Safer Internet Day: Resources and Activities for Post Primary Schools
Safer Internet Day is an annual event to promote safe and responsible use of the Internet and digital technologies. This year Safer Internet Day will take place on Tuesday February 7th. If you want to learn more about this event and how to get involved then this webinar is for you.

 During the webinar we will:

 Identify internet safety’s place in departmental policy guidance documents and school policies

• Examine the rationale for Safer Internet Day and the world wide campaign
• Explore resources available to schools for Safer Internet Day

Thursday, 2nd February at 4:15pm via Zoom

Register - tiny.cc/PP-SID-Webinar

Athlone Education Support Centre will be hosting a DEIS Community of Practice (CoP) for the academic year 2022/23 for Post Primary DEIS schools. 

This CoP will offer an opportunity to engage in the DEIS Action Planning process through the 8 themes of DEIS. It will focus on how to effectively gather relevant baseline data and subsequently set SMART targets.

·      Participants will examine the difference between targets and actions and how to link both. This will be examined with a particular focus on effective approaches to teaching and learning contained in the actions identified by the school to benefit student attainment and inclusion.

·      Consideration will be given to acknowledging effective Teaching, Learning and Assessment as the core activity for engineering change in schools.

·      Participants will consider how effective Teaching & Learning supports the implementation of actions under the three areas of classroom practice, subject department and whole school level.

·      Monitoring and evaluating the impact of these targets and actions will be explored. Communicating a summarised DEIS report to the community and the Board of management will be reviewed.

Throughout the year, the facilitator will use key slides to focus in on the basics of DEIS action planning for all, asking principals and DEIS co-ordinators to share good practice. It is envisaged that new to DEIS participants will learn from listening to peers and gaining valuable insights as to what is happening in the different schools, bridging the theory-to-practice divide.

Tuesday February 7th and Wednesday February 22nd 5.30p.m.-7.30p.m.

Please note this is an interactive workshop and participants will be required to participate from a fixed device with cameras and microphones turned on for the full duration of each session. Attendance at both sessions is a requirement for attendance certificate.

The objective of this workshop is to support participants in the development of specific skills to enable them to effectively facilitate group meetings and learning events both face to face and online.

Participants will explore the core responsibilities of a facilitator and how to effectively guide a group to achieving its objectives through using a range of skills and techniques. They will also discover key best practices for keeping groups on track and engaged as well as how to deal with more challenging situations including a range of different participant types. Learning will be embedded through reflection, discussion and group exercises.

Athlone Education Support Centre will be hosting a DEIS Community of Practice (CoP) for the academic year 2022/23 for Primary DEIS Schools.

This CoP will offer an opportunity to engage in the DEIS Action Planning process through the 8 themes of DEIS. It will focus on how to effectively gather relevant baseline data and subsequently set SMART targets.

·      Participants will examine the difference between targets and actions and how to link both. This will be examined with a particular focus on effective approaches to teaching and learning contained in the actions identified by the school to benefit student attainment and inclusion.

·      Consideration will be given to acknowledging effective Teaching, Learning and Assessment as the core activity for engineering change in schools.

·      Participants will consider how effective Teaching & Learning supports the implementation of actions under the three areas of classroom practice, subject department and whole school level.

·      Monitoring and evaluating the impact of these targets and actions will be explored. Communicating a summarised DEIS report to the community and the Board of management will be reviewed.

Throughout the year, the facilitator will use key slides to focus in on the basics of DEIS action planning for all, asking principals and DEIS co-ordinators to share good practice. It is envisaged that new to DEIS participants will learn from listening to peers and gaining valuable insights as to what is happening in the different schools, bridging the theory-to-practice divide.

 Coding in the Classroom

Course Duration: 5 one-hour sessions. There are also video tutorials available to complement the lessons.

Prerequisite: The only prerequisite for this course is an interest in learning about computer coding.

Equipment: You must have access to a computer with an internet connection to participate.

Learning Outcome: At the end of this course, the participant will have the basic coding skills and resources to enable them to teach Coding to a Junior Cycle class.

Course Outline

Week 1/2 January 11th & 18th 7p.m. 

·       Introduce basic coding concepts through Scratch coding

o   Variables, operators, loops, decisions

o   Assignment, arithmetic, comparison, Boolean combinations  - arrays, lists

o   Functions / Procedures

·       Design a simple ‘Lotto’ computer game in Scratch

Week 3 January 25th 7p.m. 

·       Algorithms and Flowcharts

·       Creating Apps with Javascript and AppLab

Week  4 February 1st 7p.m. 

·       Coding using Minecraft for Education

·       Designing a website with HTML

·       Components of a computer system – Hardware/Software  - CPU, memory, main storage, I/O Devices

·       How the internet works / protocols for communication

Week 5 February 8th 7p.m. 

·       Binary/Octal/Hexadecimal Number Systems – Bits/Bytes/Switches/Pixels

·       Machine Code / Assembly Language

·       Sequential / Parallel flow of control

·       Python Coding

·       Coding the Raspberry Pi single-board computer

STRESS, ANXIETY, RESILIENCE - What do I need to know?

This session is suitable for Primary and Post Primary Teachers and SNAs 

·      An interactive workshop where you will learn what these terms mean and how they are present in our experiences.

·      Evidence of how Stress and Anxiety affects our neurodevelopment and our general health.

·      Getting to know how our bodies hold stress and learn body-based language to recognise and release stress.

·      How to develop Resilience in ourselves and in the children, we work with.

·      Simple strategies to help us work and live well with less stress and more ease.

This interactive session will provide an overview of the roles and responsibilities of teachers in the area of child protection including; an awareness of signs and symptoms of abuse, handling a disclosure from a child, mandatory reporting responsibilities and curricular provision. There will be time in this meeting for teachers to ask questions and seek clarifications in matters relating to child protection, mindful of confidentiality requirements.

This interactive session will provide an overview of the roles and responsibilities of teachers in the area of child protection including; an awareness of signs and symptoms of abuse, handling a disclosure from a child, mandatory reporting responsibilities and curricular provision. There will be time in this meeting for teachers to ask questions and seek clarifications in matters relating to child protection, mindful of confidentiality requirements.

Description:

This two-part course is designed to assist special education teachers in supporting children with literacy difficulties at school. After completing this course, teachers should gain an understanding of effective literacy tools they could use to identify children’s literacy needs, become aware of evidence-based literacy programmes and understand ways to structure literacy support at school.

Learning Outcomes:

Teachers will be enabled to:

1). Understand how to use the Continuum of Support to structure literacy support in primary school.

2). Become familiar with assessment tools to use for identifying children’s literacy needs (e.g. how to complete a running record/ miscue analysis, what to look out for in children’s reading).

3). Discuss evidence-based literacy programmes.

4). Discuss target setting when creating literacy support plans.

5). Become familiar with some general tips and teaching strategies to support children with literacy difficulties in school.