Uncategorised Archives - Page 2 of 3 - myBarton

DistrACT

DistrACT gives you easy, quick and discreet access to information and advice about self-harm and suicidal thoughts.

The content has been created by doctors and experts in self-harming and suicide prevention. DistrACT also provides emergency contact numbers of the best people to call and talk through your symptoms. It is available from the app store and google play for absolutely no cost.

DistrACT won the British Medical Association ‘Patient Information Award 2019’ for wellbeing. It’s recommended by the NHS in their Apps Library.

The app offers total privacy and can be used offline to:

find out about self-harm and suicidal thoughts
discover self-help techniques and safer alternatives to self-harms
explore the ‘chill-zone’ with links to resources that can make you feel better, such as films, books and online videos
access details about available services and support – all in one place
know what do do in a crisis or emergency

Users can feel safe and secure because no sign-up is required, and the app does not collect any personal data.

23rd March 2020

Calm Harm

Students, Uncategorised, Wellbeing

Calm Harm is an app designed to help people resist or manage the urge to self-harm. It’s private and password protected.

Calm Harm is based on the principles of dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT). DBT is a type of talking therapy that’s often effective in people with mood disorders. It’s recommended by the NHS in their Apps Library.

The app provides tasks that encourage users to distract themselves from urges to self-harm and help manage their “emotional mind” in a more positive way.

You can personalise it if you wish, by choosing the background colour theme and deciding on whether you would like some company using a variety of friendly characters.

The app then provides you with four categories of tasks to help you surf the urge. ‘Distract’ helps in learning self-control; ‘Comfort’ helps you care rather than harm; ‘Express yourself’ gets those feelings out in a different way and ‘Release’ provides safe alternatives to self-injury.

There is also a ‘Breathe’ category to help calm and get back in control.

You can do the activities for either blocks of five minutes or fifteen minutes with a countdown for each minute. You will be able to track your progress and notice change*.

(*Please note the app should not replace any it.)

20th March 2020

BBC iPlayer

Blended learning, Images, video, and audio, Mobile learning, Referencing, Research, Students, Teachers, Uncategorised

BBC iPlayer lets you watch BBC content from your computer, Smart TV or mobile device.

BBC iPlayer isn’t just for catching up on last night’s Eastenders or rewatching Gavin & Stacey for the 17th time, you can also find a lot of educational material in its depths. You can watch the latest episodes of QI to learn more quirky facts about the world or explore the hundreds of episodes of Science and Nature documentaries. There’s also great comedy and entertainment shows for when you have finished your work for the day and need to relax.

David Attenborough alone can take you through Climate Change for your Science lesson research, the different ecosystems around the world for your Geography research or even the early years of making nature documentaries for Media lesson research.

Some more examples of programmes that can aid your research are below:

Criminology – Jack the Ripper

Engineering – The Limit: Trickiest Tunnel

Music – Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool

Sport – Shane Williams: Rugby, Concussion and Me

Dance – The Royal Ballet: Mayerling

Don’t forget though that some episodes are only available for a limited time and can be removed from iPlayer at any time.

You can look through all the episodes and series available for each subject on the BBC iPlayer website or click one of these categories; History, Documentaries, Science & Nature, Music.

20th March 2020

Sribbl

Assessment and feedback, Distance Learning, Resources, Teachers, Uncategorised

Scribbl is an online transcript creator for Google Meets. It’s simple to use, once you’ve signed, you just add Scribble as a member of the Meet session and it will automatically transcribe everything that is said in your Meet.

Their FAQ page has a tonne of information to help you see if this is right for you – https://www.scribbl.co/faq

It’s Easy

Step 1: Create a free Scribbl account
Step 2: Launch a Google Meet
Step 3: Copy/Paste Google Meet call in details into Scribbl Home Screen
Step 4: Click “Join Scribbl to Call”

Pricing

You get 240 minutes for free, that can be a number of small sessions or one big meet that you want transcribed. After you’ve hit 240 minutes you can purchase more minutes. It works out roughly 3p per minute but you need to purchase them in chunks of 120 minutes and upwards.

20th March 2020

Egenda

Productivity, Students, Time management, Uncategorised

Egenda is a homework tracker app to help you keep on top of all your assignments.

Egenda is a simple to use app, all it takes is 3 steps; Create your classes, add some assignments, hammer your homework.

All you need to do once set up is to add your homework assignment in as soon as the teacher sets it, you’ve then got a one stop location to remind yourself of what’s due soon and what you can leave for later. You can also view homework by just the class.

