There are now 17 tertiary institutions across New Zealand which are providing Microsoft Office 365 ProPlus to their students free of charge!

What does this mean? The latest version of the full Office productivity suite, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote are available for offline and online use to best prepare you for class. As long as you’re a current student at an eligible institution that has activated the service, you’ll be able to use this software for free.

• Install on up to 5 compatible PCs and Macs, plus 5 tablets (including iPad!)
• Sync across all your devices with OneDrive
• Gain valuable skills on the world’s most popular productivity software
• Use the same programmes as your lecturers and tutors to ensure full file fidelity
  If you are enrolled at an eligible tertiary institution that has activated the service, you can download the software by signing in to Office 365 using your institution login and password. If you’re a student at one of the below tertiary institutions, simply click on the corresponding link and follow the instructions. If your institution isn’t listed below but has activated this service, you can visit this link and sign in using your institution login and password.

• AUT University
• CPIT
• Eastern Institute of Technology
• Lincoln University
• Massey University
• Manukau Institute of Technology

• Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology

• Open Polytechnic of New Zealand
• Otago Polytechnic

• Te Wananga o Aotearoa

• Unitec
• University of Auckland
• University of Otago
• University of Waikato

• Waiariki Institute of Technology
• Western Institute of Technology - Taranaki

• Wintec

Don’t forget, you’ll need your tertiary institution account login and password to sign in and take up this benefit.

Did we miss out your tertiary institution? Ask your institution’s IT department about getting Office for free. We’ll keep you updated and provide direct links to other institutions that are providing this exciting benefit in future blog posts.

The Microsoft NZ Education team has created the Microsoft in Education Cloud Forum, a place for Kiwi educators and school IT decision makers to collaborate on all things cloud. The forum is designed to aid conversation and engagement around how to best utilise the cloud in improving learning outcomes and facilitating 21st century learning.

It's a great channel to ask questions, provide and find recommendations and best practices from other schools and generally become more familiar about what's happening with the cloud in education. Current subgroups include "SharePoint as a Learning Management System (LMS) for education", "HELP with Office 365", "Upcoming Events" and "Learn Yammer". Some schools have even created school cluster discussion pages within the group.

Having been running for a few months now, we're building up a fantastic membership of schools who have deployed Office 365 and are looking to learn more about its functions. We're loving watching this forum grow, and would like to invite readers of the NZ Education Blog to request an invitation if you are interested in joining!

We are so excited to announce that the new SharePoint now allows for more innovative interactions with SharePoint sites and content on mobile devices: contemporary views, device channels, and new native apps (SkyDrive Pro apps and SharePoint Newsfeed apps).

Mark Kashman, a Senior Product Manager on the SharePoint team this week blogged about how, "From the start, touch has been a key area of investment across all of the products in the new Office, and SharePoint is no exception. Now we're making SharePoint even more touch friendly. The new Touch Design mobile pages enhance the touch experience of two core SharePoint components, SkyDrive Pro and Sites.

"Now, when you access SharePoint Online from smaller devices-from 11-inch screens down to 4-inch-you have a new app-like experience that enables you to work your best with your documents and team sites," Mark adds.

Take a look at a few screen shots of SharePoint on 11-inch and 4-inch screens:

The Touch Design view of "my documents" in SkyDrive Pro on an 11-inch touch tablet device.

Backstage of the Touch Design experience on a 4-inch screen showing navigation access to Office 365 tiles. After clicking into the SkyDrive Pro tile, you see a "shared with me" documents pivot.

To find out more, read Mark's full article here. Tweet us your thoughts! @MSNZEducation.

Game-based learning (GBL) is an innovative practice that is working to engage kids in learning important 21st century skills and content. In this sixth grade classroom at Quest to Learn, ongoing feedback is embedded throughout the course of a collaborative geography game called Galactic Mappers. Check it out!

Game-based learning is predicted to take the education sector by storm as the awareness of 21st Century learning increases throughout the world. Why? When a child progresses through a game, they are learning; if they are actively engaged in the game, their minds are coming to understand a new system. Whether the game is for entertainment or serious purposes, this is true. So, when learning in the classroom feels dull for a student, they are not being engaged and motivated by the learning process. Learning is about acquiring the skills and thinking processes necessary to respond appropriately when under pressure. What gamification gives our students is effective, interactive experiences that motivate their minds by actively involving them in the learning process.

Windows 8 has numerous learning based apps that are taking classrooms by storm. Among our favourites are Physamajig, which allows students to watch their own sketches be translated into realistic physics objects and Wordament, a very addictive word game, that provides a fun way to improve vocabulary.

Once again, Sam McNeill, the Director of ICT at St Andrew’s College, has blown us away with his innovative and creative use of technology in the classroom. Sam runs the St Andrew's College "eLearning Stories" blog which provides a virtual “look through the classroom window” into the exciting eLearning happenings in the various classrooms around the fully-independent, co-educational school for pre-school to Year 13. Recently he blogged this original post (here), about some of the great work a Year 9 Math class is doing with OneNote and Surface. You can read it below!

