The best software in the World has bugs from time to time, and we’re proud to say ours is no different
Bugs are just opportunities for us to improve our software, this is why we love squishing bugs. Don’t feel bad about reporting an issue to us but please take a note of these tips to see your support query is dealt with quickly.
A favicon is a tiny image (just 16 pixels square) that will display on your browser’s tabs (and sometimes address bar). Adding one is very simple and can give that little bit of extra visual assistance when visitors to your cloud site have too many tabs open!
When it comes to providing students with the best education possible, it’s all about focusing on the development and sharing of ideas for 3 schools within the Cabot Learning Federation.
If you’d like to get your school ‘up in the cloud’ like Bristol Brunel Academy, then why not get in touch and let us show you all the fantastic stuff we do. To find out more and arrange a demo, please contact us on 0114 224 2334 or email realsmart@smartassess.com or visit www.smartassess.com.
Earlier this year, three of the schools – Bristol Brunel Academy (the first school to have a BSF managed ICT service), Hans Price Academy and Bristol Metropolitan Academy – had the opportunity to change their learning platform provider and after deciding that there had to be a ‘smart-er’ way to use technology to help them with their goal, opted for realsmartcloud.
We caught up with the man co-ordinating the decision, Learning Technologies Coordinator Chris Mackintosh, to find out how realsmartcloud is helping to improve the development and sharing of ideas across the trio of schools. (more…)
You can now create a ´post-it´ style announcement of notices in your WordPress site, which can then be targeted at different users.
You will need to create two new categories, one called ‘student-noticeboard’ and another called ‘staff-noticeboard’. Then simply apply posts to these categories. Once this is done your logged in users will be able to see the noticeboards that apply to them, i.e. staff can see staff and student noticeboards, whilst students can only see the student noticeboard.
The ´front page news´ for logged in users will display the top three posts in the noticeboard categories.
On our demo site we’ve created a widget link for these noticeboards, as category links for logged in mentors / users. By clicking on the link to the category all your noticeboard posts will display.
We’ve posted our ’0-6 Month Guide’ again because we think it’s the most useful bit of kit we’ve got – and it will help you to start using realsmart immediately!
What’s more, we’ve uploaded this using ‘Issuu’ so that you can browse the guide in this page, rather than having to download the PDF. Click on the image below to read the guide at your leisure……
What if you need to get lots of information out to people in a blog post, but don’t want to take up the full page? Why not cut them in half?!?
Our Managing Director discovered this cool little feature to other day whilst he was running a training session. Instead of having loads of text you can truncate your posts. You get a nice little ‘Read the rest of this entry ‘ message, that allows you to click on it and expand the post.
We’ve posted our ’0-6 Month Guide’ again because we think it’s the most useful bit of kit we’ve got – and it will help you to start using realsmart immediately!
Using web apps in the classroom can save you time, money and unleash the full power of the internet; that’s why here at smartassess we’ve explored just how much it could save you.
Here are just a few ideas…!
Microsoft Office £40 per computer x 600 = £24,000 You will probably update your Microsoft licenses every 3 years and these apply to the machines you register these apps on. Unlike Google apps which are free, online and collaborative.
Exchange email server =£20,000 This is a physical server that needs to be managed in your school site and needs to be upgraded around every 4 years. Unlike Google mail which is hosted, free, safe and secure.
Image editing software =£4,000 You might add Adobe Creative Suite to your multimedia classrooms. Why not add Aviary to your web apps for free and let your staff and students work through their browsers.
Mind-mapping software =£17,000 You could spend this on Inspiration or other mind-mapping software where users can create mind maps and save them to their documents, or you could use realsmart’s rmap to create collaborative online mind maps, graphic organisers and concept maps to share and collaborate on.
Website Design =£8,000 + £2,000 renewal Are you bored of seeing the same dreary content every time you click on the school website link? Is the headteacher’s message more than 2 months old? Is last year’s Ski Trip still front page news?
Using the realsmartcloud website as a vehicle for stakeholder engagement not only saves you money but also helps build your school’s community through its simplicity of navigation and ease of updates. Your website is now an easy to update communication hub for all your school’s stakeholders.
So, if you can write an email, you can build your website. There is no better way to say what your school is about than to quickly and easily show what is actually happening inside. Create engaging content, and make your website your school’s learning portfolio.
Survey system =£2000 Most schools use third party organisations to measure student and parent consensus at various intervals, especially when preparing for an Ofsted inspection. Google forms are a free and engaging way to ask questions at any time and receive feedback in an easy to manage spreadsheet.
Multi track sequencing software / Audio editors =£12,000 So you might buy Sibelius or Cubase for your music classroom or on a few machines to enable users to create podcasts. Or you could use the wonderful online audio editor in Aviary for free.
VLE =£24,000
What would you use this for? Sharing files? Come on! We can all do better than this. Use the realsmartcloud to add context to your learning resources, and use a real learning environment, where, as you use it, you learn.
Remote access gateway =£12,000 When all your apps are in the cloud why would you want to dial in to your school shared area? With everything in the cloud, resources can be shared instantly with every one you want, anytime, anywhere.
Limited server storage =£10,000 One terabyte of network storage and a new server, not to mention tedious backup solutions, or Unlimited Storage on the realsmartcloud at no extra cost.
Video Server =£8,000 Limited video storage and local streaming, or use the power of Google Sites to host unlimited streamed video to whatever device you are using to view it.
Printer saving =£50,000 per annum How much do you spend on printing every year? The average secondary school spends £50,000 on printing and copying every year. Get your head in the clouds and become paperless, collaborative and online.
Total saving = £ 193,000 !!
Some of the great free web apps we have recommended above are:
Aviary – a free suite of powerful online creation tools. Photo-editing, logos, web templates, filters, colour palettes, screen capture, multi-track mixing and more at Aviary.com link Issuu – present your documents, PDFs etc. in an easy-to-read web format - example Vimeo – host your videos online without clogging up your own servers. Coverit Live – update your website during major events using this free mobile app SoundCloud – upload your audio podcasts and embed them into your website.
“WOW ! This sounds great, but this is a huge shift in current thinking, isn’t it?” -Really? Think about all the web apps you currently have in the cloud.
Think: online banking, Facebook, ebay, email, Amazon, photos. Think how quickly you receive feedback on all these interactions? Shouldn’t education be just like this?
“OK, so lots of what you suggest are free web apps; why wouldn’t we just do this ourselves? “ -You need a cohesive learning environment that, with one single log-in, gives you access to everything from one place.
If you tried to put all these things together yourself, you will have the headache and pain of all the issues that we’ve already solved for you. Our smartpass system connects to your school MIS to create and manage user accounts across all of your web apps, creating groups the same as your teaching groups in realsmart and Google Apps, including email, making the realsmartcloud the quickest and most comprehensive way to communicate and engage with your learners.
Keep your feet on the floor and get your heads in the cloud.
