All books become BIG BOOKS

Our school has started receiving a monthly visit from Redbridge's mobile library bus. This has really excited the children. In Year 1, we have been using the visualiser to turn all books into big books. The children are so enthusiastic about sharing their chosen books with the class and love seeing the illustrations and text on the 'big screen'.

The process of selecting books and encouraging the children to pre-read these at home before the sessions is make a positive contribution to their reading diet. I will keep you posted about further developments with this use.

Fruit Salad Demo

I used the visualiser for the first time with my class (Year 1) before we broke up for the Spring holiday. Of course, gadgets of this nature never fail to attract the attention of small children and I was not to be proven wrong on this occasion.

The greatest thing about this visualiser though is its sheer portability. I have previously seen an ICT Consultant from Havering using one last year at Manford Primary (a Whiteboard Network meeting). He showed it alongside a more expensive model. The demonstration really put me off of even considering the lower quality product. The resolution was so poor.

I was half expecting a similar standard with these ones, but technology really does move fast. The standard of the Genee Mini Visualiser is almost on a par with the more expensive one our school owns. There was no graininess or time lags when moving an object at all.

I used the visualiser to demonstrate how to create a fruit salad, not the most exciting things for adults, but 5 year olds always think that you are 'so clever' and a 'good cook' when you peel and cut an apple!

They were fascinated by the enlarged real-time image being projected onto the Smart board and this modeling allowed them to peel, cut and mix the fruit completely unaided. Without this I would have had to have demonstrated this task with a small group at a time.

The children then wrote instructions for the process ...