This morning I was invited by Mr Ben Hilliam to sit in and observe one of his Year 9 Math classes. I was keen to do this as I knew the Maths Department had been experimenting with the combination of MS Onenote, a Microsoft Surface and a Miracast device to wirelessly broadcast the screen of the tablet through the classroom projector.

The following video is a screencast of Mr Hilliam’s first 6 minutes of the lesson. He is writing on the Surface Pro directly, and using MS OneNote to record his voice and handwriting in the background:

All students in this Year 9 class have read only access to this OneNote notebook so they can revise at anytime, and in this instance the lessons were being recorded for a student that was absent for the week. Once uploaded to YouTube, the link is inserted into the Notebook for student access.

What impressed me about this section of the lesson was the ease of the technology – it essentially existed in the background and in many ways, it was a direct substitute for the role of a whiteboard. Mr Hilliam was still asking students questions back and forward and they were still coming up and pointing to places on the graph on the projected image on the whiteboard to indicate their answers. The big difference however was that this was being recorded digitally for later revision.

Towards the end of last year we undertook training for a lot of 2014 Year 9 teachers and introduced them to the SAMR model. I recently came across a new poster for this:

Explaining the SAMR model through coffee

The teaching in this Year 9 Math class falls clearly in the augmentation range – the teaching is not obviously different however the technology operating in the background provides massive functional improvement. Students, both those absent and physically present in the class, can all revise the concepts being taught at anytime.

Here are some photos of the students at work practicing the concepts that had been taught:

A student reviewing the MS OneNote content recorded moments earlier by Mr Hilliam, and then practicing in his exercise book.

Students around the room making using of their laptops to review / rewind the concepts as taught and recorded from the start of the lesson

Whilst the phrase “ubiquitousness of technology” is over used, this lesson did demonstrate that when used effectively, the technology is not at the forefront of the lesson. It was not gimmicky or flashy, instead it provided functional improvement to what was already a great lesson.

I am excited to see how other curriculum areas make use of technology like this in their classrooms and will blog about these in the future. As the Director of ICT it’s important for me to support initiatives like this that trial how new technologies can be used in the classroom. On my recent trip to Edutech 2014 I trialled a MS Surface Pro 3, some of the only demonstration units outside of the USA, and was very impressed. I have pre-ordered one for our staff to trial once it is released and am interested to see at what point in the future touch screen devices like this may replace the traditional laptops given to staff.

Let’s face it. Apps are now an integral part of our everyday lives. We use them to check the weather and check into a flight, to see when the next bus is coming, record notes, read books, play games and much more.

A great outcome of the app revolution is the transformative learning that apps can help foster. There are thousands of education apps in the Windows marketplace from early learning “games” to study aids and even apps that will help you manage the classroom, with more being published every day.

To get you started, we’ve curated a list of 100 education apps that we hope you’ll find helpful. You can access this by loading it below.

For even more, visit: aka.ms/Apps4Edu or go directly to the Windows Store.

Microsoft UK recently blogged about the top Education Apps in the Windows Store. We thought it was such a fantastic list, we wanted to share it with you. The post was written by Stuart Ball, the Partners in Learning UK manager, and gives a refreshingly honest insight into the benefits of these apps in facilitating 21st century learning. Enjoy!

	OneNote	Microsoft OneNote is your digital notebook for keeping track of what's important in your life. Jot down your ideas, keep track of classroom and meeting notes, clip from the web, make a to-do list as well as draw and sketch your ideas. OneNote is your one place to capture and organize everything.
	Wordbrush	Words have been trapped in straight lines for too long...set your words free! WordBrush allows you to draw text freely on the screen, each letter following the trace of your finger as though you were painting with a brush.
	Kodu	Kodu lets you create games through a simple visual programming language. Kodu can be used to teach creativity, problem solving, storytelling, as well as programming.
	Physamajig	Just sketch something out and it is translated into a realistic physics object. Add attributes such as bounciness, friction, and joints - then create your own games by adding Behaviors to the objects.
	Skitch Touch	Skitch Touch is a free tool for communicating visually with friends, co-workers, and the world. Annotate images with arrows, shapes, text, and more. Use Skitch to sketch something new, mark up maps, screen captures, or even a photo.
	QR Code Designers	QR code design made easy! "QR Code Designer" The only application generating custom-designed QR codes.
	Project Sienna	Microsoft Project Siena (code name) is a new technology for app imagineers. Build Apps and databases without any programming.
	Bing Translator	The Bing Translator App for Windows is your companion when you need to quickly translate what you are looking at. Use your camera or just type the text you want to translate. Text and camera translation work offline with downloadable language packs, so you can get the power of Bing Translator on-the-go, even when you don't have an Internet connection
	Fotor	Fotor is the best all-in-one photo editing application. With cutting-edge tools including Basic Editing Tools, Brilliant Visual Effects, Frames, 1-Tap Enhance, Collage, Text, Tilt Shift and Raw Converter, all bundled together in one powerful package
	Nearpod	Nearpod is a synchronous solution for the use of mobile devices in the classroom. Create multimedia presentations with interactive features such as quizzes, videos, polls, drawing tools, and more
	Socrative	Educators can initiate formative assessments through quizzes, quick question polls, exit tickets and space races all with their Socrative Windows app. Socrative will instantly grade, aggregate and provide graphs of results to help you identify opportunities for further instruction. Save time and visualize student understanding when it matters, now!

