Top-Up Charge - Questions and Answers

[00:00:05] Welcome to this very special episode of the Digitize Fully Charged Podcast. My name is Niall and I'm standing in for Pam today. It's just going to be me and we're going to have a very special episode where we're going to do a bit of a questions and answers type episode. Now, I don't have a title for this style of episode yet, so please do let me know what you think we should call it. I'm thinking something like Top-Up Charge because you're topping up your knowledge because I'm answering questions or like a mini charge.

[00:00:35] Yeah, I'm not sure yet, so please do let us know what you think we should call this type of session. Basically, you ask us questions, we're going to answer them. So without further ado, let's jump in. Okay, question number one. How do you record the podcast? Mics, camera, software? I want to get started to record a podcast for my students, but I don't know where to begin. What did you do to start the podcast? Cheers.

[00:01:03] Okay, so let's start with mics. So you mentioned that one first. The ones I use here, if you're watching the video, you can see if not, it's the DJI mic. It's just the first one that was there and I clip it onto my shirt. Another thing you can do as well is, so this is from the, I forgot the box there. No, I've not. It's like a lanyard that has a really strong magnet on it and you can just wear it and then attach the mics in there.

[00:01:28] So that works really well, especially if you've got a thick jumper on. So that works for the clip-on mics. I do have a Sennheiser one up here as well, just as like a super backup, just in case. And then lastly, yeah, that's what I use to record. I would love to get like a Shure podcast mic, but they're like £200. So no, not at the moment, certainly. For your students, if you're doing it for your students, whatever microphone you've got, I would recommend just even getting a cheap USB mic would be a great start.

[00:01:58] The one that they've got in Chromebooks or Windows devices or iPads will do fine to get started with. Absolutely no problem with that. But if you want to up-level your audio, even a cheap USB mic is going to make a massive difference. This one here, come on, there we go. This one here is the Blue Snowball. I've had this for, oh, 12 years now. This is my go-to if I just need to plug in a quick USB mic, especially if you're using it with students. It just works really well.

[00:02:26] So this was, if you're watching the video, you can see I've got the Snowball here. If not, it's the Blue Snowball. It's what it's called. You can get it for around about maybe £40. The Yeti is the next step up, which is quite nice. It looks nice, but the Snowball is cheap. So yeah, this one works really well. It's just my quick go-to if I'm doing anything with students. Pam uses a really nice mic. I can't remember what hers is, possibly Sennheiser.

[00:02:51] And she has for hers, but yeah, if you're just getting started, the one on a device is fine. Your phone is also good if you want to record just a note and just hold it like that to you or position it. That also works. So give that a wee try. Camera. I use the Sony ZV-1. That is my camera. So again, if you're watching the video, you'll be able to see the camera that I'm pointing to right now. If not, the Sony ZV-1 is really good.

[00:03:18] There's a difference between a DSLR picture camera and a video camera. So I might be getting this wrong, but I believe the difference is if you use a video camera, it's a higher tax than a photography camera. So that's why most photography cameras stop recording at 30 minutes because any more than 30 minutes is classed as a video camera. So it costs a higher tax.

[00:03:42] So if you are doing it, if you're just doing short bursts, like a DSLR, if you've got one of those, will create fantastic video. But you'll be limited to 30 minutes. So we heads up for that one. Sony ZV-1 is great. I plug it into a capture card and then into the back of the computer. And that records really nicely. You can also do it via USB as well. Just a micro USB works. So that works good. Works well.

[00:04:06] Well, Pam, I believe, just uses a Logitech C902 camera webcam. She uses a webcam. So that works well enough. That works fine. She does also have the Canon for this as well. She's got the Canon video camera for this as well. But webcam's fine. Also, again, just use the one that's on the device. It'll be fine for starting up, especially if it's just students that are recording. Just use the webcam. Don't need fancy kit at the moment. Software. Software.

[00:04:35] So we record ours on StreamYard. And then from StreamYard, you can record locally, which means that whilst you are in the video call, it saves the video of the person who is talking. Like throughout. So Pam, me and the guest will all have our video and our audios recording locally. Saves it to your device. Then once you finish the call, it automatically uploads it to their server. And then I just download that.

