Yesterday was my ninth visit to the annual BETT Show and I do think that I'm becoming quite efficient now in navigating the stands and picking out the new products that are: manageable and cost-effective to implement in the classroom as well as having a positive impact on the curriculum and children's education. So, in no particular order, here are some of the highlights I found:
- the Blue-Bot and Bee-Bot now have an audio playback feature that speaks the movements that are happening (saving adults like me getting a dry throat and making it better to use independently by children) - https://www.tts-group.co.uk/Hero-BeeBot.html;
- TTS have also started selling activity tins for the Bee-Bot, containing: accessories, jackets and activity cards to help enhance your use of the Bee-Bot on the many new mats that are now available like a wildlife garden, dinosaur jungle and an amusement park;
- Twinkl have launched a free AR-based coding app on the theme of Little Red Riding Hood;
- Twinkl have also started creating AR-linked books too, like https://www.twinkl.co.uk/resources/twinkl-originals;
- Learning By Questions appears to be an online, multiple-choice quiz from which you can get feedback on how children perform although personally, I'd rather pick the questions myself (e.g. from the Classroom Secrets resources) and just create a free Google Form;
- Mission Python is a book teaching you how to code via the theme of a space adventure, although look on their site, whilst it's very detailed, would need some simplification before actually presenting to children;
- BBC Bitesize has recently undergone a slight design update and archiving of old content, whilst BBC Teach continues to upload curriculum video clips and live lessons.
- Mighty Writer is a felt-based story mapping mat which looks quite fun.
- Scottie Go is an interesting collaboration between real magnetic command blocks and a programming app.
- CoderZ is an online robot programming site.
- iSandBOX is basically projection-mapping technology for a sand tray which would be phenomenal if your school has the money and space to put it.
I had a fantastic day out and even came back with quite a nice haul of merchandise that'll I'll be distributing to my Technology Team at the end of the year!
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