and currently best app I would pay for…. (and have done so!)

Createbook

Why just read ebooks? When you can create your own! CreateBook is an easy to use App allowing users of all ages to create stunning eBooks which include text, video and a range of other media.

And don’t forget they are Apps for Twitter, Facebook, Flipboard, Khan Academy and LinkedIn. As well apps like these for teaching and practicing maths or spellings

	iMath	iMath is designed to help children under the age of 12 to improve math ability and develop interests in mathematics
	The Spelling Bee	'Bee' the bee! Fly between beautiful locations unscrambling words! As you figure out words you get points that will unlock rewards! Each level has a random theme that will help you figure out the mixed up word. If you can't guess the word, you can spell any shorter word and still get points!

Already using some of these apps? Tweet us your thoughts! @MSNZEducation.

This week, Thailand’s Office of the Basic Education Commission (OBEC) is announcing a sweeping cloud education partnership with Microsoft, one that will provide 8 million students and 400,000 teachers throughout the country with free access to the world's best cloud-enabled productivity software, Microsoft Office 365 for Education. The deal will allow students and teachers throughout the country to create, connect and collaborate on a safe and secure platform. This is the largest cloud education initiative ever, and one that promises to foster sustainable growth and raise Thailand’s overall standard of living for generations to come.

Partnerships like this are more critical today than ever before, with a recent IDC study citing skills developed through Microsoft Office among the most in-demand for future jobs. By 2020, according to the report, an astounding 30 percent of skilled jobs will require proficiency in Microsoft Office.

In Thailand today, young people between the ages of 15 and 24 represent the largest unemployed population, a significant barrier to the country’s future prosperity. Through this partnership, Thai youth will develop the 21^stcentury skills they need to find productive employment and help lead the country into the future. The agreement builds on Microsoft’s longstanding investment in Thailand’s education system, which in the past 20 years has impacted more than 164,000 teachers and 8 million students across 9,000 schools nationwide.

This is exciting news for Microsoft, following our recent partnership announcements, including a partnership with the Sao Paolo State Department of Education to provide Office 365 to more than 4 million students, a large-scale cloud education partnership of 7.5 million Office 365 seats deployed by the All India Council for Technical Education and the 4.5 million seats deployed by the Catholic International Education Office. But while Tuesday’s announcement demonstrates positive momentum for Microsoft in Education, it is only a single step on a long journey.

That journey, which is taking Microsoft to countries and classrooms in every corner of the world, is helping to create a better future for young people, one that is globally connected and economically sustainable. Cloud technology, and specifically Office 365 for Education, can be a great equalizer, helping under-developed countries catch up to those that enjoy relative prosperity. But even in those more prosperous countries, technology can continue to transform the prospects of young people.

Take Finland, for example. This progressive country is often held up as a model for successful education reform – and rightly so. But even Finland recognizes that its journey to education transformation is ongoing. This week, I’m traveling there to kick off Microsoft’s pilot partnership with more than 100 schools to support teachers and technology. This partnership brings cities, companies and other key education stakeholders together to address the challenges of improving learning environments against a backdrop of shrinking budgets. Microsoft will invest in teacher training, advisory and learning materials so that educators can take full advantage of technology in the pursuit of more effective teaching and learning. As in Thailand, this effort is intended to spark economic and employment opportunities for the country’s youth.

The road to true education transformation – where technology and pedagogy work seamlessly and hand-in-hand – is a long one, full of twists and turns. But this week, Microsoft has taken an important step forward in two countries with very different educational and societal challenges. As we help Thailand address a crisis of youth unemployment and Finland build on an already exemplary foundation, we recognize that wherever we are, our commitment to building a better and more sustainable future compels us forward.

This blog was originally posted by Anthony Salcito, Vice President - Worldwide Education at Microsoft. You can read it here.

Getting Smart recently created this awesome infographic on what schools need to implement blended learning. As the infographic describes, blended learning is more than electronic textbooks and productivity tools. It involves inventing and adopting new learning environments that work better for students and for teachers.

