2001
2002
Return from holiday in North Yorkshire to find that I have been successful in application for BPRS.
August 8th
Send e-mails to several people. Begin to organise folder of information gathered previously, and tucked away 'just in case' the application was successful. Update web site to add journal page and other BPRS related areas.
August 25th
Back from family holiday in Herefordshire and start to sketch out a plan of action. Chest infection means slow progress. Use Amazon to price up relevant textbooks, but still waiting for reply regarding the payment of funding. Don't want to fork out too much up front.
Request for information/assistance now posted on bulletin board on BPRS website. Nothing received as yet, but I don't know how heavily used the site is. A few other relevant reports posted now, so I print those for guidance on format of my own.
Start of the official research period. E-mail my mentor to update him on progress.
September 4th
Start to draft out questionnaire(s). Still collating material from various sources. Obtain OFSTED documents: Inspecting Geography and Inspecting ICT. Organise a day during half term to visit Durham and my mentor.
September 10th
Order book advertised in TES: Using the Internet in Secondary Schools. Still not certain about funding details as I haven't heard back from the BPRS admin. Read the latest copy of 'Geography Review', of which my mentor is an editor: a lot of Internet content, and some useful information.
September 11th
Day of attack on Trade Centre towers. My wife was there just under a year ago, and it seems a little surreal. Guardian today had feature on flooding links, and all the ones mentioned have been on my site for months. Probably doing something right. Try again to contact Association of Teachers Websites, who failed to get back to me the first time I contacted them.
September 15th
Complete the first draft of pupil and teacher questionnaires ready to send to mentor. Not completely happy with the structure at the moment. Still no response from request on BPRS site. Start a rough outline of report, setting out the structure. E-mail several people who may be able to help, including Liz Taylor, new Website editor for the Geographical Association, who is also head of PGCE course at Cambridge University: we have some ICENI Associate teachers from Homerton arriving next week. She replies that she would be glad to help.
September 22nd
A busy week, and a visit from a former colleague, now at Hills Road 6th form college to spruce up his website. Trial the new Wisenut search engine, and find an excellent local site: Norwich School's Geography department - very nice design and some well-constructed interactive features. Add the site designer to my contact list. Includes some useful notes taken at a GA lecture on the Montserrat eruption I was unable to attend.
Received reply from BPRS on how to claim back money, so the ordering of books and software can now go ahead. Plans being finalised for trip to Durham to meet my mentor. Half term filling up fast, and I'm keen to get the questionnaires distributed. Update website with some new resources and links. Need to obtain a list of school addresses so that I can set up a mail merge for the questionnaire distribution. Decide to trial the questionnaire in my own school at the next Dept. meeting.
September 29th
Another busy week at school. Off to the Saltmarshes with the 6th form next week. Updated over 50 hyperlinks on the web site, redesigned pages and started to put together a Top 10 of websites. Planning layout of resources CD.
In the week, contacted County Hall, and received details on disc of all Norfolk schools for me to do my mail merge with the questionnaire. Thanks to those concerned.
Day on the salt marsh and sand dunes at Holkham. Reminded me of what Geography should be about more of the time...
October 5th
Receive book ordered from TES on the Use of the Internet in Secondary Schools. Send out pilot questionnaires to colleagues at KES. Already thought of some improvements that can be made. Also discussed research with 'student teachers' from Homerton College. Report in TES on how problems with reliability of the technology were affecting ICT use in Primary schools: gremlins.
October 6th
E-mail mentor to make further arrangements for the trip to Durham. Visit to Norwich, and pop into PC World to buy some sundries. Put together first expenses sheet for some items bought so far. Decide that to broaden the scope, I can set the task of designing the packaging of the final resources CD as a project to Design / Technology group at school. Still no contact from ATW, or from BPRS Bulletin board.
October 8th
Getting responses back from pilot questionnaire. Tim gets in touch re: our meeting. Book train tickets using the Internet. Progress at last. Start to make a list of questions: things that need clarification.
October 11th
Got most of the questionnaires back, and have printed up more ready for an INSET course in Norwich tomorrow where I hope to make contacts which will help increase the collection of data. Ring Tim and get details of our meeting in Durham and arrange the meeting. Looking forward to that. Train tickets arrive.
October 12th
Course at the County INSET centre gives me a chance to introduce the research to colleagues from Norfolk schools: the target audience / sample. A good response. Also meet up with Sid Arkle: ICT Advisor for Norfolk and a former colleague who seems enthusiastic and we discuss possible involvement in the upgrade of the county Internet pages. A very useful day, and we also learn a tap dancing routine (don't ask...)
