theTeacherCloud - Evidence for Learning

Children Centres and Nurseries are now using the ‘Evidence for Learning’ app to enable staff to quickly add new evidence to their Children’s Learner Journeys

The Willows Centre for Children in Portsmouth is just one of many children centres and nurseries that have recently chosen to use the ‘Evidence for Learning’ iPad app to improve the way they capture and document observation evidence.

‘Evidence for Learning’ is a very useful tool for recording children’s activities and achievements, it looks professional, and the app developers really listen to your feedback...
Tanya Shehan,
The Willows Centre for Children(http://www.willowscentre.org.uk)

All Children have a Learner Journey shared with parents

Like other children centres, the staff at The Willows Centre are required to keep a ‘Learning Journey’ file for each child. Within this file, observations are recorded, children’s work is added, photos of the children at nursery, programmes of work and targets are kept, and information booklets filled in by parents are also included. Parents are also encouraged to look through these files at Parents' Days and add their own comments. Class teachers complete a termly report on the children, commenting on their development and tracking the progress they have made.

Traditional collection formats provide major challenges

The main challenge faced when collecting evidence for the children’s Learning Journeys is time, especially as it relies on a number of traditional paper based formats. The introduction of digital cameras also came with their own challenges. According to Tanya Shehan ICT Nursery Assistant, ‘We have always used digital cameras to capture photos of the children, which we then print out and annotate. However, we still often find that cameras would get lost or would not be fully charged when needed. We therefore needed something that would be professional, quick, efficient, and reliable to use alongside the other forms of evidence that we collect.

Using iPads to help

During their visit to the BETT Show in 2013 Tanya saw how iPads were being used by other schools to collect evidence and create learning journeys. ‘We really liked how professional this looked and how easy it was to do’. Tanya took this feedback back her Head Teacher who agreed to buy each area of the nursery an iPad to use to collect additional evidence for the children’s learning journeys.

Free Trial

Once the iPads were purchased, staff at the Willows spent a long time researching the different Apps that were available from the Apple Store. They eventually chose the ‘Evidence for Learning’ app, with one of the main reasons being the ability to have access to a free trial. According to Tanya, ‘It was very helpful to have the free trial of Evidence for Learning, so we could get an idea of how to use the app and what the reports would look like in the children’s folders. It is easy to use and fairly self-explanatory, with a simple layout. We felt that it looked better and worked better than some of the other Apps out there.

What makes the ‘Evidence for Learning’ app so great to use?

The ‘Evidence for Learning’ app is great as it allows the Willows staff to easily capture children observations and achievements, quickly tag them to individual or groups of children, and then map these to the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) statutory framework.

The app is easy to use and captures evidence as it happens, allowing staff to link it to the EYFS quickly and efficiently. It has also been useful to be able to set our own date ranges and comment templates as this has meant we can really personalise the app to our needs. – Tanya Shehan

The app is being used on a daily basis in The Willows Centre. Each age group has their own iPad with the app installed, and this is used to record the children when they complete activities. The evidence collected is printed and makes up part of the children’s learning journey, alongside examples of their work, written observations and annotated photos. According to Tanya ‘Parents have seen the reports in their children’s files on Parents day and they have been very positive about how professional they look’.

Supports ANY Assessment framework
The ‘Evidence for Learning’ app will support any assessment framework. It has a Framework Library that contains an 'open' collection of education, curriculum, and assessment frameworks from all around the world. It even allows users to upload their own custom frameworks.

Easily Produces Reports
The ‘Evidence for Learning’ app also allows you to easily produce personalised reports on demand that can be sent either to a printer, email, a cloud-services provider such as GoogleDrive, Dropbox or SkyDrive, or directly to other Apps installed your iPad. Many other schools use this feature to not only help with the creation of children learning journals, but also to provide evidence to support the conversations at parents’ evenings, observation evidence for assessment moderation purposes, and even provide the invaluable information that can be sent to those new schools for when a child leaves.

Helps with planning
The ‘Evidence for Learning’ app will even allow you to quickly check a child’s progress and identify which areas of the EYFS are still to be achieved, allowing you to plan useful, relevant activities right there and then.

Staff can now quickly and easily add evidence to the Learning Journeys
The Willows Centre have already seen a return in their investment in the ‘Evidence for Learning’ app as there has been a reduction in the amount of time staff spend documenting evidence. According to Tanya ‘It has reduced the amount we use the digital cameras, as we can just use the app to capture photo evidence and annotate them. The app is quick and easy to use, and the evidence looks neat and professional and provides uniformity to the Learning Journeys.

About The Willows Centre for Children

The Willows Centre for Children is a busy Children’s Centre, based in North End, Portsmouth. They offer integrated education and care for children from 3 months to 5 years, and have around 80 children onsite, each day.

It is a fully inclusive setting offering 42 full time spaces for children allocated a Local Authority place because of their Special Educational Needs, alongside children accessing Nursery Education Grant and childcare places. The children who attend the setting have a range of needs, from mainstream children to those referred to us by healthcare professionals with additional needs, such as Autistic Spectrum Disorders, Physical Delays, Speech and Language difficulties and Behavioural issues.

The Willows encourage all children and adults to be accepting of each other, regardless of ability. Working closely with outside agencies and healthcare professionals to support children with additional needs to ensure they have the best opportunities to grow and develop. They also work closely with families to give each child a good beginning.