Digital Leaders 2022-2023

 

 

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We are Castleview School's Digital Leaders.
Our ideas and hard work help influence the entire school! Some of our roles and responsibilities can be seen below:

Programming Robots
Leading School Assemblies
Delivering Meetings to the Staff
Taking the lead with any technology
Joining the Online Safety Committee
Helping classes in Computing lessons
Attending Workshops at Langley Grammar

Click here for a full list.

 

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This year's highlights so far!

 

Coding Workshop 29/06/2023

The Digital Leaders have been on a trip to Langley Grammar’s Digital Schoolhouse to attend coding workshop run by Computing Lead, Stacey Jenkins.  They had a wonderful morning on an ‘Alice in Wonderland’ adventure with the BBC micro:bit.  A great thank you to Digital Schoolhouse for allowing us to have this opportunity.

 

Industry Visit from Purple Mash 23/06/2023

Today, Dawn and Dora from Purple Mash came to visit Castleview to look at the impact of the 2Simple software across the school. They witnessed Reception using a variety of tools during their computing lesson and were extremely impressed with the children's mouse control and ability to navigate within the program. In addition, they delivered an industry talk to the digital leader team. They described the organisational structure within 2Simple e.g. Marketing, Development, CPD and Education teams and the roles that exist within these teams. Of course, as always, the digital leaders loved the merchandise that was given out.

 

Alan Mackenzie Workshop 07/06/2023

Our online safety advisor, Alan Mackenzie, spoke to Year 5 and 6 children about online disinhibition.  He also delivered a workshop for parents.  To advertise Alan's visit, the Digital Leaders made posters, which were displayed around school.  Here are some examples:-

The day before his arrival, the digital leader team went to the gate to distribute leaflets to persuade as many parents to attend his talk. 

On the day of the visit, the Digital Leaders came back to school in the evening.  They presented the introduction for the Parent's Online Safety talk explaining their own online experiences.

Visit from OhBot 18/05/2023

Dan and Susie from Ohbot came to Castleview to deliver a fantastic workshop on AI technology. Raspberry Pi club attended in the morning and Digital Leaders in the afternoon. First, the children challenged Ohbot to answer questions on any topic. A discussion took place about the validity and accuracy of Ohbot’s responses. Next, they challenged Ohbot to become a historical character. Ohbot became Queen Victoria on 13th June 1842, when she took her first railway journey from Paddington Station to Slough. Ohbot was then tested on another range of questions relating to this local historical event. Unfortunately, testing proved that there is still a long way to go in perfecting this technology. Dan concluded the session with a demonstration of how AI technology works and the sources it uses. All the children had a fascinating experience and learnt a great deal!

Trip to the BETT Show 29/03/2023

Castleview's Year 6 Digital Leaders journeyed to the ExCel Centre for the BETT show, showcasing the best of tech in education.  Digital Leaders coded robotic animals, played laser-guided sport, interacted with gaming projections and met with our lovely partners; Ohbot, Purple Mash, Vestel and the Internet Legends of Parent Zone.  It was a very exciting visit!

Purple Mash 2Animate Challenge 24/02/2023.

Digital Leaders have been working hard to impress the Purple Mash team by creating a short animation to explain a concept in Science, a time in History or a place/feature in Geography!  Good luck! The entries are looking great already! The competition closes on the 6th April 2023.  Winners will be announced shortly after 11th April 2023.

Conducting Assemblies and Activities 08/02/2022

All of the Digital Leaders led an amazing assembly to launch Safer Internet Day.  They had done lots of preparation in advance and were very professional in the way they conducted the assembly!  Sajjan, our Year 6 Digital Leader, created an amazing Comic to share with his peers.  The Year 5 Digital Leaders led some great interactive educational games in their year group. Year 4 Digital Leaders hosted a book reading of 'Chicken Clicking' to Year 2 children.  The Year 3 Digital Leaders led a self-created word search activity in their year group.  They all did a fantastic job!

Some of them received a Head Teacher's Award for their fabulous contributions!

 

Purple Mash 2Code Qatar Football World Cup Challenge 06/12/2022

To mark the Qatar 2022 World Cup and Computer Science Education Week, the Digital Leaders have been using 2Simple Software to code their own football games.!

Sphero Workshop 03/11/2022

The Digital Leaders visited Langley Grammar School’s Digital School House to attend a Sphero workshop run by Computing Lead, Stacey Jenkins. The children worked their way through a series of coding challenges with increasing complexity. Some tasks required considerable perseverance to succeed. The morning culminated with a DT challenge to build a chariot for Sphero! Everyone had a fantastic morning and thoroughly enjoyed themselves. A huge thankyou to Mrs Jenkins for delivering such an amazing workshop.