[00:05:05] You can do this with things like Zencaster as well. It's great for recording. Soundtrap is another one. If you use Soundtrap, it's great for recording the audio and editing the audio as well. For editing, what I then do is I stick it into Premiere Pro and I edit in there. I did use Adobe. What's the sound one for Adobe called? I can't remember off the top of my head. But I was just playing around with settings and spending ridiculous amount of time. So I just use the one that's in Premiere Pro. That's fine.

[00:05:34] For editing for yourselves, if it's video, Canva is grand. That'll be fine. Adobe Express will be grand. If it's just the audio, Soundtrap is great. And it shows you everything that you're needing to do. You can see the waves as somebody's talking. So that's really good. So try that. How did we get started? So the first thing we wanted to do was we wanted to work out what questions did we want to ask?

[00:06:04] Why are we doing this podcast? So we worked out the questions. And then from there, we worked out who we wanted to be on the show. Now, I've had this list for close to two years now of people that I want on a podcast. So yeah, I've been working on this for ages. From there, we came up with the title and we came up with all the branding and everything. So I created our first thumbnail, sent it off to Pam and Kaz, who sent it back to me.

[00:06:31] I sent it back to them and just a couple of iterations later and we had it all sorted. From there, we refined the process to get people on. So what's the initial message? What information do they need? Like social media? Where is it going to be saved, stored? That kind of stuff. So we did all of that. And then from there, yeah, we just had fun and started out kind of what we'll be doing for the podcast.

[00:06:59] Yeah, so my, I guess my takeaway for you from this is work out why you're doing the podcast and what you want your students to learn from that. So if they are learning how to create a podcast, what software is available? What are their questions? Who do they want to interview or talk about or talk to? So if it's issues in their local community, which businesses can they interview and talk to?

[00:07:28] If it is how to use certain pieces of software or the work that they've been doing that week, just get to know the software and the tools available to them themselves and just get to know everything really well. So yeah, that's everything. And then from there, what do we do? We upload to YouTube and we upload to Acast. YouTube for video and Acast for audio.

[00:07:51] And Acast sends out to Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, sends out to Deezer, absolutely everywhere. You can use other tools. There's things like Podbean do this. Zencaster also do this. I just used Acast. I thought it was the easiest one available. So that's what we do. But it's up to you. Honestly, see if you're recording it just for your students. Just record via Microsoft Teams or Google Meet. Keep it nice and simple.

[00:08:19] The easier that it is, the more likely people are going to enjoy it. Like I went in very deep with this very quickly. So it does take a lot of time. I enjoy it. But if I was having to collaborate and work together with others, it would be a wee bit more messy. So yeah, just make sure it's nice and simple for everybody and just enjoy the process of getting together and talking together. And that's when the good conversations will flow. So hopefully that's helped and showing you kind of a bit of what we do for the process.

[00:09:20] Here. Because I was able to then go and explore and land in this position that I'm in now. So that started the journey for me. Where can you get started? So the first thing that I did with my students was I got them to record themselves reading stories just locally on their device. Okay. Just use the webcam and just got them to read stories. Two reasons. First one was it's really basic. Or I guess three reasons there. First one is it's really basic and it's really simple to do.

[00:09:47] It's just literally hit record, record a video if you're reading a story and then stop the recording. The second one is it builds confidence with the learners on using the device and using the camera, that kind of thing. Some of my students don't want to be on camera and that's fine. So we just recorded the audio instead or we held up something in front of the camera, that kind of thing. That's fine. We were just getting started and just kind of learning how to use these devices. The third thing was it allowed me as a teacher to go and see how students are using the device and how their reading is also coming on.

