Every week, schooljotter.com names one school website its School Jotter of the Week – showcasing those websites that are great examples of how a school website should be. Now, we want you to tell us if you think you have an outstanding School Jotter!

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Last Wednesday – 26th February – Webanywhere officially launched the two brand new apps, Jotter Learn and School Merits. These can now be purchased and integrated with your School Jotter website – or as standalone e-learning solutions.

We launched the apps with two webinars. Tracey Gentle, our trainer – and on-house CEOP Ambassador – talked about why the range of apps, the Jotter Suite, had been introduced. Tracey then explained how the new dashboard works, integrating your School Jotter website with Jotter Learn and School Merits, plus Blog and Forum, which will be available in about a month’s time.

Tracey provided a walk-through of both Jotter Learn and School Merits, showcasing how they are simple, easy-to-use solutions for engaging pupils and improving performance and attainment.
Every school that attended the webinar was entered into a prize draw to win the new apps, and we announced the winner – Barley Hill Primary School, Oxfordshire – at 5pm. Already a School Jotter user, we’ll look forward to seeing how they integrate Jotter Learn and School Merits into everyday teaching!
Following the launch, the App Store went live. This is where you can purchase any of the new apps, or just take a trial to see what you think. The App Store is accessible to anyone who has been upgraded to the new dashboard (find out more about the new dashboard here).
For School Jotter customers who have been upgraded to the new dashboard, our e-learning expert Keith Taynton has created a training video.
If you have any questions regarding the Jotter Suite, or any of the apps within it, get in touch with us here.

Webanywhere’s recent string of Nurturing Online Learning events have been a huge success – and we’re now planning more for March and April.

During February, to coincide with Safer Internet Day, we’ve visited Manchester, Swindon, Halifax and London – with two more events, in Carlisle and Birmingham, scheduled for this coming Monday. Each event, joint-hosted by Webanywhere and a local primary school, covered e-safety and cyberbullying, and Ofsted requirements for school websites. Both sessions of each event were delivered by CEOP Ambassador Tracey Gentle.
During each session, cyberbullying was covered in detail: What it is, how teachers can spot it, and how your school can prevent it in the future. Then, Tracey helped teachers make sense of Ofsted’s ever-changing list of requirements for school websites, discussing each area in plain English and giving suggestions as to how, aside from pleasing the inspectors, a school website can benefit from meeting the requirements.

At each event, a local school presented their website and explained how they used it to its full potential – engaging parents, pupils and other teachers.
If you missed our recent events, we’re now scheduling follow-up sessions for late March and April. Most will cover e-safety and Pupil Premium, and will take place in Oxford, Liverpool, Norwich, Chelmsford, Blackpool and a follow-up event in Birmingham.
To keep up to date with our latest event news, and to find out when the dates of the new sessions are, keep an eye on our events page (www.webanywhere.co.uk/events) and our Twitter handle (@webanywhere_ltd).

Last month, we announced that two new e-learning products were on the horizon. School Merits and Jotter Learn were both unveiled at the BETT Show, in almost-finished form, and visitors to the Webanywhere stand had the opportunity to see how they could transform learning in schools.

This month, we announce our next development. School Jotter, the UK’s leading primary school website system, is to become part of a fully-integrated e-learning ‘suite’.

To begin with, all our existing customers who use School Jotter 2 – the second incarnation of the School Jotter system, launched in 2012 – will be upgraded to a new dashboard for free. Called the Jotter Suite, it’ll look something like the image above.
The Site button is where their School Jotter 2 website can be accessed. In other words, the website itself won’t change, or how it’s edited – more how it’s accessed. However, the messaging, admin and file storage features of School Jotter have been split off into separate apps, as you can see from the screenshot above.
Next – and this is where it all ties together – School Merits and Jotter Learn will both become available. They will both be accessible via the Jotter Suite dashboard, bringing with them apps for blogging and creating forums. School Merits and Jotter Learn will be available from 26th February,
Eventually, all Webanywhere products will be accessible via the Jotter Suite. It means one sign-in for all your e-learning needs, plus you’ll be able to transfer data between the different products, seamlessly. For example, soon, you’ll be able to download the progress reports of your class from School Merits direct to your School Jotter website system. Ultimately, it’ll save teachers time, give you more opportunities for integrating e-learning – and make learning online a more enjoyable experience.
If you’d like to find out more about the new Jotter Suite dashboard, or the new apps, sign up for the School Merits and Jotter Learn launch webinars on Wednesday, 26th February.
You can get all the details regarding the webinars here.

