration of cyber security and data protection has taken place.

A locally hosted solution

This is, I feel, the more difficult scenario.   The third-party platform is hosted on the schools own network and hardware and therefore the security of the platform can be directly impacted by configuration decisions of the school itself.   The school therefore should ideally be conducting regular penetration testing to check the security of the infrastructure on which the third-party solution sits.   The issue here is that some third parties at this point believe that the security of the data is therefore down to the school as they control the network and network setup.   This is the kind of response I have received from a number of solutions vendors only recent.   To a point they are correct but only to a point.   The network should be constructed with “privacy by design” in mind such that it is developed with security always in mind, but the network infrastructure is only half the solution.    The other half is the third-party software.   It too should have been developed with “privacy by design” at the forefront of thinking and it is for schools to question whether this is the case.    For me, this means asking questions in relation to how the company approaches checking their application for vulnerabilities.    This ideally should involve a proactive search for vulnerabilities including the use of vulnerability assessment or through bug bounty programmes.    There is also the acceptance that the finding of vulnerabilities should be treated as a “when” as opposed to an “if”.    As such companies should be able to demonstrate that they have a plan in place for when a vulnerability is identified in their platform.   This plan should involve notifying clients in a timely fashion.   In relation to being timely I think it is important to consider the ICOs requirement to potential report data breaches within a 72 hour period, so it would be preferable that disclosure happens sooner, and ideally within 24hrs, rather than later.   It is this vulnerability notification process which I seem to often find to be particularly lacking in third party vendors supplying solutions to schools.

As schools take on more and more third-party solutions, and as more and more of these solutions are integrated and communicate with each other, the cyber security and data protection risk related to third parties only increases.    Schools therefore need to ensure that this is carefully considered and that they have taken all reasonable measures to ensure that their data and that of the students, staff and parents related to the school remain secure.    An easy starting point is therefore contacting third parties and asking some of the questions listed in this post.

More thoughts on VR: Free VR apps

This morning I continued my experimentation with the HP WMR headset I am currently playing with, trying the below apps:

  • Home: A VR Spacewalk
  • Sharecare VR
  • Geogebra Mixed Reality
  • VR Museum of Fine Art
  • Google Earth VR

I picked the above due to being free and also being listed by Steve Bambury on his list of Educational VR Apps.

The first app I tried is one I had tried in an initial demo I received on using VR so is an app I was at least passingly familiar with.   Basically, you are put in the position of an astronaut on the International Space Station.   The app is reasonably intuitive once you get going, with instructions offered to you at each stage.    I must admit to feeling a little disoriented at times but on reflection this isn’t surprising as, being an astronaut, you would be working in zero gravity resulting in no clear sensation as to which way is down.   Overall a fun little app which may have a place in science or possible design technology lessons or even to help provide context for space-based stories written within English lessons.

My next app on the headset was Sharecare VR.   This app lets you pull apart the human body and look at its constituent parts including the skeletal and circulator system.   I didn’t find this app instantly intuitive however it is relatively simple meaning with a little effort I got to grasp with what you can do.   I can see clear uses in Biology lessons looking at how the human body is constructed and getting a better understanding of the various parts.   It may also be useful in Sports Science or Physical education courses.   My feeling is this app might be useful either as a starting point before teaching specific areas of the human body or might be useful to provide the context to ensure students see how individual components of the human body relate.

The possibility of using Geogebra in VR sounded interesting to me as I am familiar with the desktop based version so I was eager to use this app. Must admit to being a little disappointed by it however not being a Maths teacher, this may be simply because I don’t quite understand how the app might be used in lessons.   The app comes with a number of geometric shapes and patterns in 3D which you can scale and move around.  The controls are rather simple however I felt they were maybe a little too simple resulting in limiting what you can do.    Overall this isn’t an app I really think I can pass any judgement on; Will leave that to the Maths teachers.

The Museum of Fine Art as a VR experience sounded interesting, being able to explore a Museum but in VR.   My first issue was that the space I was experimenting in was a little small to get the best out of this app.   I suspect it would be so much better using the backpack mounted and therefore wire free Z-Series workstation however on this occasion I was wired to the PC in its desk-mounted setup.   A bigger space also may have made things better.   The app easily lets you explore the virtual version of the museum and walk, or teleport, around various exhibits.   Each exhibit comes with a description providing information on the exhibit.     I found this app quite interesting albeit I am not sure why, after using it and exploring once, you would want to then revisit.   It may however allow art students easy access to revisit masterpieces as and when they need without the difficulty and cost of travelling to a real rather than virtual museum.

My final app for the weekend was Google Earth VR and I must admit I really enjoyed this one.    I found myself visiting schools which I had worked with previously in the UAE, visiting my family home, doing a flyover of my current school and also visiting a couple of famous locations.   The provided tutorial easily prepares you to be able to get the best out of the simple control system so almost immediately you can begin flying around earth.    I found myself stepping back when jumping into a location on the edge of the Grand Canyon so you do have to be careful.    The limitation I did find is that some locations don’t have detailed street view maps available so you can only fly over rather than step into the location.   This was the case for some locations in Al Ain in the UAE which I was hoping to explore, having previously lived there, however exploring the UK seemed to work in most locations.   The free ability to fly around the UK and visit different locations is likely to have potential applications in a variety of lessons including providing context in English lessons, exploring different structures and architecture in Art or in Design Technology lessons or visiting different parts of the world for geography lessons.   I am sure the free form ability of the app will present applications way beyond the above suggestions.

It is clear that there are a number of very useful and interesting free apps available for a WMR headset like the HP unit I am using.   I suspect and hope this will increase over time.   The apps I looked at provide a useful starting platform once you have a headset and suitable PC or Laptop.    My next plan is to explore a couple of paid apps where I think I will focus on free form apps most likely mainly focussed on the STEM or STEAM subjects.    Am looking forward to seeing what additional applications to education might be possible.