| The area was a hive of activity, anticipation buzzed in the air and excited conversations seemed to be about little else. Surprisingly, this wasn’t due to their recent school holiday or imminent SATs but an appearance of police incident tape. Last week the Year 2 school entrance area became a crime scene. According to a faux CBBC Newsround report, sometime during the Easter break a school iPad was damaged which led the police being called. There is no shortage of suspects, from mid-day assistants through to members of senior leadership. Being strictly impartial, the Year 2 children have begun to assist with the ongoing investigation during their weekly computing lessons. |  |
 | When asked about their lessons so far, the children have been eager to share their theories. Ryan (2MB) exclaimed that the videos are amazing. Emelia (2BG) intrigued by seeing how the police arrived at school to investigate. Velsie (2JP) said she is enjoying the challenge of finding out who is responsible. Dani (2JC) was also really excited about the iPad mystery, although she admitted she may miss her teachers if they were sent to prison. As a year group team, we felt that the scheme of work for this half term seemed a little lacklustre; it recommended teaching how to email. Therefore we realised that we needed to develop a bespoke series of lessons appropriate to the needs of the children within our classes. Given the summer term can be demanding, we decided that our lessons needed to be as fun and as engaging as possible. |
| Using a cross-curriculum selection of skills, including reading and writing, the children are utilising Google Classroom to collaborate in lessons. This secure platform simulates a social media experience that many of the children may be familiar with at home, in a controlled and safe classroom context. The children are interacting and making inferences based on multimedia ‘evidence’ to help solve the mystery. This has already facilitated conversations around online safety, age appropriate content and the use of devices beyond school. |  |
The lightbulb moment for the children happened when they realised how their typed messages would appear on their classmate’s screens instantaneously. Naturally, it didn’t take long for some children to work out how to post an emoji or two! Billy (2JP) explained that he likes how he can “text the other people in class”. Lacey (2JP) said that she is enjoying using Google Classroom because she can read the comments that other children post. This shows a lot of promise for cultivating peer work alongside computing and literacy skills.
The school’s co-operative value of solidarity has helped embed a collegial culture which has enabled this innovative plan to become a reality. It is great to see the children enthused as they learn and develop the key skills of creating, contributing and retrieving digital content. By virtue of the iPad Mystery’s novelty the children are exceedingly engaged and have high expectations for what they will achieve.
For more information, please speak to Mr Powell or your child’s Year 2 class teacher. As you are here, please enjoy the iPad Mystery videos that the children have seen in class so far.
The school’s co-operative value of solidarity has helped embed a collegial culture which has enabled this innovative plan to become a reality. It is great to see the children enthused as they learn and develop the key skills of creating, contributing and retrieving digital content. By virtue of the iPad Mystery’s novelty the children are exceedingly engaged and have high expectations for what they will achieve.
For more information, please speak to Mr Powell or your child’s Year 2 class teacher. As you are here, please enjoy the iPad Mystery videos that the children have seen in class so far.
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