If you’re a School Jotter customer, or if you visited our stand at the BETT Show you may have already heard the news – or even seen an early mock up – but our flagship primary school product is changing.

School Jotter, currently on version 2, is used by more primary schools than any other school website system available. Teachers like how easy it is to use, and the attractive websites that we can create for them. Administering their website is simple and takes minutes, and means updating and maintaining the school’s website becomes a joy rather than a chore.

Because of this, we didn’t really want to change the way that the School Jotter system itself works. So, the changes that are taking place are more around the actual dashboard – the first screen you see when you log in.
Now, if you use School Jotter, your school’s website can integrate with your e-learning. The new dashboard – the Jotter Suite as it has been named – is now home to a range of apps, with more being developed all the time. The first apps, to be officially launched on Wednesday, 26th February, will be Jotter Learn and School Merits.
Jotter Learn allows teachers to create department and classroom websites – giving them a secure online location to assign work, and provide an information resource for pupils. These ‘learning sites’ can be created to support any subject or assignment.
Jotter Learn also allows resources and lesson plans to be shared between schools, with the aim of building a ‘School Jotter community.’
The School Merits app allows pupils to be rewarded online. Teachers can bulk assign classes and year groups with ‘merits’ – an online currency which pupils can use to build avatars and donate to charity. Teachers can track progress through online reporting and parents can see how well their child is doing in school.
Other, smaller apps that will be launched at the same time include Blog, and Messages; We’re expecting Blog to be particularly popular, as more and more schools are using blogs to improve written English skills.
Later this month, you could win the full Jotter Suite, including School Jotter, Jotter Learn, School Merits and Blog for one year! Every school that takes part in our launch event will be entered into a draw to win this prize, worth around £4,000. To stand a chance of winning, simply:

• Sign up to our launch webinar at 3.45pm on 26th February

Here, you’ll see the new Jotter Suite in more detail via an online presentation

Or:

• Attend our launch event at 4.15pm on 26th February at Webanywhere HQ, Keighley

Here, you’ll get to see the new Jotter Suite in more detail, enjoy an alcoholic beverage with us, and grab a bite to eat

For more information about the launch, to book a demo at your school, or to request a digital brochure, simply email info@webanywhere.co.uk.

It’s day 2 at the BETT show, and we’re as busy as ever at stand F380.

If you’re at the show, here’s a few offers we’re running which you might want to take advantage of:

– We’re offering 50% off our popular primary school VLE, Learnanywhere, all day today if you come to the stand for a demo.

– You can claim a free Spellanywhere account if you track down one of our dinosaur mascots and have your picture taken with them. Just tweet the pic and tag @webanywhere_ltd and we’ll get in touch to set up your account. Steve Ding (pictured), our Head of Primary Division looks like he’s claimed his already!

– Our orange shirted experts are offering free LMS checks all day, come over and have a chat about your system, how it’s performing and where you might want to develop it in future.

– On the LMS topic, Keith Taynton is giving a seminar at the stand on “Flipped Classroom” later today at 3:00pm – no need to reserve a place, just drop by.

We’re really looking forward to meeting up with everyone at the show, and we’ll have something fresh to offer each day, so watch this space or keep an eye on Twitter: @webanywhere_ltd.

 

 

BETT is now less than a week away – and here at Webanywhere, we’re making final preparations to release two very exciting developments of the School Jotter brand.

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In the latest of our guest blog posts by members of the Webanywhere team (you can see the first, by James, here), Becca, from our Support team, explains how you add a Twitter feed to your School Jotter website.

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