Do you need help with the tools needed for using the classroom to start blending your classroom? Go to http://www.microsoft.com/nz/windowsintheclassroom/ to learn about our complimentary Windows in the Classroom Seminars.

We are very excited to bring to you Office Mix, helping you to make online lessons simple!

Turn your PowerPoint presentation into an interactive online lesson. We call this a mix. Everything you need to create and share your mix is included. Add audio and video of yourself giving your presentation, write on slides as you talk to them, insert quizzes, practice exercises, and more – all from within PowerPoint. It’s like a screencast, but better. All you need is Office 2013 and the free Office Mix add-in!

Here's just a snapshot of the awesome things you can do in Office Mix:

• Record audio or video of yourself giving a lecture. Write and draw directly in PowerPoint, just like you would on the whiteboard.
• Work in PowerPoint - Creating a mix is as simple as making a PowerPoint document. Just install our PowerPoint add-in, and then create lessons from your existing PowerPoint presentations or new ones.
• Save Time - Everything you need to create a mix is included in the PowerPoint add-in, so you don’t have to jump between several apps.

• Interact - Bring your PowerPoint presentations to life by adding interactive quizzes, online videos, Khan Academy and CK-12 Foundation exercises, and even web pages.
• Share - Sharing is as simple as sharing a link. Your mix is private until you share it, and you choose with whom you’d like to share it.
• Take the guesswork out of distributing your mixes. Students can view the mix on just about any device with a web browser.

• Analyze - See your impact and gauge student understanding with near-instant analysis of your mix. See which students have viewed your mix and how they did on your quizzes so that you can invest your energy where it is needed most.
• Instant Feedback - Students see their quiz results instantly, so they know how they did and can improve. Want to give your students even more feedback? Add feedback to the answer choices, so students understand why the answer is correct or incorrect.
• Personalize - Help students learn at their own pace. Students can pause, rewind, watch sections over, or even play your mix at 2x speed.

For more information and to download Office Mix, click here.

Why Microsoft recently came up with this fantastic infographic, and we had to share it with you! The image gives you excellent insight into how Office 365 for Education can be leveraged in the classroom to help our students gain the 21st century skills so crucial in preparing them for the modern workforce.

To interact with the links on the full image, please see the original post at http://www.whymicrosoft.com/Pages/A-Day-in-the-Life-Student.aspx. Enjoy!

Teaching our students to develop time management skills and learn how to prioritise their school, work and personal lives is never an easy task. During Windows in the Classroom seminars, our education specialists teach senior leadership teams and teachers from all over New Zealand how our expectations of students can be better met with 21^st Century technology. One of the fantastic benefits of Office 365, is the way in which Microsoft Lync and Outlook work together to create a seamless and consistent system of communication between students and teachers.

Check out the video above to get an idea of how students and teachers can benefit from Office 365. Want to find out more?

Windows in the Classroom seminars finish at the end of June – and our schedule is filling up fast! You can host a session at your school or attend one in your area. All you need to do is register your interest by emailing nzeducation@microsoft.com.

We are very excited to share with you this fantastic case study of Tuckahoe School's adoption of the Surface Pro in their BYOD program. Check out the video and tweet us your thoughts! @MSNZEducation

Not sure where to start with BYOD? Want to learn more?

Download our discussion paper which investigates the myths around the BYOD model in schools, and understand the questions which should be addressed when considering allowing students to bring their own devices, and which option might be best suited to a school’s culture.

This paper is intended to stimulate discussion around what constitutes best practice 1-to-1 learning.

Download the Whitepaper here.

Currently the #1 PDF app in the App Store, Drawboard PDF has been designed by an Australian developer and is free for a limited time only. You can now view, annotate and manage student PDF documents the easy way! This App is ideal for replacing the pen and paper, avoid printing documents again by using these innovative features that make annotating a PDF a breeze.

You can either upload or create a new PDF, annotate using the extensive array of tools and then save it back as a compatible PDF. Drawboard distinguishes itself by its intuitive user interface and experience, stylus and touch input separation, smooth and natural pen, and array of tools.

Features include:

• Open and read PDF documents
• Toggle between using an activated stylus and finger touch to perform annotations
• Create new PDF documents of different size, orientation and page count
• Radial menu with the following features:
• Smooth and natural inking pen/stylus inking - change stroke width and colors
• Eraser - also works on the back of the stylus eraser where functional, and right click on mouse
• Undo/Redo
• Select tool to move annotations around the screen
• Shapes - rectangle, ellipse, line, arrow
• Text markup - highlighter, underline, strikeout, squiggly
• All annotations have the option for varying colors, widths, opacities, fills etc
• Bookmarks
• Search
• Share by email
• Print
• Recent document recovery
• Open large document file sizes
• View and display options
• Save as a compatible PDF
• Insert, Rotate and Delete Pages

Find out more and download the App here, it won't be free for much longer!

