Digital Media and Computer Control across The Classroom

This introduces the concept of a computer and its software as a digital hub for a range of sources of digital media that can be used themselves as tools for teaching and learning in the classroom.

Schools can now use programmable toys to aid teaching and introduce computer technology and its uses to children at a n early stage and in a fun way.

We looked specifically at The Roamer, The Pixie and The Beebot.

Bee-Bot is a visually attractive, audible easily handle able programmable floor robot which can be used to support the development of skills in a wide range of areas. It allows learners to give a range of instructions from simple to more complex. Pupils with SEN could use it to develop one, two and three stage sequences using a variety of activity mats.

The programmable floor robot, the Bee-Bot is a perfect starting point for teaching control, directional language and programming to young children.

It can be used for the development of fine motor skills by using the directional buttons. It can support imaginative play through the use of commercial or school designed covers. It allows learners to demonstrate skills in ways that a traditional approach would not support. A positive ICT resource for early Years.

PIPPIN and PIXIE are programmable vehicles for use in primary schools, nurseries and playgroups. Each is a rectangular box with wheels underneath and a keyboard on top. Children program them to carry out activities such as knocking skittles over or carrying a book across the classroom.

Data Logging Within The Classroom

Data logging is commonly used in scientific experiments and in monitoring systems where there is the need to collect information faster than a human can possibly collect the information and in cases where accuracy is essential. Examples of the types of information a data logging system can collect include temperatures, sound frequencies, vibrations, times, light intensities, electrical currents, pressure and changes in states of matter.

The logging and saving of information provides for increased knowledge and sometimes improved management of how and why different processes work. Many loggers archive information such as temperature using sensors and then convert the information into electrical signals. The data is archived and once retrieved can be filtered and properly understood.

As the stand-alone is specifically designed for data logging it is able process data faster, more efficiently and can have far more sensors than a PC. The information from the stand-alone logger can then be transferred to a personal computer.

Data logging is used in a variety of situtations. An easy example is the black box recorder in an airplane, which gathers information on the plane's flight to be used later. Another is a weather system logger used by meteorologists to detect temperature and pressure in order to determine upcoming weather conditions.

Data logging provides for the gathering of statistics which are used to give a better understanding of the field you are working in. The information is needed in all types of businesses to determine performance, quality, efficiency cost cutting, fuel consumption and many other vital information uses.

Over the years there has been an evolution in data logging and the type of loggers that are used. In the past, the equipment was bulky and mechanical, using huge paper chart recorders. Now, sophisticated computers and microprocessors retrieve the information in far more detail than could have been processed previously.

Loggers are used in everyday life unknowingly by you the public.

The next time that you are in a supermarket and hand over your credit card or store card, a data logging device may track your spending movements by the store. It can assess which items you have bought, how many times a month you buy them and even, how many times you use the store.

In today's society nearly all information from the weather to our shopping habits ends up in a data logger. The information is archived and saved for use at a later date.