October 14th
Usual Sunday morning chance to do more catching up. Add some web stuff and order 4 ICT / Education books on Amazon. Had a chance to review some of questionnaire responses, and it's clear that there isn't the detail being put into the answers that I'd hoped for.
October 18th
4 books arrive from Amazon: some excellent stuff in them. Half term here, apart from INSET tomorrow, and some throbbing teeth. Preparing a progress report for mentor visit.
October 19th
Root canal work: not recommended. Meet up with IT Adviser Sid Arkle and he takes me through some changes to the Norfolk teachers' network. Manage to do a bit of work relating to the research. Details for BETT 2002, and there are several lectures which are directly related to the research. Pre-register for entry to event.
October 22nd
An early start for a train from misty Doncaster. Went to see French film 'Amelie' last night, which comes highly recommended. Reading 'Sea Room' by Adam Nicolson. Carriage full of teachers talking loudly... Tickets booked on thetrainline.com work fine: seat reserved and waiting. Up to Durham, and meet up with Professor Tim Burt in his spacious office in Hatfield College. We go through the folder of stuff done so far for an hour and a half and it's all very positive and encouraging. Talk about the use of Excel to collate data and pull out the findings: decide to keep the statistics simple, and not go in for too many significance tests unless they seem to be helpful at the time. Tim suggests doing one-to-one interviews with HoDs who have given a range of responses: some who are happy with the use of ICT, and some who seem more tentative. Have a tour round Hatfield College where Tim is Master, and lunch/coffee: the academic atmosphere is very addictive. Meet Professor Bob Allison the Head of Geography department who is similarly enthusiastic and supportive. Arrange to meet up in the Spring term when the data has started to come in.
Had a good luck round the city once our meeting is over, and go up the tower of Durham cathedral, which was apparently voted Britain's 'favourite building' recently. Good view down towards Hatfield college.
Train arrives on time, and back through the night for some fish and chips and very expensive malt whisky. A very useful day, and I feel ready now to proceed with the data collection. E-mail Tim my thanks on return home.
Redesigned questionnaire. Set up mail merge. Booklet arrived from Reading University 'Reading and Language Information Centre'.
Offer of help from colleague in Swaffham to help with distributing questionnaires. Prepare / print a new version following mentor discussions. Send out small sample to other 'types' of school: Independent, and Sixth form college. Prepare envelopes for major mailing, and add section to website on planning a lesson using Internet on Gujarat earthquake of Jan 2001. Head gives permission to attend BETT 2002 show.
November 4th
Lots of fireworks round our way last night. Add several new sections to website, and continue with preparing questionnaires for distribution/filling envelopes. Received first repayment of BPRS expenses. Log onto Geographical Association website and ordered several GA publications. Fill in questionnaire for British Geological Society, who are interested in the resources that teachers of Earth Science want to see produced and available. Could be relevant to what I want to produce.
November 5th
Package from the USA: no suspicious white powder, just a CD-ROM which has all the information on Climate Change from the EPA: a very useful resource obtained by sending off a quick e-mail from the website. I've previously obtained an excellent poster on the run up to the birth of the 6 billionth person a year or so back from the USA.
Get more stamps: lots of requests for information and posting first batch of questionnaires has eaten the others.
November 11th
A busy weekend. Lots of progress made: had several more schools returning the original questionnaires. Updated sections of website, adding recent 'finds'.
Registered for BETT 2002 online, and also booked tickets for 2 seminars: a BECTA one on ICT and Education, and a subject specific one on Geography and ICT. Ordered tickets and paid online too.
Also registered for a BECTA Online conference: ICT in Practice, which will run from the 20th to the 22nd November. Will try to make some contributions, and also a request for help from other delegates. The conference was free as it is online.
Worked through most of the articles in TES Online: gave me some useful leads. Also managed to read BECTA Focus group research on Internet awareness and usage, July 2001, which had some useful statistics.
November 13th
Received more details of BECTA Online conference. First batch of Questionnaires ready for posting tomorrow.
November 17th
Another busy week. Posted all the questionnaires now: around 65 all told. Still waiting for deliveries of resources ordered from the Geographical Association and Pearson Publishing (the latter having cashed my cheque some time ago). Added several updates to website contents. Received my certificate from Nominet for my domain name: geographypages.co.uk.