[00:10:17] I didn't use it for evidence or anything. I just used it to kind of see how we could use the devices. From there, that's when we started to get to do fun things like using the accessibility tools, which are absolutely for everyone. First thing to turn on is definitely the large mouse cursor, whether you're using a Chromebook, whether you're using a Windows device, whether you're using Apple products, large mouse cursor. Three reasons. First one, maybe your students need it. Okay, maybe they have visual needs and they need to use the large mouse cursor

[00:10:46] to see where they are on the screen. Second reason is it's great for presentations. If your student is having to ping up their screen onto the whiteboard, for example, and they're showing everybody how to use their device or showing them everybody their work, then it's just easy for everybody to see, particularly if you're far away from that device. And the third reason is as a teacher, you only have a short glimpse sometimes to see what students are doing on their device.

[00:11:13] So if they've got a large mouse cursor, it makes it so much easier for you as a teacher to walk around the room and just check to see that everybody's on task and doing everything appropriately and that they need to be. So large mouse cursor just makes that difference for everybody. Then you've got things like the Zoom. You've got your docked magnifier. You've got the full screen magnifier. You've got text to speech where it will read out to you. You've got your dictation, so your speech to text. You've got the high contrast. There's sticky keys.

[00:11:41] There's highlight text caret, which shows where you're typing. You get a wee blue circle around it. You've got your highlight mouse cursor, which gives you a red circle around it for the Chromebook. All of these settings are also on all the other devices, so just go and check them out and go and just have a little play. So the next thing to do would be to have a think about how you can make that swap in your lessons to make that difference for your students. One step that I took was to try to have like a digital day.

[00:12:08] Now, I know this is controversial, OK, but I think having that digital day really forced me to think about how I can use tools, digital tools for all of my students, for all of the lessons, OK? And you don't use them for all your lessons down the line, but you use them appropriately. The right tool for the right occasion. But by forcing myself to have a think about how I could use this tool in digital lessons, I then had that knowledge to jump back to at future times.

[00:12:37] So my advice to you would be if you're a total beginner, swap one small thing, OK? And just challenge yourself to swap one small thing. Maybe it's going from a USB stick to using cloud storage, OK? So using Google Drive or using Microsoft OneNote. No, not OneNote, OneDrive. Maybe it is instead of an art lesson where we're going through books about a museum and all the different paintings that are in the museum, go on to Google Arts and Culture

[00:13:04] and explore that museum, like actually go around the museum like you do in Google Maps, that you can actually explore museums. Maybe it is instead of handing a worksheet for students for their times tables. I'm keeping it really simple here. Instead of that worksheet, get them to do it online and hand it into you on Google Classroom or Teams, OK? Make that one simple swap for yourself and then challenge yourself again. How can I do more and more?

[00:13:31] As you go on, you will see what works and what doesn't, OK? I am not saying that every lesson that I ever do is digital. In fact, a good... Oh, I don't want to give a percentage, but a good like 70% of my day at the moment, even less than that, 90% of my day is not digital, OK?

[00:13:55] At the moment, about 90% of my day is not using digital tools and that is absolutely fine because it's the right tool at the right moment or for the right lesson or for the right occasion, OK? But that 10% that I am using it is effective and it is more effective than using a piece of paper. So try to use digital tools as often as you can, but for the right occasion. And then you mentioned the digital curriculum as well.

[00:14:22] Now, depending on where you're listening to this, we've got people from America listening, people from South Africa, Sweden, somebody from France has been listening, there's somebody from India. There's lots of different countries that are joining us right now. So I can't speak for every country, but the likelihood is that your government will have some sort of policy for you to have a look at. If they don't or you can't find it, go and check out Education Scotland's one. They have one called the Teacher Digital Skills Toolkit and that is a great starting place for you to see as an educator.

[00:14:52] What skills do you need and should you already have and should you be aspiring for for your students? And what should you be teaching your students about? So it's got things like online safety. It's got things like using the device, which we'll come back to in a wee second. It's got things like password security, using AI, touches on AI, I believe. So there's lots of different things in there for you to get to know. Now, I mentioned there that using the touchpad is going to be a massive skill for your students as well. It absolutely is.

