Windows devices and Office 365 enable smooth transition to Blended Learning in Old Bawn Community School As a large, multicultural school with almost 1000 students, recently nominated as a Microsoft Showcase School, Old Bawn Community School took the decision to begin the process of introducing Windows devices for all teachers and students to foster students’ independent learning skills, as Principal Ursula McCabe tells us:“We wanted to empower our teachers, challenge our students and deliver curriculum content using 21st century skills that would prepare students for further education and the world of work. Wriggle trained our teachers as digital leaders who shared their skills with their departments. We then introduced devices for each student (1:1) starting with first years this year.”“Lessons have now become more interactive with the onus on students to explore processes and answers as opposed to learning through direct instruction.“ Laying the Founda

How iPadOS 14 will Positively Affect your Classroom by Jamie Johnston From my experience using iPad in the classroom and training educators around the country, I know that Apple design their devices to enhance the user experience and make creative and independent learning easier, and iOS 14 and iPadOS 14 are no exception. The iPadOS updates, including new features like Scribble, are set to make learning with iPad even more seamless than before. Scribble From writing on the board to giving feedback to students in their copybooks, as a teacher, my handwriting has always been an issue, which is one of the many reasons I’m so excited about Scribble. Scribble literally gives teachers and students the ability to turn written text into typed text instantly. For me the iPad was never supposed to be a device that relied on heavy keyboard use - certainly not in education. It is best when it is unleashing creative potential i.e. when students have an iPad in their hand and are actively

iPad Class Sets Facilitate Safe, Effective Learning during the ‘New Normal’ in Firhouse Community CollegeWhen school closures happened in March 2020, many schools experimented with a number of different methodologies to ensure continuity of learning. Luckily for Firhouse Community College, a school of almost 800 pupils in Dublin, their investment in iPad Class Sets and the skills they built through their use, meant they were in a better position to pivot to remote learning.‘We invested in managed iPad Class Sets with Wriggle to foster students’ independent learning skills and formative and summative assessment strategies’ explains Deputy Principal, Denise O Flanagan. The iPads are in high demand and their use has facilitated project-work and the development of key skills such as ‘Communicating and Working with Others’ as collaboration is much easier for students when they are using iPads.’Building the Skills for Flexible LearningWhether i

Learning the lessons of a Pandemic Improving Blended Learning in the Irish Education System The COVID-19 pandemic fundamentally disrupted the traditional Irish education system, almost overnight, when the decision was made to close schools under public health advice. Schools and educators found themselves quite suddenly under intense pressure to adapt and continue to deliver education across multiple platforms, to a dispersed student body. Students and parents also faced serious challenges to maintain learning and education in a home environment, an unfamiliar experience in a familiar place.As a stop gap, Wriggle moved to increase its training for teachers on platforms during COVID-19 as an interim measure and we have trained almost 10,000 teachers since schools closed in March, in order to help them adapt.As schools, parents and teachers continue to adapt to changes brought about because of the pandemic, this report looks at the initial phase, to understand their collective experience

St Joseph’s Secondary School in Rush, Co Dublin decided to switch to using iPads in the depths of the last recession after linking up with educational technology firm Wriggle. By Emmet Ryan, The Sunday Business PostPatricia Hayden is well aware of the importance of saying "I don't know". The principal of St Joseph's Secondary School in Rush, Co/. Dublin, had a bold plan during the economic crash, but she knew she needed help.Hayden was also smart enough to realise her lack of knowledge could help to identify the challenges ahead. In 2011, when Ireland wasn't flush with cash, she decided the school needed to switch to using iPads."We are short of space in the school and we had a lot of boys who found the traditional methods boring. We felt there was an opportunity with individual devices that we could inspire the students a little more," she told the Business Post."We wanted to change things in a way that would make them think differently. Back then, a Deis (disadvantaged) school