 

Assisting Reception 07/10/2022

On Friday afternoon, our wonderful Year 5 Digital Leaders went into the computing suite to help the children login to their computers and assist them with challenges on Purple Mash. They were indeed keen, kind and of course patient!

 

Poetry Competition 06/10/2022

It was National Poetry Day on 6th October, and this year the theme of the competition was linked to the environment. There are several Purple Mash resources that the Digital Leaders used to write their poem. The competition opened on the 26th of September and will run until the end of October. Keep an eye on our page to see if any of our poems won in the competition!

 

Purple Mash 2Code Challenge 30/09/22

It was National Coding week from 19th September as well as EU Code week from 8th-23rd October, so a great opportunity during these weeks for our Digital Leaders to explore 2Code. There were different levels of activities as well as a range of games and quizzes to enhance their 2Code experience.

 

 

2020-2021 Highlights 

 

Hosting a Staff Meeting! 29/06/2022

On Wednesday evening, our lovely Digital Leaders ran a staff Personal Development Meeting (PDM).  They informed all teachers of their online habits, both at home and in school, as well as comparing their online behaviour with National Statistics for 8-11 year olds.  Their performance infront of the adults displayed confidence beyond their years.  A fantastic achievement!

 

Alan Mackenzie Workshop 08/06/2022

Our online safety advisor, Alan Mackenzie, spoke to Year 5 and 6 children about how to be responsible and respectful when online.  He also delivered a workshop for parents.  To advertise Alan's visit, the Digital Leaders made posters, which were displayed around school.  Here are some examples:-

The day before his arrival, the digital leader team went to the gate to distribute leaflets to persuade as many parents to attend his talk.

On the day of the visit, the Digital Leaders came back to school in the evening.  They presented the introduction for the Parent's Online Safety talk explaining their own online experiences.

 

Coding Workshop 28/04/2022

 

On Thursday, our tech wizards from Castleview visited our local Teach Computing Hub to experience a hands-on coding workshop. The Digital Leader team were first to visit in the morning followed by Raspberry Pi club in the afternoon. The workshops started with some unplugged activities, which were followed by a series of coding challenges to program a Crumble controller to light a sparkle, turn a motor and make a buzzer sound. The sessions culminated with an integrated DT activity where the children designed and made their own monster and attached the Crumble sparkles. Finally, they ran their code to produce flashing monster eyes! A massive thank you to Stacey Jenkins from Langley Grammar who led both workshops. All the children involved had a fantastic time. 

 

Conducting Assemblies 08/02/2022

 

Digital Leaders led an amazing assembly to launch Safer Internet Day.  They had done lots of preparation in advance and were very professional in the way they conducted the assembly!  The Year 5 and 6 Digital Leaders also led some great interactive educational games in their year groups.

Find Your Balance: Exhibition at The Houses of Parliament 07/02/2022

This was a very special day for Saran and Eshan, two of our amazing Digital Leaders.  Their winning artwork was displayed in The Houses of Parliament as part of the Parent Zone Find Your Balance Competition (see earlier highlights).  Their artwork depicted the need for children to keep a balance between their online and offline activities.  Tan Dhesi, MP for Slough, was on hand to present our very talented children with their prizes.

 

 

Purple Mash Termly Challenge 28/1/22

The Digital Leader’s have produced Online Safety posters which will be displayed around school, in preparation for Safer Internet day 2022.

Gifts from Purple Mash! 7/1/22

The Digital Leaders were delighted to recieve their new Purple Mash Certificates, T-shirts and bugs, after completing the Digital Leader Termly Challenges. They proudly wore them while showing prospective parents around school this week.

 

Assisting Reception.

Every Friday afternoon, our wonderful Digital Leaders go into the computing suite to help the children login to their computers and assist them with challenges on Purple Mash.  They are indeed keen, kind and of course patient!

Purple Mash 2Code Challenge 3/12/2021

It is Computer Science Education Week from 7th-14th Decmber, so it gave our Digital Leaders a great opportunity to explore 2Code. There were different levels for activities as well as a range of games and quizzes for our Digital Leaders to enhance their 2Code experience.  Here are some of them hard at work!

