In these austere times, free is good, right? Here are three sources of professional development that you will, I’m sure, find useful.

ICT Reviews

This is a free educational ICT supplement from PC Pro Magazine. Featuring articles and reviews by Dave Smith, Merlin John, Chris Drage, and others, it covers netbooks, tablets, interactive whiteboards (which was my contribution) and more. Download it from the PC Pro website.

Reportage

The Press Association building, LondonHow did reporters cover the Whitehaven shootings last year, in which 12 people were gunned down by someone on the rampage? What technology did they use? Join Drew Buddie and me for a live discussion with Tony Johnston, of the Press Association, at 7pm UK time on Tuesday 25th January. 

Also find out how schools can work with the Press Association in a very cost-effective way to give students a real insight into how a modern paper works, with a professionally-produced magazine or newsletter at the end.

You’ll want to tell your Creative and Media, Media Studies and PHSE/Citizenship colleagues about this session too.

The session will start promptly at 7pm UK time, although usually you may enter a few minutes early if you wish. Here’s a world clock for colleagues who will be outside the UK at the time. The session will be hosted until 8pm, but the room won’t be closed until 9:30pm for colleagues who wish to continue the discussion. Please note that the session will be recorded.  If -- sorry, I mean when -- you tweet about these sessions, please use the hashtags #vitalcpd and #sictco.

Newsletter

I am hoping to get the next issue of Computers in Classrooms out very soon. It will cover a lot of (mainly current) stuff I think you will find very useful. This marks a temporary break from the Games-Based Learning specials, which will be coming out afterwards. Computers in Classrooms is a free newsletter which thousands of ICT co-ordinators and other ICT leaders have found helpful. Click on the link just given and sign up now! It takes just a couple of minutes. It’s a double opt-in process, meaning that you will receive an email asking you to confirm that you’d like to subscribe.

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