Things have been very quiet on this blog of late. Now I’ve threatened to go quiet in the past, usually with much fanfare and then kept on blogging anyway. This time, I just sort of faded away. A combination of many things prompted this quasi- web 2.0 disappearance ( I also went very dark on twitter and facebook too) including my daughter getting very ill, a momentous change (for the better) in ‘domestic’ circumstances, a confidence crisis just after getting my promoted post and recovery from surgery and illness. All this stress, I guess, makes you consider just what you are all about and where you want to be. What I have found of late is a rediscovery of the ability to let go of things. Other folk have taken on stuff at work that I previously did, and it’s happened at home too,  and I’m now finding that I’m able to focus very much on me and mine in a way that for two years at least, I think I’d forgotten, or at least lost sight of. So I’ve spent the last 3 months recuperating, hospital visiting (things got a bit hairy there at times, as some of you will be aware !) moving house and looking after teenage children again (something I certainly thought I’d seen the last of !). And I’m now looking forward to the birth of my third grandchild (and first granddaughter). I think having been forced almost to take some time out has been good for me in reflecting upon where I want to be in both my professional and personal lives. I have a much clearer focus, both on the end and the means of getting there.

And there’s much to look forward to over the coming year. My new principal teacher post has a very broad remit !! so much to get my teeth into there, including work on ePortfolios using blogs, Wiki’s and MyGlow in our learning community primary schools as well as continuing the games-based learning work using Guitar Hero World Tour. The EVS research project starts next week in our High school tracking attainment of two parallel S1 classes. We have been busy this week at Glasgow University writing higher order questions for use with the voting system software which really push learning skills at the higher levels of Bloom’s taxonomy. This novel use of voting systems will be tracked over the next few months until March next year.

My next post will be on the continuing GLOW research. I’m going to be giving a presentation on this at the SERA conference in November this year (which will be the last ever time I speak about GLOW, by the way) when we will be making available the data from the extended project which followed an S3/4 cohort through their entire Biology standard grade course using GLOW as the means of delivering ICT. The hard work of writing the journal papers can then begin. Despite a somewhat sniffy attitude from some in Scottish education, this has succeeded in its original purpose (and has been brilliantly supported by the GTCS) in shining a little spotlight on just how effective (or not) GLOW has been in raising attainment and school improvement. I’m just putting the finishing touches to a piece about qualitative aspects of this research, based on an honours thesis written by a research student who looked at GLOW using classroom activity coding.. I think its the first piece of research measuring the effects of GLOW on student engagement and it’s impact upon learning and teaching time. I’m saddened that there is so little evaluation of such an expensive national project taking place, and, I actually think its a shame that in their rush for the ‘full 32’ , Learning and teaching Scotland appears to have sacrificed sound project management on the alter of hype and spin, and that some breathing space for a comprehensive evaluation of the GLOW project nationally so far is now called for. Perhaps the forthcoming government report on this organisation will lead to a more robust approach to quality assurance here.

Time will tell…