Purple Mash Christmas Card Design Challenge 18/11/2021

The digital leaders are busy preparing their Christmas card designs for the Purple Mash competition.  They are required to design a festive image using '2Paint a Picture' in Purple Mash.  The winning design will become the official 2Simple (Purple Mash) festive card and the winners will be receiving 10 printed copies of their card and a goody bag.

Good luck to our lovely Digital Leaders.

Digital Leader Sphero workshop 11/11/2021

On Thursday morning, Stacey Jenkins from Langley Grammar School visited Castleview. She ran a brillant Robotics workshop for the Digital Leader Team. The children worked their way through a series of coding challenges with increasing complexity using Sphero. Some tasks required considerable perseverance to succeed. Everyone had a fantastic morning and thoroughly enjoyed themselves. A huge thankyou to Mrs Jenkins for delivering such an amazing workshop.

 Find Your Balance: “A day in my digital life” Art Competition 25/10/2021

The Digital Leader team created entries for “A day in my digital life” art competition to show how they find a healthy balance between their online and offline lives. The top 50 entries are to be displayed in the Houses of Parliament in London!

We have already received the announcements of the winners!

Here are the winners with their prize and letter.

 

A world first at Castleview! 08/10/2021

On Friday, Dan Warner from Ohbot, came to unveil his latest Robotic product – Ohbot AI. The Digital Leader team were the first children ever to code Ohbot AI. They were invited to undertake a series of challenges to test and evaluate this latest robotic creation. During the afternoon, Raspberry Pi club were also treated to a workshop. An amazing experience for all those children involved. A massive thankyou to Dan for this incredible opportunity.

Introducing the new Digital Leader team 01/10/21

The team have been busy creating posters to introduce themselves to the school. Their posters will be on display in classrooms and the Computing Suite.

 

 

2020-2021 Highlights

Safer Internet Day 21/06/2021

Year 4 and 6 Digital Leaders led a range of activities within their bubbles to celebrate Safer Internet Day.  They had done lots of preparation in advance and were very professional in the way they conducted the activities to mark the event!

Robotics Workshop 27/05/2021

For the second Thursday in a row, Stacey Jenkins from Langley Grammar School came to Castleview to deliver a Robotics workshop. This time the lucky recipients were the Year 3, 4 and 5 Digital Leaders. The children worked their way through a series of coding challenges with increasing complexity using Sphero. Some tasks required considerable perseverance to succeed. Everyone had a fantastic afternoon and thoroughly enjoyed themselves. Another huge thankyou to Mrs Jenkins for delivering such an amazing workshop.

 

Year 6 Digital Leader Workshop 20/05/2021

The Year 6 Digital Leaders along with Raspberry Pi Club were treated to a fun filled Sphero Robotics workshop hosted by Stacey Jenkins from Langley Grammar School.

The session started with some warm up activities to familiarise everyone with the coding app used to control Sphero. Next, the children were asked to design a chariot for Sphero to pull around the hall. There was considerable creativity on display. However, some designs were more successful for the task than others! The session finale required the children to manoeuvre their chariot around an obstacle course. Sphero did not always move in the expected way! Consequently, the children had to debug and retest their code constantly to perfect their robot’s path. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves and agreed they had learnt a lot from the session. A huge thankyou to Mrs Jenkins for delivering such an amazing workshop.

 

Competition update! 05/05/2021

CONGRATULATIONS to Year 6 Digital Leader Aarna Chamoli who won the Smart Cellular design a mascot competition. She created Smart the Bear who will become a friend to Smartz the Lion – pictured below. Aarna’s design will be transformed in CGI style and will appear throughout the Smart Cellular website. In addition to this, Aarna won 10 ipads for Castleview!

What an amazing achievement! Well Done Aarna.

 

Digital Leader Meeting 26/03/2021

The Digital Leader team met today to plan their entries for the Smart Cellular ipad competition. GOOD LUCK everyone! Fingers crossed.

 

Headteacher’s Award 08/03/2021

The Year 5 Digital Leader’s received a Head Teacher’s award for their contribution to Safer Internet Day, which was held on February 9^th 2021, during lockdown. The team delivered an amazing, virtual, online safety assembly to their year group. This was a fantastic achievement as they had researched, written, practiced and performed their assembly completely independently.

 

Industry afternoon from Ncino 11/12/2020

The Year 6 Digital Leader's and Raspberry Pi club members had the opportunity to experience an afternoon in industry. They listened to a fantastic live presentation about the many different jobs that exist in a modern tech company like Ncino. The speakers, from a range of departments (including development, marketing, sales and implementation) talked about the part they played in the company and provided the children with a range of possible roles that they could consider for future careers.