[00:15:20] A quick tip for you, using the cow method, something I created with my younger students, has worked wonders. So the cow method is for anybody who's not watching, you stick your tooth, one hand, one finger from each hand up, up, up to your head like cow horns. And from there you take one horn off. This is your clicking finger, OK, or your clicking horn. And this clicks on the touchpad. OK, so if you're wanting to move something or click and drag, this is going to teach you how to do that. So you take one horn off, you click on the touchpad.

[00:15:49] Your second horn off is your moving finger, your moving horn. So you click on the touchpad with one horn and you move with the other. And that just is a way for students to learn how to use a touchpad and how to do click and drag. Once they get good, they can use one finger or one hand. That's absolutely fine. But it's just a way for your students to learn how to do that. Then they can be doing things like pinch, zoom in and out. They can be using three fingers to swipe left and right to go back and forward web pages. You can do two fingers up and down to scroll.

[00:16:16] What is a click versus what is a brush or like a touch on the touchpad? Two fingers for clicking as well. So if you press with two fingers on touchpad, that's your right click. Lots of different skills available to your students that possibly they do not know about. So have a look at touchpad skills as well just to get to know the touchpad. Hopefully I've covered lots there for you. And we're going to jump on to question number three. Question number three. Good morning, Pam.

[00:16:44] What can I do to make an impact in my school around apps and websites? My school has zero interest in using computers and I've been handed the role of digital leader in my school. I know that they do not want to listen to me tell them to get with the times, but I am at the end of my tether. They print out worksheet after worksheet for their classes and it makes me mad knowing that they can offer so much more of a rounded education for their students. I've heard you talk about SAMR, S-A-M-R, and I'd say that we are less than S.

[00:17:14] What tips would you have to excite people about using tech in their classes? Okay, so SAMR, you're probably wondering about that. I don't know if you can be less than S. So don't worry because I don't think you can actually be less than S, so that's fine. So SAMR is just a thinking process. It's basically a model where if you were to take an activity for students, a learning opportunity, how can you up-level that learning opportunity? Now, SAMR has its issues. There's things I would change about it,

[00:17:42] but it's just a great place for you to think about where am I on this learning opportunity and where am I going? Okay, so S is like substitution. So if I had a pen and paper, how could I substitute that pen and paper for digital activity online? And that's then using things like your Chromebooks or your Windows device or your Apple device to type instead of write. Okay. A is augmentation. You've then got modification. And then redefinition is things that aren't totally possible.

[00:18:12] So redefinition would be things like using VR headsets, talking to people. Like if you're doing a French lesson, actually talking to somebody who is a French teacher in France or talking to students there. It's things like going to the moon. It's things that aren't actually physically possible from within your classroom that you're then able to do using digital technology. So that is SAMR. This will stop to you. We can come back to SAMR at a future time if you are interested. It's just a thought model for you to think about.

[00:18:40] So how do we make that difference in schools? Amazing question. For me, the first thing that we would do is know that to make change is going to take a while. You can't just go in and say, right, everybody's using computers all the time. You're only going to be met with resistance and people aren't going to enjoy it. Using technology is such an enjoyable experience. People should have that opportunity to, yeah, enjoy using the tools and see the difference that it can make for their students.

[00:19:08] So go slow with it. One thing that I saw Olivier Adad doing from Armadale Academy a couple of years ago, he was doing emails and it was just an email every second week, third week, I think it was, maybe month to month. And it was, here's a new digital tool for you to go and have a look at. And it was a quick couple of minutes. How do you use the tool? How can it make a difference for our students? That worked really well for them. I believe he did a couple of videos as well for people. So that works well.

[00:19:36] One thing I've done is a bring your topic type thing. So this is more for the younger ones, but possibly for the older ones as well. So I was just in my classroom, told everybody, come along, it's just a drop-in session, and bring a topic that you're doing over the next couple of weeks, couple of months. So people came along and said, right, Niall, I'm doing something on the Victorians, I'm doing something on the current elections, I'm doing something on for maths, whatever they're doing. And the goal was to give them a digital tool

[00:20:05] to go away with, to go and have a look at and apply to that topic or to that learning. So whether that was using things like the Immersive Reader, we'll come on to that in a second, because that's a brilliant starting place. Using things like Google Arts and Culture, using creating video games with Microsoft MakeCode Arcade, loads of different tools available to them. And it was just showing them that these tools are available. Come and pick my brains, see if there's anything that I can do to make things easier for you. And yeah, take it easy with the tools that are available.

