Supporting Children's Learning with ICT

1. Supporting
Children's Learning
with ICT
RHIAN DAVIES
P138844

2. “One of the great things about working with
computers is that we are constantly learning from
each other. No matter how confident and
experienced we are, other people may have a
different way of doing something, a quicker short
cut, a more useful tool.”
Galloway (2004) p.8 “We… live in a wonderfully
challenging time. We invent tools
of great potential that promise
much delight. … providing
breakthrough combinations of
learning approaches, achieving
a synergy between what works
for learners and what
reinforcement and enrichment
the creative use of technology
can provide.”
Davitt (2005) p.10
“Every parent as well as every
teacher is acutely aware of the
importance of developing
children’s literacy and numeracy
capability both for their success
in the world of education and of
later life. In our increasingly
technological age becoming a
confident user of ICT is
increasingly recognized as vital.”
Cook & Finlayson (1999) p.8

3. Introduction
 Our school has interactive whiteboards in every classroom, a laptop that is shared between the
teachers and TAs, one computer in each classroom and a room that is used for interventions, an iMac,
iPads, notebooks and digital cameras. The iPads are divided between each Junior class and the
Foundation Phase share four. One whiteboard is a Smartboard and two are touch screen boards. The
others are Promethian Whiteboards.
 I am a HLTA in school and I work with most of the classes. I support a group of children in Year 6 on
Mondays, I teach the Year 1/2 class on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, on Thursdays I do PSD activities with
Year 2 children in the morning and I do PPA in the Reception/Year 1 class in the afternoon and on
Friday I cover SENCO time in Year 3/4 in the morning and then cover PPA in the Year 6 class in the
afternoons. I teach a variety of subjects including Maths, English, PSD, Music, Art, Drama, R.E and P.E. I
enjoy working with all of the children but feel restricted with undertaking activities such as this as I have
such a rigid timetable with no room for any flexibility.
 I intend to undertake a lesson for my PSE group of Year 2 children. I want them to use Puppet Pals and
act out a scenario using characters that the children make themselves. I will work with three children
who are Outcome 6 and will see how they respond to the questions asked of them, how they use the
Puppet Pals programme and how they work together as a team.

4. Learning Objectives
“ICT must be used across the curriculum, in the same way that a pen
and pencil are used in most subject areas. What we have now is a
much more flexible tool which can greatly enhance the leaning
experience.” (Ager, 2000, p. 15)
 By the end of the lesson I would like the children to be able to
have achieved some of the PSD outcomes and some of the ICT
skills (see the lesson plan).
 The children should be able to recognise the Puppet Pals
programme and discuss how they could answer the questions
given to them. They should also be able to plan and perform
using the characters they create and apply their knowledge of
how to behave to demonstrate that they are at the appropriate
PSD outcome. After they have used the Puppet Pals app they
should be able to evaluate their performance assess whether or
not they answered the question.

5. Class dynamics
 There are 29 children in the Year 1/2 class (17
children in Year 1 and 12 children in Year 2).
 The children in Year 2 range from Outcome 4 to
Outcome 6. I chose to work with three of the
children who are Outcome 6 for this activity.
 I work with Year 2 children one morning a week to
work on activities relating to the Outcomes they are
working towards.
 I used the PSD document and the ICT Scheme of
Work from 2008 from www.learn-ict.org.uk (which
was given to me by the Foundation Phase leader).

6. Lesson/activity outline
 Subjects: PSD and ICT
 A group of Year 2 children who are PSD Outcome 6. (Child A, Child M and Child Z)
 Objective: to create a Puppet Pals show using “What would you do if…?”
 Resources: iPad, Puppet Pals programme, “What would you do if…?” cards (see resources page).
 ICT skills: save work with assistance, take pictures with a camera, use menus to find information, share and work with
others using ICT equipment.
 PSD Outcomes: learning that they can and often do control their emotions, identifying problems and coming up with
solutions to solve them, show understanding of how they should relate to each other morally and ethically.
 Lesson:
• Ask the children if they have ever used Puppet Pals on the iPad before. Explain that they will be given a question or
scenario to create a Puppet Pals show.
• Give them time to familiarise themselves with the Puppet Pals app.
• Demonstrate how to make themselves as characters on it. Allow them to work together to take photos, draw around
their faces and choose a body to put their faces on.
• Show children the “What would you do if…?” cards and decide together which question they want to create a Puppet
Pals show with.
• Children can use the menus to decide which background , music and any additional characters they want to use.
• Choose a second question and repeat the decision making process.
• Save their work and watch their performances.
• Evaluate with the group and discuss any changes they would make if they were to do it again.

7. Resources
 iPad (Puppet Pals app and camera)
 “What would you do if…?” cards

8. The Evaluation
When I asked the children about their previous knowledge of the app they had all used Puppet
Pals before so they knew how to use the menus and the basic principles of what they had to do
and how to record themselves. The used the time I gave them to familiarise themselves with it
again, use the menus and see what choices they had with the backgrounds and music and the
variety of characters they could work with. However, they did not know how to create
themselves as characters. I demonstrated how to do this and one of the children told me that
this was “amazing” and they seemed to really enjoy creating their own characters.
Cook and Finlayson (1999) state that “Children can develop their electronic sophistication…
particularly if they see an adult or older child making use of them.” (p.15) They discuss the use of
electronic equipment that children come in contact with and write that they become more
competent the more they use ICT equipment at home and at school. Children learn off each
other and adults and learn by trying out the equipment alone or with others.

