This week I've been working on resources for www.studyzone.tv for the programming aspect of the new computing curriculum. It's been great fun and has really taken me back to my degree in computing. I've found it especially interesting to see that many of the terms and concepts I will be teaching my class in September are the same terms and concepts I was being taught at university. As part of my work this week, I couldn't resist building a version of Flappy Bird in the excellent Scratch software that many schools up and down the country will be using. The game is fully commented, so I hope may be a useful resources for guiding students. Play the game here. Take a look inside the game here. I'll use this blog post to share how I approached this challenge and the order in which I did things. Why Flappy Bird? Well it's actually a very simple game with some...

All too often, expensive IT equipment is left in cupboards gathering dust. In the past it may have been Digital Blue cameras and microscopes, or more recently, webcams and Lego robots. But most recently I’m sorry to say it can be iPads or other expensive tablet computers. I have been reminded of this fact yet again recently as I spoke to two teachers from different schools regarding their rather large stock of tablet computers. There’s no denying their eagerness for the technology or their enthusiasm to share ideas with their team, but despite this the devices are getting very little use. Having rolled out over 100 iPads at my own school, we have learnt a great deal along the way on how best to deploy this new technology in a way that best encourages their usage. (These tips presume you have already identified why you need tablets, how they will boost teaching and learning ...