The 21st Century Learning – The Practical Conference aims to provide resources and support to enable schools to develop a curriculum for 21st century learners. We have heard the speakers talk about learning spaces, innovative and creative curriculum and technology – but how do you make this happen in your school? BSF is about secondary schools but we also need to prepare our younger learners to be able to compete successfully in a global market. There are two things which are key if this change is to happen:

• An understanding of why we need to change how we educate today’s learners
• Access to resources and training to enable the change to happen

The previous two conferences looked at why we need to change and it is envisaged that this conference and subsequent programmes of support will underpin the changes in our primary schools.

So how will this happen?

The first part of the conference will see the launch of the new NELC Primary Framework for ICT. In the same way as the Primary Frameworks for Literacy and Numeracy this Framework has been designed to support teachers and schools to deliver high quality learning and teaching for all children. It contains detailed guidance and materials to support the teaching and learning of ICT in primary schools.

The second part of the conference will provide an opportunity to see how the Self Review Framework from BECTA can support a school in assessing and improving their use of ICT. ICT offers rich opportunities to transform your school’s performance and transform the learning experience for pupils and teachers. Becta’s self-review framework offers you a straightforward route for improving your effective use of ICT.

The third part of the conference will provide delegates with an opportunity to look at different technologies and their potential use in the primary classroom. The technologies being showcased will be inexpensive and easy to use. Provisionally, the workshops are as follows:

• Virtual Worlds – a safe environment for children?

• Making mobile telephone videos

• Videoconferencing – simple, cheap, and manageable

• Podcasting – pupils as producers

• Blogging – web creativity and interactivity

• The Virtual Learning Environment – what can it do for you?

Each workshop has it’s own page which can be accessed under separate tabs at the top of this page. These pages will give you more information about each workshop and provide you with links to download any software that has been used as part of the workshop. It’s free and it’s available – give it a go!

Please note you need to book the workshops you would like to attend by April 11th at the latest! You can do this online by clicking on the Workshop Booking tab on the navigation bar above.

We also hope to be showcasing some of the 21st Century Learning equipment available from Promethean at the conference (see below).