9. They took photographs of each other, traced around their own faces and made their
mouths move. They then added their faces to a body. They had some difficulties with swiping
too far and going back to the home screen and they also had problems with sizing the
characters and making them too big. Child A was able to delete and start again.
Once they had made their characters they chose which question they wanted to try to
answer and show in the Puppet Pals performance. They decided to try “What would you do
if you could choose one superpower?” They then used the menus to see the backgrounds
and music available to them and discussed what they should use.

10. They talked about their superpowers and how they were going to perform it but when they
started recording Child Z was very timid and lacked confidence. Child M did most of the
talking and did not give the other children the opportunity to join in. Child A kept whispering
and did not speak loudly enough for the iPad to record her voice. She was whispering to Child
M what to do but I encouraged her to do it herself. I think this was because Child M was sitting
in between Child Z and Child A and was very confident and was also holding the iPad. They
created four performances altogether and they took different roles in each of these. Child Z
became more involved with the other recordings and was able to save each of the shows
using different titles.

11. They had a different question for the second show which was “What would you do if you saw
someone stealing from a shop?” They wanted to add a police car and a police man so they
paused the recording but one of the children pressed the wrong button and the recording
stopped. They then saved the recording and continued with the scene on the final show. Child Z
did not participate with this one. When I asked him why he did not want to join in he told me that
Child M wanted to be in charge all of the time.
We found that noise level was a problem as we could not find anywhere quiet in the school.
Every room was being used by a class or a group of children. We found one room that was
empty but then a group of Reception class children came to work in there and the children
found this quiet distracting. The other children in the room impacted on the sound on the
recording. This was discussed by the children when they evaluated the recordings.

12. I found that the children were able to discuss what their super powers would be and what
they would do if they saw someone stealing with ease but when it came to filming it on
Puppet Pals they found it difficult to portray their feelings and ideas. This was possibly
because they thought that they were other characters on Puppet Pals and put on different
voices and they were not concentrating so much on answering the questions they were
asked. I also found that the children I expected to take control of the iPad and perform
more confidently were very shy and sat back while other the other children took over.
I was very surprised at Child M who does not normally take charge of situations but during
this activity she led the group, wanting to sit in the middle of the other two children and hold
the iPad. The other children did speak and press buttons but I had to ask her to let the others
hold the iPad during some of the recordings. All of the children normally work well in groups
and this they did during most of this activity but when they were recording certain children’s
personalities altered from how I expected. I tried to encourage Child Z and Child A to
participate more and once I spoke to them they did become more involved.

13. The children achieved the ICT skills I had planned and were able to save their work, take
photographs using the camera, use the menus on the app to find information and they were
able to share and work with each other using ICT equipment. I would give them this task to
do at some point in the future but I would talk about this activity with them from a PSD point
of view rather than ICT and ask them how they would work together in a more positive way
so they could all be more involved in the recording and hopefully Child M would allow the
other children in her group more opportunities to say what they want to say and move their
characters around. I would definitely spend more time with them discussing how they could
answer the question from the card and ensure that they understand that answering the
question is a very important part of the Puppet Pals show. Having already had this
experience of using Puppet Pals they could spend more time on their actual performance
rather than creating their characters as they have already made them.

14. The children told me that they enjoyed using this app and would like to use it again. Their
favourite part of the activity was taking photographs of each other and making their own
characters.
I find Puppet Pals an excellent app to use as my son who is in Year 3 uses it a lot at home
and creates lots of shows on there using characters that were already on there and
characters that he has made himself (his own face and photographs of Lego figures). I will
use it in school again but I will rethink my delivery of the lesson. The children used it well and
were able to use all of the ICT skills I had hoped they would be able to achieve but they
were less concerned with the PSD Outcomes I had planned. They were able to achieve
them when we discussed the situations but they did not portray them on Puppet Pals as I
had hoped. Instead I could have used another app such as Morpho Booth where
characters can be photographed from a book or they could have used themselves or other
people as characters and they could be brought to life with the children’s own voices to

15. show empathy with how the character is feeling or what they might be thinking. I could
also have tried Word Photo (where children can use words to describe feelings or actions).
I chose to use Puppet Pals as this was the app that I have had the most experience with.
However, when my son uses it, he uses it alone and the children in school had to work in a
group which would have involved collaboration and planning together.
I hope to encourage children to become confident when using apps and exploring them
to find out new things. As Cook and Finlayson (1999) write, “Children’s confident approach
to exploration provides a vital foundation for ICT learning and should be fostered and
encouraged.” (p.13). It is also our job as Teachers and Teaching Assistants to provide them
with the opportunities, as Cook and Finlayson (1999) also state that “Teachers face the
same decision-making processes in using computer software as with any other curriculum
resource; that is, how to integrate it smoothly into existing provision in a way which
enhances learning.” (p.38).

16. The Evidence
Pictures of the
children creating
their characters
after taking
photos of each
other.

17. Puppet Pals Performance 1

18. Puppet Pals Performance 2

19. Puppet Pals Performance 3

20. Puppet Pals Performance 4

21. References
Ager, R. (2000), The Art of Information and Communications Technology for Teachers.
London: David Fulton Publishers.
Cook, D. and Finlayson, H. (1999), Interactive Children, Communicative Teaching. ICT
and classroom teaching. Buckingham: Open University Press.
Davitt, J. (2005), New Tools for Learning. Stafford: Network Educational Press Ltd.
Galloway, J. (2004), ICT for Teaching Assistants. London: David Fulton Publishers Ltd.
Suitable Contexts For Assessment in Personal and Social Development, Well-Being and
Cultural Diversity. Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council. (No date)
www.learn-ict.org.uk