This week we’ve chosen the Aston All Saints Church of England Primary School website which has been as our Website of the Week.
The first thing that catches my eye when I look at it, is the main image of students. This image appears on all pages of the website and it seems to represent the main values of the school – Caring, Sharing, Laughing, Learning. These four values of the school are listed on the homepage; a great way of reminding students and parents what the school cares about.
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This week we’ll be taking a look at a school who have clearly picked a theme for their website and then threaded everything through it. Woodbank Primary School in Bury are clearly rather fond of their leafy green visuals, something that shows up in the school’s logo, its iconography and even its photos.

I like how, rather than letting the design or even the teachers speak to the parents, the school has very clear opinions from its students, signaling a high degree of respect. The Head Boy and Head Girl are given their own paragraphs next to glossy photos, right on the homepage – certainly something enticing for any prospective parent. It’s clear from the additional imagery on the page as well that the school takes learning seriously, with smartly-dressed students in a variety of situations.
Design-wise, this is one of our first sites to feature parallax scrolling, where images behind the text appear to move at a different speed to the body of the page, producing a more dynamic web-page and allowing for greater use of imagery. I also like the tile-based buttons at the bottom of the page, but if I were to offer a tip it’d be to put them higher up – parents want to see your important information, and while it may be in the menu bar, not everyone’s going to check this!
Overall, a great, green website, so congratulations to Woodbank School!

I think uber themes really are the future of school web design. All of our newer websites are great, but it’s the uber themes that really stand out as bold, modern and vibrant designs, while still being subtle and working on any device size. This week we’ll be looking at Halifax’s Bowling Green Primary School, as the last Website of the Week of 2015.
With Jotter 2 being three years old now we’re getting an increasing number of schools requesting upgrades to newer themes, as we saw last week with Alfreton. When you’re happy with the School Jotter software but want something a bit more modern for your front-facing website, a redesign can be an ideal, cost-effective way of getting what you need while maintaining your content in a hassle-free manner.

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We’ve got another of our fantastic uber themed websites this week, taking us to Furze Down School in Buckinghamshire. A SEN school focusing on communication and interaction, Furze Down features one of the latest examples of our modern, accessible themes. It really does manage to capture everything a school website needs, from relevant information at the very top through an intuitive menu system to a large, glossy slideshow to really get a feel for the school.
Furze Down is certainly a non-traditional school, featuring a small selection of just over 100 pupils, but it manages this with aplomb, garnering Outstanding Ofsted ratings at its most recent assessment in 2014. It stands to reason that such a school would need a great website, and we were more than happy to deliver.

Probably my favourite part of the website is the tiled buttons at the top. These stretch and adapt to fit your screen size, and their iconography is intuitive but basic. It really is a great and novel way to set out a menu, a far departure from the all-too-common list of links. I really like how the areas of the pages are defined using blocks of colour as well, rather than harsher lines.
For its clean lines, modern approach and clear attention to the needs of its pupils, staff and parents, Furze Down is our Website of the Week!