Microsoft NZ and ShareThePoint bring you "Office 365 and SharePoint 4 Schools Essentials" - Register now!

Description
This one-day intensive course is an introduction for people who are new to SharePoint 2013 and want to use it for staff intranets, classroom sites, class blog sites, document management and student-parent collaboration.

Please refer to the attached PDF Flyer on this blog post for more information!

Target Audience
Trainer, End User, Project Manager, Knowledge Manager, Help Desk.

When

Morning Only (9am - 12.30pm): for people who need the introduction to using SharePoint, and what is possible.
Afternoon also (9am - 5.00pm): for people who need to be able to configure the site, and introduce new processes.

Helping school leaders clarify their vision for 1:1 learning and building an executable framework to bring this to life.

Microsoft and CORE Education bring you the complimentary 21 Steps to 21st Century Learning Workshop in May 2014. That's not far away! Registrations are almost full for both Auckland and Christchurch workshops, don't miss out!

This two-day seminar will explore the planning and implementation of 1:1 learning in your school. Facilitated by world education leader, Bruce Dixon, the workshop is designed to support school Principals and eLearning leaders to work together. We recommend two leaders attend from each school.

"The presenter was completely engaging, and a master of his knowledge. It was a privilege to be led by somebody who has been there with devices in the classroom since their inception." – Stephen Hensman, Principal, Taradale High School.

We invite you to register your interest to attend the workshop in Christchurch: 12th-13th May, or in Auckland: 15th-16th May.

In the workshop you will work through the 5 Phases that outline the Design and Deployment Guide to 1:1 learning:

• Phase 1 – The Compelling Case for Change: Create a solid foundation for a 1:1 initiative, with a clear vision and actionable, measurable goals.

• Phase 2 – Redesign Learning and teaching: Focusing on rethinking and redesigning all aspects of teaching practice and the learning experience, based on the information garnered and ideas developed in Phase One.

• Phase 3 – Lead the Shift: The vision and goals have been set. It’s time to turn the vision into reality, and theory to practice. This phase develops strategies in the key areas of stakeholder engagement, financial models, equity of access, community buy-in and teacher professional growth to support your initiative.

• Phase 4 – Manage Implementation: Once all the strategies for change are in place and being put into action, schools are ready to plan the actual 1:1 implementation. This implementation covers a range of tasks, including managing the budget, creating a 21st century learning environment, conducting a readiness assessment and establishing critical partnerships, culminating in the actual start

• Phase 5 – Evaluate Continuously: Effective evaluation of your initiative is the backbone of its success. Without any genuine commitment to such a process, the impact of the previous 20 Steps can be marginal. It underpins the ongoing development of a program and ensures the best possible outcomes for students, staff and the school.

Can you believe it's been a whole month since the 2014 Global Forum in Barcelona? We are still buzzing and in a timely fashion, Anthony Salcito's Keynote Speech has officially been released!

Since the Forum, Anthony's blog Daily Edventures has shared some incredible stories. Anthony has featured a guest blog from Todd La Vogue (a Microsoft Expert Educator and Global Forum winner), he's showcased the students from ESADE and Saltash.net who brought their unique and important perspective and energy, he's shared The Pitch competition, and of course, announced all the winners.

In Anthony's own words, "While I do love to share my view on the future of learning – and of course demo the latest apps from Microsoft and our partners – the true magic of the Global Forum is in the connections that are forged at this incredible event. If you were not able to be at the Global Forum in person, this is a great way to share in the spirit of the Global Forum, and the incredible, powerful work that takes place in every corner of the globe to provide students with the education they need to succeed in the 21^st century."

Tweet us your thoughts @MSNZEducation and of course, enjoy!

This blog was originally posted by Jacqueline Russell, Microsoft Surface Education Manager, on the Microsoft Surface Blog. Jacqueline gives such fantastic insight into the benefits enjoyed by Cincinnati Country Day School, the first school to adopt the Surface Pro 3 as their 1:1 student computing device, we had to share it with you. We hope you enjoy it as much as we did! Tweet us your thoughts at @MSNZEducation. 

A few weeks ago, I had the great fortune to visit one of the premier schools in the US and a pioneer in the use of mobile computing in Education.  I had heard a lot about Cincinnati Country Day School before I visited. I knew that they were the first school in the nation to go 1:1 back in 1996, and had heard great things about the Tablets in Education conference they host annually. Even though I knew what to expect, I was still amazed by what I saw, and inspired by the vision of their IT Director, Rob Baker. Cincinnati Country Day School (or CCDS) is a private Pre-Kindergarten through High School located on a sprawling campus surrounded by sports fields in the suburbs of Cincinnati. With such a strong focus on technology, I had expected it to be obvious when I walked in – I guess I had in my head the “old school” stereotypes of technology centers with cables dangling from the ceilings and monitors lining the hallways, and at least a computer lab, or 3 or 4.  I saw none of this. Walking around the lower, middle, and upper schools, I was struck by a few things:

• The focus on the Creative Arts – from their beautiful performing arts center and music hall, to their student art gallery and all the artwork and photography covering all of the walls. Again, I had assumed that a school as focused on technology as CCDS is would be more geared to STEM disciplines. But Rob explained that when technology is as embedded into the learning process as it is in CCDS, it becomes a very natural and powerful creative tool, that’s not only great for science and math, but also can be used for digital arts, media production, and performance.
• Student Empowerment – especially in the middle and upper schools.  Students get a “free bell” for studying, and there were lots of open collaborative spaces where I witnessed students doing group work with their tablets, and also some individual quiet study spaces.  Students also have individual “advisory” sessions with teachers that help guide a lot of this self-directed learning.
• Mobility – everywhere on campus I saw students working both inside the classroom and outside the classroom in groups or individually. There were very few allocated single-use spaces – the whole design of the school helped to support the Anytime Anywhere Learning concepts. I also noticed that teachers rotated through different classrooms throughout the course of a day – it felt more like a University than a traditional high school.
• Tablets, tablets everywhere – I didn’t notice them at first because students were carrying them around like they would their books under their arms, and in their backpacks. But when I took a second look at the students sitting in the dining terrace, or lounging on the steps in the common area, I noticed they were all either casually browsing, writing or sharing content on their tablets.

We have other customers who have committed to Surface Pro 3, but CCDS is the first school to adopt Surface Pro 3 as their 1:1 student computing device. When I sat down to talk to Rob about his vision and philosophy around technology in Education, he spoke about 3 things – the importance and value of reading and writing to the way students learn, their focus on the creative process, and giving teachers and students technology tools that are versatile enough to support whatever they want to do. When I asked him why he chose the Surface Pro 3 for CCDS, he told me that it was the first no-compromise device that met all 3 of his criteria:

1. Reading & Writing – “With the 3:2 aspect ratio and the big beautiful screen, the Surface Pro 3 is the first tablet PC that has a useable portrait mode for students to read and annotate naturally like they would a textbook or a piece of paper.” He also added, that he’s tried many different digital inking solutions across different devices and that the Surface Pro 3 has one of the best active pens and screen digitizers that he’s seen.
2. Creativity – Rob was convinced long ago that the Windows platform with Office apps and especially OneNote combined with digital inking was the best technology platform to support student learning and creativity. “We have a saying at CCDS – ‘try typing that’.”  And he goes on to explain that students need to learn creatively, without the restrictions of a keyboard or fill-in-the-blank type learning activities. “The creative process all starts with a blank sheet of paper and a pencil”.
3. Versatility – “Every student learns differently, and every teacher teaches differently, so we need a device that will support them in whatever they want to do throughout their 4 years. The Surface Pro 3 is so lightweight yet solid, that I’m not worried about students carrying it around with them. And having the full power of Windows 8.1 with the keyboard and 12 inch screen make it a great primary computing device for teachers”. Rob went on to talk about device versatility in the context of removing constraints, “Any Device that lacks an active digitizer, and thus true pen on paper inking is too limiting in functionality. In a school, you want to empower your teachers and students with the ability to annotate, sketch, draw, show process and highlight anytime and anywhere they need to. Whether the students were typing, writing with the pen, using touch, reading or any combination of these: the focus was on the task at hand, not on the technology. When everything you do can be digital, the collaboration, engagement and creativity of students and teachers is amplified exponentially.”

I had heard from many Education Experts and Advisors that ultimately, the device doesn’t really matter – it’s more about the web, apps and the digital learning content available. So, at the end of our conversation, I challenged Rob with this notion, and his response was, “Sure, the device doesn’t matter… until you have the wrong device and can’t do what you want with it. Then it really matters.” 

We are very excited to announce the NZ created, NCEA Hub app, which is only available in the Windows Store!

Students are now able to track their progress towards achieving an NCEA qualification throughout the school year and look up information on NCEA standards and subjects. The app allows students working towards a Level 1, Level 2 or Level 3 NCEA certificate to keep track of how many credits they have achieved as well as provide standard information and resources.

We are only one week away from the SharePoint in Education event, held at Microsoft New Zealand! It's going to be a fantastic afternoon and we are all very excited to hear the amazing Lou Zulli Jr give his insights on Office 365 in Education. Click here to Register now! More information below:

If you are from the education sector, and would like to learn more about SharePoint and specifically how it is used in Schools, then this is for you!

Microsoft is hosting an afternoon get-together with a few presentations followed by networking and drinks. Although FREE to attend, places are strictly limited and Registrations are essential before Friday, 18 July. Click here to Register now! You can also find out more on the ShareThePoint Website here.