14th October 2019

Noisli

Assistive Technology, Concentration, Productivity, Students, Uncategorised

Noisli allows you to improve your focus and productivity by mixing different sounds to create an environment perfect for you.

It’s worth us mentioning straight away that Noisli is free in your internet browser either at the website or as a Chrome Extension but the Android and iOS mobile apps do cost £1.99. So if you think Noisli could work for you, make sure you give it a good test using the browser based system before you think of spending money on it.

Anyway, Noisli allows you to create your own audible envrionment by mixing certain sounds together based on whatever relaxes you.

If a late night camping in the woods is your idea of heaven, turn up the sound of the log fire and the summer night, you’ll hear the crackling of the logs and the distant noise of crickets in the background. If something a bit busier would be better for you then maybe the noise of a coffee shop or a train, you can even add thunderstorm noises if you so desire. The actual sounds selection is Rain, Thunderstorm, Wind, Forest, Leaves, Water stream, Seaside, Water, Bonfire, Summer night, Fan, Train, Coffee Shop, White Noise, Pink Noise, Brown Noise.

If you create an account you can save your combinations and share them with friends, use a timer to remind yourself to take a break or use their built in distraction free text editor.

14th October 2019

Any.Do

Students, Study support and revision, Time management, Uncategorised

Any.Do is an award-winning app used by millions of people to stay organized and get more done.

Any.do helps you organize your life by creating a to do list then setting reminders to keep you on track, you can also use this same system for lists such as shopping lists. It’s free!

The beauty of Any.do is that it can be used on a huge range of devices including your Apple Watch or Amazon Alexa devices, it also integrates with Siri for Apple users too. Plus for Android users, it works on any Wear OS smartwatch and support for Google Home devices is currently being worked on.

Android

Windows

8th October 2019

Socrative

Maths, Research, Students, Study support and revision, Uncategorised

Socratic is a Google app where you can simply take a photo of a problem and get an instant explanation and step-by-step solutions.

It’s easy to give it a try, download the app and take a photo of one of the questions below:

SCIENCE

How long will it take a 1500 W motor to lift a 300 kg piano to a sixth-story window 20 m above?

What are the differences between active and passive transport?

In the reaction of lead nitrate with magnesium chloride, what is the spectator ion?

An electric device delivers a current of 5.0 A for 10 seconds. How many electrons flow through this device?

MATH

√3x−13=5

−12x+9y=73x−4y=2

State the possible rational zeros for the function f(x)=3×3+11×2+5x−3

Find the distance between points ( -3 , 7 ) and ( 4 , 1 ).

LITERATURE

What does the green light symbolize at the end of the book?

Who is Anne Hutchinson? How does Hawthorne feel about her?

Why does Elisa begin to trust the stranger and invite him into her garden?

What does Crusoe’s second trip to Guinea reveal about his character?

HISTORY

What was one purpose of the Marshall Plan of 1948?

Who was Elizabeth Cady Stanton?

Why was 1968 a year of turmoil in US history?

What part did Washington play in the French and Indian War?

4th October 2019

What is VR, AR and Google Cardboard?

Uncategorised

What is VR?

VR

In simple terms, Virtual Reality (VR) is a complete, immersive experience that is separate to the physical world. For this, you would need VR devices such as HTV Vive, Oculus Rift or Google Cardboard.

This quick video from Google demonstates an example of how you could use VR in a lesson, granted it is for a younger audience but it’s just an idea to aid understanding.

What is AR?

AR

Augmented Reality (AR) simply adds a digital element to a live view, most often by using the camera on your phone. A good example of AR is the lenses in Snapchat or the Pokemon Go smartphone game. The video here shows an example of the AR of Google Expeditions.

This video from Google shows a couple of different examples of AR in the classroom, watching a volcano erupt or looking at an asteroid belt.

Google Cardboard

Whilst some VR devices are quite expensive, you’ll see that Google Cardboard is very low cost. The standard Google Cardboard device is currently £11.40 because you use the Google Expeditions or Google Cardboard apps on your smartphone and place your smartphone into the Cardboard device as a viewer. Whereas a device like an Oculus Rift, which has a screen and all the tech packaged inside the viewer, will set you back around £400 each.

If you picked a Google Cardboard viewer for around £5, you could kit out 3 classrooms with viewers for the price of a single Oculus Rift device.

These devices allow you to position your smartphone in the unit to work as the VR screen. This is perfect for a classroom environment, especially since almost everyone has a smartphone these days. This video we made shows just how quick and easy it is to add a smartphone to the viewer.