[00:20:35] So like I said, you could use Immersive Reader. That's a great starting place for everybody. Accessibility tools are always a fantastic starting place because you're making that difference for your students. And it's easy for educators to see that difference for their students immediately. So for Immersive Reader, one thing that I did was I had about 10 different slides on PowerPoint. And each slide had a story that, you know, I'd thrown it in the chat GPT and asked it to create me a story.

[00:21:01] And from there, I put the story into the slide and I made the text purposefully too small to read. So the text was there, but the students couldn't read it. Okay. Even on full screen. So they had to go into Immersive Reader. And then that is where they can change the font size, the text, the text size, the font, line spacing. They've got picture dictionaries. They can translate it. They've got reading coaches there. You can change the text to speech, speed and voice.

[00:21:30] And there's so much that your students can do with Immersive Reader. So that is a great starting place always. What else could we do would be to set up a group of people that are behind you that support your decisions. Now, these could be staff or it could be students. Okay. So you could have a little working party of digital leaders or you could have student digital leaders who go into classes and show staff and students how to use the tools. A great way for teachers to learn how to use the tools is seeing how students are using them. So you could have, for example,

[00:22:01] for, I mean, I'm recording this on Burns Night. So you could have a Burns activity where students are writing poetry and they're assigning pictures to the poem or annotating it and just getting those digital leaders to go in and just show the teachers how to use those tools as well. So it's just flipping that way of thinking where the students are showing the teacher how to use the tools whilst also showing the students, the other students how to do it.

[00:22:28] So get a team behind you that believe in your message and what you're doing. But know it's going to take time. With every leadership role, it's going to take time. You can't go in there with all guns blazing because you're just going to be met with resistance. Walk with people, show them the route that they need to take and that you'll help them with. And together, you're going to make a massive difference, not only for the staff, but also for the students. So best of luck. Please do let us know how you get on with that.

[00:22:58] Hopefully that's helped and given you a wee bit of a start. And on to question number four, the final question. Hi, Pam and crew. I've seen online that everybody is going to bet this year, but what is it? Should I be going? And how are all of these people going to bet when they have classes to cover? Just a quick question and figured you'd know the answer. Great question. Okay.

[00:23:26] So first of all, what is bet? You know what? I don't know what bet stands for. Bet is an educational technology event that takes place down, oh, for us it takes place down in London. It is on, hold on, let me have a wee look. It is on the 21st to the 23rd of January next year. It says 2026 here, although I think that's 2025. I think that's a spelling mistake there. It's also in Malaysia

[00:23:55] on the 2nd to the 3rd of October 2024, so the year before. And then it's also in Brazil on the 28th of April to the 1st of May 2025, so this year. It's an EdTech event, so it's honestly incredible. So as you walk in, so it's at the XL Centre in London, near the O2. And as you walk in, on either side of the building, so this was two years ago, it was the last time I was there. On either side,

[00:24:21] you've got like an airport hangar sized rooms. And in there, there's just hundreds, possibly thousands, of different exhibitors and stands and stalls and tables of people showing off how EdTech can make a difference to your students. So you've got people like Lenovo, you've got Google for Education, Microsoft Education, you've got Canva, you've got, for example, people like Quizzes, Kahoot, you've got Soundtrap,

[00:24:51] you've got like, everybody who is involved within EdTech is there. A massive shout out to TextHelp, who I've been there every single time I got remessaged to say, am I going this year from TextHelp again? And just checking. So yeah, it's always great to meet up with the TextHelp team. I know they've changed their name recently, I can't remember it off the top of my head. But yeah, I mean, if you type in TextHelp, it still appears. So check out the TextHelp team. But yeah,

