Gamification is based on the idea of applying game elements to non game contexts. Kids love playing games, so it creates amazing opportunities to educate them in a gamified way. Integrating elements of gamification into teaching can help to increase engagement and to improve learning outcomes. Here are some ideas for incorporating elements of gamification into the classroom.

Ways to use gamification in the classroom

Use technologies

Although gamification does not require you to use technologies, you can benefit from a number of online resources to gamify your classroom. For example, there are many online resources for learning languages, practising maths or spelling in a gamified way. Technologies not only allow students to learn but they can also help develop other useful skills like critical thinking or problem solving.

Online educational games

One of the easiest ways to gamify your classroom is finding some kid safe sites that can be used to allow students play educational games as part of the lesson or as a reward for doing a good job in something.

Create a class-wide achievements system

Work together with students to develop the short and long-term goals that will be achieved through gamification. Working on this as a team can encourage collaborative work and students will feel more motivated to perform well because they were involved in the decision making.

Provide badges and rewards

Providing badges and rewards can be very effective in celebrating certain student achievements. This is expected to encourage students perform even better next time. What is more, it can be a great tool for raising student confidence.

Share the progress

Encourage students by sharing any achievements of their peers. Students are more likely to try harder and achieve better results when they feel some competition. The best thing is that they are learning while being involved in fun activities.

Overall, incorporating some elements of gamification into the classroom can help make learning more engaging as well as it can teach students practical skills, encourage collaboration and creativity.

Ofsted requires that you include certain documents on your school website, and all this means at its minimum is that they must be provided as downloads. But, for accessibility, wouldn’t it be nicer to have them readable and embedded on your website? You can probably see where this is going – yes, School Jotter lets you do that! First of all, take a look at this page for an example of what I’m talking about.
Setting this up is easy – first of all we’re going to go into Edit mode, click Insert Item, then choose Document.

You’ll be asked where you want to put it, as usual with these things. Then it’ll bring up the File Upload dialog box – we’ve gone over this before, but for everyone’s benefit here’s how that works again. Navigate to the folder you want to put the file in (or create a new folder using the Add Folder button at the top), then click Upload File.

You’ll get the following dialog box and can add your own documents here:

Note that not every filetype is supported (unsupported types will still be downloadable but will only display as a download link) – the full list of supported types is txt, text, rtf, htm, html, xhtml, pdf, doc, docx, xl, xla, xlc, xlm, xls, xlt, xlsx, ppt, pptx, pps, pot, ppsx, odt, ods, odp, odg, wp5, wpd, and pub. Click Add File or drag your file into the box, then click Start Upload, followed by OK. It should work its magic and leave you with this:

You can customise the width and height of the box through the grey bar that appears at the top of the page when clicking on the element. The controls along the top of the document will let you navigate it, and will work across devices (including mobiles).
Now save and publish the page and you’re done!

It’s that time of the year again, when primary teachers comb the web looking for creative ideas for crafts in the classroom. Eating too many Easter eggs can be unhealthy for pupils due to the high amounts of sugar they contain. Therefore, teachers can keep them busy with creative DIY crafts instead of hiding sugary chocolate eggs all over the classroom.

Let your students feel the Easter spirit by being creative, decorating their own Easter eggs. Some of the greatest Easter egg ideas can be found in this infographic:

Boost learning in the classroom with School Jotter’s Resources app! Create and save your own resources or find hundreds of readily-available ones, easily searchable within the app and share them with teachers in your school.

Have you started creating egg-related lesson plans? If not, you still have time for that. Easter is the perfect time for engaging students in some fun classroom activities.
There are many different ways for celebrating Easter in the classroom. Baking Easter biscuits, egg hunt, colouring Easter themed  illustrations, singing Easter songs, or maybe painting and decorating eggs? Check out our latest infographic to get some inspiration for decorating Easter eggs in the classroom.

Don’t forget about our Easter egg decoration competition!
You have a chance to win your very own GIANT Betty’s 5.4 kg chocolate egg!
Get creative and decorate an egg as your favourite character, animal or in any weird and wonderful way you like. Then, make a picture of your egg and tweet it to @Webanywhere and see if you have won. The competition will end on Tuesday 22nd March.

Today we are sharing some ideas about how social media could be used in the classroom and how it can benefit your classroom and your school.

Connecting, communicating and sharing. Connect and communicate with other classrooms through social media. Connect and share resources with other teachers from your school or from other schools. You can also use hashtags to facilitate guest speaker discussions.

Improving teamwork. Use social media for class discussions. Create a private group for discussing a particular topic or engage in open discussions.

Engagement. Engage with students, parents and communities by posting updates regarding school news and events

Learning. Share online learning resources with students. Add links to useful websites, videos and documents online. Encourage students to share useful learning materials with their peers.

Staying up to date. Require students to post news related or any other trending articles. This activity encourages students to read relevant articles every day.

Sharing. Use social media platforms to share the work of your students. Publish interesting articles, presentations or other projects that your students create.

Increasing awareness of your school. Sharing links to your school website on social media can help increase the search engine rankings which means that your school website attracts more visitors that can lead to more people choosing your school.

To conclude, it is worth looking at different methods of incorporating social media in the classroom. It does not have to become a permanent thing, give it a go and maybe you will discover something that really helps to engage with students. Make sure you always educate your students how to use social media safely.

Here’s your chance to win your very own GIANT Betty’s 5.4 kg chocolate egg!
Get creative and decorate an egg as your favourite character, animal or in any weird and wonderful way you like. Then, make a picture of your egg and tweet it to @Webanywhere and see if you have won. The competition will end on Tuesday 22nd March.

Meanwhile, check out our latest infographic to discover some great DIY ideas for Easter.

It’s no secret that there’s a recruitment crisis in education at the moment. Fewer new teachers are joining, and those already here and leaving in ever-greater numbers. A recent survey found that 90% of headteachers were struggling to fill vacancies in their schools. Naturally, fewer teachers means the potential for less learning by students – no matter how dedicated or skilled those remaining are, they’re competing with high workloads and difficult conditions.
The Association of School and College Leaders have argued that the solution here lies in flexible working for teachers, and, in a manner of speaking, we’d be inclined to agree. What this situation shows, we think, is where a blended learning strategy can really come into its own. By utilising elearning, educators and their students can learn to do more with fewer (physical) resources.

A VLE, with its self-marking quizzes, learning analytics and endless customisation options, can prove invaluable in automating much of the drudgery and admin problems that so-plague the teaching profession. This leaves the teachers themselves free to improve their lesson plans and provide better tuition to their charges.
Additionally, with the heavy focus on one-to-one teaching – something which can’t be achieved with diminishing staff numbers – a VLE with integrated social platforms can prove a real boon. Give every pupil the option to engage directly with their teachers, and in turn give the teachers the option to give quick, easy and detailed personalised feedback.
Too often a VLE is seen as a “needless luxury”, something which takes time away from more pressing matters. We think this is missing out on a lot of the positives. While it’s true that getting used to a VLE can take some time, with a few advocates and the right attitude we know that one can work in any environment, joining up learning and facilitating ever-greater growth.

Easter is fast approaching and primary teachers are looking for quick and easy ideas to engage students with DIY crafting. With that in mind, we created the infographic below, where teachers and pupils can find some of the greatest and simplest craft ideas for the classroom.
Many teachers are using our Resources app to store all the great ideas, documents and images they create or find online. This helps them to enhance the learning experience of pupils every Easter.