 

Digital Leader T-shirt Competition update

There was a surprise delivery at Castleview! A “goodie bag” and Thankyou card arrived from Purple Mash, to say Congratulations to the Digital Leaders for their amazing competition entries. Thank you so much Purple Mash. 

 

Digital Leader T-shirt Competition 06/11/2020

The Digital Leader Team have been busy designing T-shirts for the November Purple Mash Digital Leader T-shirt competition. We have already heard back from Purple Mash via Twitter.

“Brilliant work and some amazing entries”

Don’t forget to follow us on the new Castleview School Twitter page. @CVS_Slough Fingers crossed one of our entries is a winner. Good luck everyone!

 

Introducing the new Digital Leader team 23/10/20

The team have been busy creating posters to introduce themselves to the school. Their posters will be on display in classrooms and the Computing Suite.

 

First Digital Leader Meeting 16/10/2020

Today, there was much excitement as the Digital Leader team were awarded their badges! Other items on the agenda included:

• The role of a Digital Leader within the school.

• An evaluation of the Digital Leader page on the school website.

• The new Castleview Twitter page. @CVS_Slough

Here are some of the team’s ideas …

 The Digital Leader team also wanted to introduce a new feature on their page “The Computing Quote.” The first quote was nominated by Houria.

Steve Jobs (1955 - 2011)

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2019-2020 Highlights

Alan Mackenzie Workshop - 20/11/2019

Alan Mackenzie is an Online-Safety consultant who visits our school every year. He speaks to Year five and six pupils about how to stay safe online and also delivers a workshop for parents. To advertise Alan’s visit, the Digital Leaders made posters, which were displayed around the school. Here are some examples:

 

At home time, the day before his arrival, the whole team went into the playground to distribute leaflets, with the purpose of persuading as many parents as possible to attend his talk.

On the day of his visit, the Year five and six Digital Leaders from Ryvers came over to Castleview to join us. They enthusiastically joined in and answered questions during the workshop. They were hosted by the Castleview Year 5 Digital Leaders who had chance to share ideas and socialise after the talk.

Finally the Castleview School Digital Leaders, came back to school in the evening. They presented at the parent’s Online-Safety talk with an explanation of their own online experiences.

                         

 BT Engineers Visit - 11/11/2019

The Digital Leaders had the opportunity to meet with some tech visitors from industry. Two local BT Network Engineers, JC and Callum came into Castleview and ran a session for the Digital Leaders. The focus was on the impact of STEM subjects (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) in the work place and the part these subjects play in the life of a BT Engineer.

They also spoke to the team about their own schooling and the career paths they have followed at BT because of their love of technology. Finally, they shared photos of what it is like inside the Slough depot (next to the post office on the A4) and aspects of their day to day role as an engineer.                                                                             

Robotics Workshop - 10/10/2019

This term, the Digital Leader team visited Langley Grammar to take part in a Robotics workshop.  Everyone was very excited about the trip, especially when it was revealed that this was the first time this session had been delivered. Therefore, Castleview were the first primary school in Slough to use the brand new Spheros robots!

The session started with some unplugged activities. Firstly, a quiz looking at patterns in the natural world, although the concept was very simple, it proved quite challenging! The children then moved on to creating their own repeating pattern based on a simple square.

Then on to the part everyone had been waiting for, time to make friends with Spheros. The children worked their way through a series of progressively more difficult challenges focussing on how Spheros moved. They controlled the movements from an app, on an ipad. The app required them to write a series of instructions using a drop and drag programming language similar to Scratch. Considerable resilience was required as Spheros did not always move in the way the children expected!

Consequently, the Digital Leaders had to debug and retest their code constantly to perfect their robot’s moves. The session finale involved adapting their robots so they could carry a pen and draw a square in a designated area. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves and all the children, along with Mrs Chandler from Year 6, agreed that they had learnt a lot about robotics from the session. A huge thank you to Mrs Jenkins for inviting us.

        

 

Safer Internet Day 2020 - 11/02/2020

Tuesday 11th February was Safer Internet Day (SID) 2020.  Castleview along with 1321 schools across the UK celebrated the day with a range of activities.

The digital Leader Team started the day off with a fantastic assembly on this year’s theme “online identity” which they presented to Year 2 and above. Children then went back to classes to work on a variety of activities.

The Digital Leader Team worked alongside class teachers to lead a range of activities in classrooms. Here are a few examples.

   Year 2 spent time in the Computing suite and looked at a range of stories.