Date: Wednesday 23 July - 4-6pm

Venue: Microsoft New Zealand Ltd, Level 5/22 Viaduct Harbour Ave, Auckland 1010  Bing Maps

Schedule

Click here to Register now!     

Speakers

We look forward to seeing you there!

As of 7th July, Yammer Enterprise was made available to all academic institutions at no additional cost. Yammer basic was always available for free as an enterprise social network option but did not allow for granular management of this environment as many organisations require.

Yammer Enterprise is now free under Office 365 for Education A2, A3 & A4 plans! The Office 365 A2 plan is the free plan available for staff and students. Our Office 365 for Education offering was recently enhanced with additional no-cost Office application downloads for students through Student Advantage and will now include Yammer Enterprise. All existing Office 365 Education plan schools will receive licenses for Yammer Enterprise.

So what is Yammer Enterprise?

Yammer Enterprise is an enterprise social networking platform providing seamless, open sharing, and cross collaboration within your school. It is a transformational technology which has changed the way students and staff work. It promotes sharing ideas, thoughts, finding information and asking questions to innovate and collaborate.
 
The possibilities for using Yammer in education are endless. Here just a few scenarios that might help get
the ideas going:
·       Classroom/Teacher/Campus collaboration – teacher to student, student to student, mentoring, questions, announcements
·       Departmental collaboration – professor sharing, collaboration, information sharing
·       Projects – project information, graduate student projects, sharing of ideas
·       IT helpdesk – questions, information sharing
·       Research – sharing ideas, working cross teams, working with external parties securely
·       Alumni – Alumni collaboration, announcements, jobs
·       External collaboration with researchers, companies, other universities/schools.

If I have an existing Office 365 Education tenant what do I have to do to get Yammer Enterprise?

If you already have A2 or A3 academic skus enabled the ‘Yammer Enterprise’ license will just appear in your tenant. You do not have to order anything additional to make this work.  You still have to activate Yammer within your Office 365 Education tenant. See steps here and Activation FAQ here.

In light of this announcement we'd encourage you to visit the official blog post and a number resources
available below:
·       Microsoft in Education Blog - A view of the mobile Yammer applications available for iOS, Android,
Windows and a handy FAQ
·       Yammer Enterprise Activation Guide – A good overview for IT administrators to help you through
activating your Yammer network.
·       If you’re using SharePoint 2013 on premise you can integrate with Yammer Enterprise to provide
an enhanced social experience with SharePoint 2013 SP1.
·       The Yammer app for SharePoint that was released in July embeds Yammer feeds into SharePoint
sites (similar to the Yammer web part that is available for SharePoint 2010 & 2007). The Yammer
app for SharePoint is available free of charge in the Office Store.
·       If you’d like to understand the Yammer Enterprise service compliance roadmap regarding security,
compliance and privacy we can provide the list of plans for Yammer key standards and
certifications.
·       Find out how other tertiary education institutions are using Yammer to improve engagement
on the Yammer customer success web site.

If you have any other questions, please contact your IT Partner.

Last month, we announced the customer preview of Office Mix, a tool designed to make it easier for teachers to incorporate online content into their lesson plans. Since then, we’ve been gathering feedback about what educators find most useful about the tool and how to make it even better, and we’re sharing what we’ve learned at the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) conference in Atlanta this week. Overall, we were pleasantly surprised to see teachers using Office Mix in ways we hadn’t anticipated (for example, asking students to create their own mixes), and we noted some usage trends that will influence how we evolve the tool in the future.

This blog post was originally posted on the Office Blog. You can read it here.

Easily discover and share lessons created with mixes

The top request we’ve received from teachers is to make it easier to share mixes. In response, we created a public Gallery designed for sharing and discovering great lessons. Through the new public Gallery, you can upload your favourite mixes, make them available to others, and browse content created by others to spark ideas or share with your class.

We’ve heard from educators that finding relevant, useful content can be a challenge, and we hope the Gallery makes that just a little easier. Additionally, you can now embed Office Mix content, so it can show up on virtually any website.

More ways to use mixes in the classroom

We’ve also learned how teachers are incorporating Office Mix into their classrooms. Here are some of the ways we’ve heard about:

• Formative assessment feedback loop. Almost all of the mixes that have been created for instructional purposes have assessments built in.
• Bite-sized learning. The vast majority of mixes created are shorter than five minutes, suggesting that educators are using Office Mix to teach individual concepts rather than replace entire classroom lessons.
• Global appeal. Though we haven’t localized Office Mix (the website and materials are only in English at this point), we are seeing mixes in a variety of foreign languages: Mandarin, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Romanian, and even Finnish.
• Not just for teachers. We were surprised to hear from a number of teachers that they were asking students to create mixes as part of project-based learning assignments.
• Catch-up. Though this doesn’t seem to be the predominant use of Office Mix, some teachers are using it to record their class lectures for students who missed a class or would benefit from a repeat of the lesson.

