Virtual Learning Network

Replies

• • Diane Henderson@dianesh

  

  Diane Henderson (View all users posts) 02 Sep 2011 2:51pm (4287 days ago)

  Had an awesome Online Snack yesterday with Suzie leading a group of Lead teachers through setting up and finding resources on Digistore.  It was so successful - I hope we can follow up on this next term Suzie, maybe taking it a step further to introduce them to specific resources in set learning areas.

  Thanks for your patience!!

• • Suzie Vesper@Suzie.Vesper

  

  Suzie Vesper (View all users posts) 07 Sep 2011 3:37pm (4282 days ago)

  Thanks for that nice endorsement Diane! Happy to do another session any time with your teachers.

• • Suskya Goodall@Suskya

  

  Suskya Goodall (View all users posts) 22 Oct 2011 9:23am (4237 days ago)

  I have used DigiStore resources for the last 5 years and link my learning pathways to my class blog as part of my learning programmes. Students seem to particularly enjoy the learning objects.

  I have learned to use the site through 'playing' but found that others don't find it as straightforward. Recently I took a group of ICT lead tchrs through setting up and finding resources. Their feedback was interesting and seemed to echo conversations I've had with other teachers in my cluster. They found the resources practical and saw potential for use, but found the logins, student pins and pathways challenging. I think the online snacks and wiki are beneficial and will support lead teachers to teach others. Can I be so bold as to recommend a simplification of the login process? Perhaps once the students are within the site they don't have any pins or logins for each pathway.

   

• • Suzie Vesper@Suzie.Vesper

  

  Suzie Vesper (View all users posts) 25 Oct 2011 10:17am (4234 days ago)

  Hi Suskya,

  Thanks for your comments here! I know that the login process can be a little tiresome at times. This is due to the conditions that were put in place in order to have the content in there available to teachers by the company that created the learning games and the organisations such as Te Papa. Unfortunately, there is no way to change the fact that you need to have a Digistore account.

  However, single sign on has now made logging in a little easier for teachers. If you self-register for an Education Sector login, you can link an existing Digistore account to this so that from then on, you only need to log in to the Education Sector login and it will automatically log you in to Digistore when you arrive on the site. Note that you do need to have a Digistore account to link initially. This can be a school Digistore account and then when it links it to your ESAA account, this will become a personal Digistore account within the school account. From then on, whatever learning paths you put in there will be your own individual paths though you can still choose to share them with your school or publically.

  Another very important thing to note is that all existing learning path folders and contents will no longer show up under 'My Learning Path folders'. You will have to click on the name of your school in the left hand menu and your learning paths will still be available there but then you will have to copy them back into your individual account and redo your folders. This was the best that they could do in the transition over to single sign on which was a major technical challenge!

  More info about the Education Sector login:

  Education Sector Authentication and Authorisation

  ESAA is the authentication and authorisation mechanism that provides users with access to online Education Sector Services which include:

  • National Student Index (NSI);
  • Services for Tertiary Education Organisations (STEO);
  • Tertiary Data Warehouse (TDW);
  • New Zealand Qualifications Authority Tertiary Education Organisation Extranet (TEOE);
  • Electronic Receipting System (ERS);
  • Tertiary Education Commission Shared Workspaces;
  • Literacy and Numeracy for Adults Assessment Tool;
  • Assessment Tool for Teaching and Learning (e-asTTle);
  • Te Kete Ipurangi (TKI).

  There are also a number of new resources available on the wiki to support teachers to find what they are looking for as well as how to do things like make learning paths.

  Check out the catalogues of content in the specific curriculum area pages such as on the English page. These have been updated to include the New Zealand specific content.

  To make the New Zealand content a lot easier to find, there is now a New Zealand specific content page on the wiki cataloguing resources from different New Zealand organisations to help make it more discoverable for teachers.

  There are also new videos showing how to make learning paths on the learning path page.

  Let me know if you have any other questions.