Top 5 highlights from the LGfL Conference 2019

Yesterday I attended the LGfL ‘Let’s Get Digital’ Conference. This is a great event which I have attended almost every year that I have been an ICT/Computing Leader. The conference is free for LGfL schools and consists of around 8 keynote speakers, the choice to attend three 20 minute seminars in smaller rooms, a free lunch and opportunities to visit pop up stands run by LGfL’s partners. These included Busy Things, J2E, Avantis VR and Google. The venue had changed to a much larger space in Liverpool Street meaning it was easier to network and find your way around!

So here are my top 5 highlights from the conference this year…

5) Don't run any more parent online safety workshops

photo: LGfL

I attended a seminar run by LGfL Safeguarding Manager, Mark Bentley @LGfLDigiSafe , who said he’s been asked a million times ‘How do I get parents to attend my parent online safety workshop?’ – His answer in summary is ‘don’t do it! It’s much more effective to drip feed online safety information through the year via a corner of the newsletter, a text or digital board in the playground.’ This way, you are getting the information to everyone, it’s not overloading them and if there are immediate updates or overnight viral scare videos – then the advice can get to everyone quicker.

This has prompted me from Sept 19 to not hold any more parent workshops during the year but to create a corner of our newsletter dedicated to online safety tips and updates and let parents know I am available for more advise should they want more detail about a particular issue.

4) The head teacher who turned his school around

photo: @LGfL

I was amazed by the journey presented to us by the last keynote speaker of the day, Chris Dyson @chrisdysonHT, headteacher of Parklands Primary in Leeds. A school he described when he took it on as being the most deprived school in Leeds. A string of previous heads had come and gone, the school was at the bottom of the inadequate rating and they had had to exclude over 100 children over a very short number of years. It was incredible hearing his story of how he has turned this school around through exceptional leadership and prioritising aspects like pupil and staff well-being. It’s at the forefront of everything. 

His journey has been broadcast of various TV/news programmes and he continues to bring his children new experiences like visiting Santa or visiting a beach by opening the school of the day before Christmas Eve for local families or shutting the school for a whole day while everything travels to the beach. Everything is funded through donations or sponsorship. He said he has managed to raise over £300,000 from businesses to go towards the children’s experience of school. They are Times Tables whizzes right through from Year 1 to 6 and are regularly rewarded for it. The school is now Outstanding and it is great to hear about this journey – especially as one of Chris’ main focuses was well-being which is so important in schools today but so often ignored. If the teachers aren’t happy, the pupils won’t be and vice versa.    

3) Networking & Meeting followers

The more I attend LGFL Conferences, the more I start to recognise familiar faces. It is a great opportunity to talk to the LGFL team who are always happy to chat about anything and to network with other leaders. I met up with Simon, a deputy head and Apple Distinguished Educator from Anson Primary and Eleanor, a teacher and Computing lead from Wembley Primary. Both of whom I knew from local Brent courses I have attended. What was really fantastic though was meeting two of my Eat Sleep ICT Repeat Facebook followers, Clare and Mandy, who I have chatted with on comment posts and who interact regularly with my page. It was fantastic to finally meet these two in real life and talk properly about our jobs and ICT. I’m hoping I can meet more followers and people I follow at future conferences which could lead to further opportunities for collaboration.

2) Unplugged programming lessons

One of the morning keynotes was delivered by Julian S Wood @Ideas_Factory, a deputy head and master computer teacher. Julian reminded me about the importance of teaching unplugged programming lessons using ideas like flow charts, instructional games and post-it note programming. It made me realise that for children to really understand algorithms, they’ve got to understand instructions and sequences. 

I implemented Julian’s ideas the very next day with my first coding lesson with Reception – right at the start of their programming journey! Perfect timing and opportunity. I usually start this topic by getting them straight on the Beebots or on Busy Things coding activities but this morning I turned every computer and robot off and we talked about what an instruction is, what instructions do teachers give you, what is a machine, how do you make a machine work, what’s the difference between a machine and a table and how can we give accurate, clear instructions. 

The children then went off in pairs and gave their partner instructions on how to brush their teeth, make a bowl of cereal and make a cheese sandwich. The partner had to act it out to test whether the instructions were accurate enough. I heard some children say things like, “How can I eat my cereal, you haven’t told me to get a spoon!” This was great as it showed how carefully they were following the instructions.

I then modelled instructions for brushing teeth but missed out putting the toothpaste of the brush. The children had to identify afterwards which instruction was missing. This is so essential for understanding debugging and I can refer back to this lesson when we start programming the Beebots next week. The children have a firmer understanding of how and why the Beebot will move because we’ve given it an instruction. And if we make a mistake I can refer to the toothpaste scenario and get them to use their computational thinking skills to figure out what went wrong and how they can fix it. 

1) EduBlocks – Transitioning from Block Coding to Python

The Number 1 spot has to go to keynote speaker, Josh Lowe @all_about_code, who has invented software that helps children and adults understand Python by using the more familiar (Scratch) block coding layout and design. His software is a FREE resource available on multi device platforms and is currently being used in over 120 countries. It is called EduBlocks @edu_blocks and has been around now for 4 years. The most incredible thing about Josh is he is 15 years old and created EduBlocks when he was 11!!! I am blown away by this! He has recognised a huge need in education to help people transition from block coding which is fairly clear to use to python which is so much harder to process.

I am really excited about exploring his website and seeing if I can learn to code in Python. Then I can teach my Year 6’s how to use it. Currently, they learn Logo after block coding but it would be amazing if some of my more talented coders can be challenged on Python through Josh’s software. I spoke to Josh and his dad afterwards and asked if he would come to my school to demo his product to my children – the issue, his dad pointed out, is that he is still a child himself in full time school! We left it as a maybe for the future… 

I would love to get Josh to visit Elsley not just to teach Year 6 how to code using python but to be an inspirational role model to them. I want them to meet someone who came up with this brilliant idea and brought it to life himself at the age that they currently are. I don’t think they’ll quite believe it but hopefully see what can be achieved even at 11 years old!

And that is my top 5 highlights from this year’s LGfL conference. I look forward to attending in 2020!

James Fraser

Eat Sleep ICT Repeat

Elsley Primary School