[00:25:19] so it's basically just this massive EdTech event where everybody who is involved with educational technologies goes to check out what's new, what the updates, what piece of hardware has been released, what software is coming out, what new tools are available for our students. And it is honestly so inspiring to go and just see some great pieces of content and see what kind of what's out there. It's also great to go and see people and it's a fantastic opportunity

[00:25:47] to meet the EdTech superheroes that are out there and just go and get caught up on with everybody who is down in London for that event. I know there's a big cohort from Scotland that go down every year. There's a ton of people from England and all across the world who come across just to go to Tibet. So it honestly is an incredible, it's huge, huge experience. How do people go? So I guess there's multiple different options. The main one is if you are an EdTech business

[00:26:17] or you're involved with EdTech in any way, likelihood is the business is sending you and that is either as a stand, as a talker or as somebody as like a buyer and you're checking out what's all there. Another way that people go down is self-funding it. They're just paying for themselves to go down. So they get the flights over to London and go from there and just buy their hotels and stuff or fly straight back up. And then I guess the final way is sometimes some companies will ask you

[00:26:45] to join them on the stand and then maybe they'll offer you a wee bit, like they'll cover you for the day. They'll get you a ticket in or something. So that's another way that people get in. I'm not sure how the deal will cover for schools. I guess every situation is different. You would need to speak to whomever you've seen online going and how they managed to go. Maybe they've taken a holiday to go down. Maybe it's been approved by the school.

[00:27:13] Sometimes if you're a London school, you'll see lots of London schools in there because there's lots of students will turn up. And yeah, honestly, incredible experience. If you get a chance to go to BET, it is fantastic. It's awesome. And there's lots of other experiences that are like it as well. But BET in the UK, I believe is the biggest educational technologies event that takes place. So if you were at BET this year, please do let us know what your favourite part was

[00:27:42] because we didn't end up there this year just with timetables and everything. So we didn't get a chance to go. We would have loved to have gone. Maybe next year. Let's aim for BET 2026. It'll be. But yeah, let us know. Please do. What was your favourite part of BET? Was it making connections with people? Who did you meet for the first time? Or was it the stands and going and seeing kind of what was out there? So thank you so much for joining me

[00:28:12] for this very special episode of the Digitize Fully Charged podcast. Hopefully I have answered your questions as well as I can. Hopefully you've come away with a little bit extra knowledge to go away and try with your classes or with your staff or with anybody who you're working with. We've covered lots from looking at different tools to how to make that difference in your classes, how to make that difference in schools. So if you do have questions, you can drop us a wee message. We're on Instagram, Facebook. We're on YouTube.

[00:28:40] We're on Twitter, LinkedIn, absolutely everywhere. If you search for Digitize Crew, that's our name for all these. TikTok as well. We're on TikTok sharing the videos. So I try every day to get a post out every single day. Just hoping that people will engage with it and kind of see how fantastic the podcast is. So please do share your favorite parts. Please do comment, like. You can rate us as well

[00:29:08] on things like Apple Podcasts, Spotify. At the moment, we're sitting at five stars. So thank you so much, everybody. We really appreciate you taking that time to rate us and give us that feedback. The feedback so far has been fantastic. I love those messages coming in. You honestly make my day every time somebody says love the podcast. And even if it's just a throwaway comment, like, oh yeah, podcast is looking great. Got one from Ian the other day. We shouted out to Ian Vosser saying loving the podcast so far. So thank you, Ian. Made a difference.

[00:29:37] And every single time somebody says it, honestly, it makes me very proud to be a part of the podcast. So thank you very much for all your kind messages. If you've got questions, drop us a message. Pam is also, we've got a special website that Pam's been working on. And there's going to be a form on there for you to ask your questions as well. Hopefully in the next couple of days. I'm recording this at the weekend. So yeah, I doubt Pam will be working today. It's a Saturday. So it's just me. So hopefully that appears soon.

[00:30:06] But aye, thank you so much for joining us. My name is Niall. I'm standing in for Pam for the Digitize Fully Charged podcast. And yeah, we'll see you again soon. Cheers. Bye.