Received confirmation of booking for 2 BETT 2002 seminars. Printed off BESANET research project on the use of the Internet. Also registered for an online conference which is to be hosted by BECTA. This runs between November 20th and 22nd, and is on the theme of ICT in Education. Also registered for a free online distance-learning course which was advertised in the TES, run by Harris College in Preston.
November 19th
Birth of my son.
November 21st-23rd
Fetch my wife and baby home from hospital. Only problem is that he won't be able to play cricket for Yorkshire... In the middle of a hectic day, find time to log on and make some contributions to the BECTA Online conference. Put a message on the conference noticeboard asking for any recommended sites, or 'must do's. Get an instant response e-mailed to me, and over the next couple of days have several more contacts, some due to a contribution made to one of the online seminars. All of the people who get in touch provide something of interest: hear of some Geographical Association research on Internet use in secondary schools, and a Fischer Trust research project which suggested that Geography was one of the subjects where ICT didn't make a significant contribution to learning, which was a little strange. Paternity leave means I haven't been able to get into school to check my pigeonhole for questionnaire returns, but I'm sure they're rolling in. Continue with Harris Open course, and change a few nappies. GA books arrive.
The questionnaires are beginning to arrive back. Some disappointingly brief entries on some of the questions, and a lack of useful resources. If everyone's experience is so positive, then there must be plenty of recommended sites.
Continuing to adjust to a baby in the house again, and a general lack of sleep for anything more than an hour or so at a time.
December 8th
What was sleep again ? A busy week. Questionnaires arriving every day in the post, many of them still disappointingly brief, but the odd gem included. Need to start entering them onto the Excel spreadsheet next week. Also completed 2nd part of Harris Open course. Downloaded BECTA IMPACT2 Research to add to other recent research. A bibliography of sources started. Received a very nice pack of stickers and goodies from Becta conference to publicise Netdays Europe. Well worth filling in one of the forms on the Online conference.
Send off 2nd expenses claim, and need to find out from DfES whether I can get an updated version of web page software to produce the final web site for the research results. Use another online lesson with my 'AS' Geography group. At the moment, one of the main issues is getting a hard copy of the lesson for the pupil's exercise books: an issue with printers being correctly 'mapped' (and pupils not pratting with the settings) and having enough toner. The running costs are very high, and they're worked to death basically.
December 15th
Received 2nd expenses claim back. Another very busy week: getting used to having no sleep again. More BETT stuff arriving, and shirt to wear at the event to publicise the website to all who see me.
Got more questionnaires back, and Liz Taylor's 'ICT in Geography' resource: an excellent set of ideas for introducing and improving use of ICT in a Geography department. Put an ICT activity involving the 'honeypot' ( a term not all the locals like ) of Castleton on the web site.
Prepare request for software etc. for next stage. Mentor would like to see some of the data entered on spreadsheet: which will be the next stage, perhaps over Christmas: in between the exam marking and reports.
Plans to make contact with school in Falkland Islands via a former colleague who now lives there. They presumably make use of the Internet due to their remote geographical location. This week was also when the government announced its ambitious plans for 'Curriculum Online'. We can only hope that the review of teachers' pay delivers on the recommendation for free laptops. The idea is sound, but there have been years of duplication of efforts, and it's about time it was all pulled together in one location. I hope to be able to make my own small contribution. At least the sudden rush of relevant reports has confirmed that this an area of relevance.
December 22nd
Finally got to the end of term. A disappointing-ish response to questionnaires so far, but hopefully more to arrive after Christmas.
Received badge and details of seminar for BETT 2002: (shirt ready to wear to publicise site, and flyers to hand out to people if necessary...) looking forward to that. Sorting out train details on thetrainline.com. Can't reserve a seat, so a 5.45 train out of London on a Friday night could potentially be rather busy. Also made arrangements to meet ICT/Education 'expert' from Cambridge University. A busy month as there's also a trip to see the Shackleton IMAX to arrange, and an exam board course in Bury St. Edmunds at the end of the month.
December 24th
A very nice man delivers the copy of Front Page 2002 I ordered on the net 3 days ago. Order book on developing sites using FP from Amazon. Time to start on the BPRS resource site as part of the process. Need to find a reasonably priced web host: work through several. May go for Clara.
Merry Christmas to all my readers!
December 31st
How to spend New Year's Eve. Well the first part of it is spent entering the details of the 59 questionnaires received so far onto a spreadsheet, and the comments in 4 section of the questionnaire on the relevant pages of the website. Seem to be some reasonable replies. Front Page book arrives, so can start to make use of some of the new features on the software. Start a new web for the finished site which will appear on the CD ROM.