More Office Mix partners means more education materials are available

The list of content partners continues to grow (in addition to the partners we announced in May: Khan Academy and the CK-12 Foundation). University of Colorado’s PhET physical science simulations app is now available through Office Mix. An Office Mix math app from GeoGebra is expected to be available later this month. Check out www.geogebratube.org for advanced viewing of thousands of STEM education materials that will be freely available through GeoGebra in Office Mix.

Partners are already letting us know that they are excited about the opportunity to broaden their reach, allowing them to help more educators. “The goal of the CK-12 Foundation is to create, curate and allow customization of high quality, free content that we can then make available to all teachers globally. Our partnership with Office Mix has allowed us to provide teachers with a faster, simpler way to integrate this information into their PowerPoint lessons,” said Neeru Khosla, executive director of the CK-12 Foundation.

Listen to what teachers are saying about Office Mix

Here are a few of our favorite comments so far from teachers who have used Office Mix:

Brien Gorham, English Teacher at Forest Ridge School of the Sacred Heart

• “Mix provides teachers with an easy way to create flipped lessons for students since most teachers are already familiar with PowerPoint. Being able to create self-directed content for students creates more class time for more challenging project work and writing assignments. Having students work with ‘static content’ at home allows for more differentiated instruction time in the classroom. Being able to track their progress is an essential feature of this tool.”

• “The familiar interface of PowerPoint is one of its greatest strengths. The layout of the Mix toolbar is easy to navigate and very user friendly. Another huge advantage is that teachers can easily repurpose their extensive libraries of existing PowerPoints into student directed content. Finally, the analytics are simply fantastic. I can see at a glance if students are engaging with the content, how in-depth that engagement is, and, through quizzes and questions, how much of that content they absorbed.”

Helen Gooch, Microsoft Fellow and Master Trainer

• Office Mix offers “great analytics so that as your students complete a lesson or learning activity, you can see how well they mastered the objectives, and you can view the results if you included quiz questions such as multiple choice, true/false, and short answer. Or, you can monitor how long they spent on various aspects of your instructional sequence. Did they breeze through certain parts or did they truly take their time to learn. These are great formative assessment features!”

Vicki Davis, full-time teacher and IT director for a small school in Camilla, Georgia and blogger at CoolCatTeacher.com

• “Think of it [screencasts] like team teaching with myself – an online me and a face to face me. Because it is so easy, Office Mix is changing everything about how I screencast. Just click the Office Mix Plug in inside PowerPoint and record the video slide by slide. It lets you do screencasting, embed videos, write on the screen and will record webcam.”

Graduates from the Microsoft IT Academy’s ‘Microsoft Office Specialist’ course have earned special recognition from Hekia Parata, Education Minister, as well as digital skills to aid their future.

The nine students from Mana College in Porirua were presented with graduation certificates and congratulations from Parata in a Connect Smart Week event at Parliament.

“It was a privilege to present these very deserving students with their graduation certificates,” Parata says. “Programmes like this are a great way of making sure our kids are equipped to work in today’s modern workforce.”

The graduating Mana College students were Krystal Bishop, Tautahi Johnstone, Jammee Kirikino, Jayden Charteris, Naki Eriepa, Karina Kinvig, Chelsea Hawkins, Asilika Tuiwainunu and Carlos Graham.

Mana College is participating in a nationwide pilot programme of the Microsoft IT Academy, which is being run in conjunction with the Ministry of Education. It is the only participating school in the greater Wellington region, with a further nine schools throughout the country participating in the programme.

The aim of the Microsoft IT Academy is to improve digital literacy and equip students with skills for the modern workforce. The global initiative also encourages students to consider the technology sector as a career option.

The Microsoft IT Academy has 300 different courses, from basic computer literacy skills in software through to high-end skills preparing students to become IT professionals.

As a result of the programme, Mike Webster, Principal of Mana College, says there has been a strong increase in information technology literacy amongst students. To date more than 100 students have participated in the programme, which has now been adopted as part of their regular curriculum.

The pilot programme was established in early 2013, and Evan Blackman, Microsoft’s Education Sector Manager says the company is thrilled with its success both at Mana College and the other schools. Microsoft is looking forward to expanding the programme in the coming year.

“The IT Academy programme is designed to help lift employability for the modern workforce, as well as opening up pathways into technology-based careers,” he says.

“It provides the resources and content that allow schools to lead students through industry-recognised training and certification programmes.”

For more information on IT Academy, visit here.

*This article was originally posted by Catherine Murray on Educate Tech Day.

It's almost Friday and we thought we'd boost your spirits. The infographic below was posted on the University of Southern California Rossier School of Education blog.

Check it out, share it and tweet us your thoughts. More importantly, take a minute to pat yourself on the back! Kiwi teachers really are our heroes and we couldn't be more proud!