What is it?The two best forms of continuing professional development are to watch each other teach and to share ideas. The Ideas To Inspire website is an excellent example of the latter and, with a collection of over 70 collaborative slideshows, you should find things you can use in your own teaching.
There is a massive range of ICT-related topics, from 104 Inspiring YouTube Videos to Neogeography In The Classroom and, because the slideshows have been started and ideas have been added by a broad range of teachers, they are constantly evolving and improving. Better yet, you are more than welcome to add your own ideas - this isn’t a clique, this is just teachers sharing their thoughts.
The collaborators are not all ICT teachers and many of the ideas are cross-curricular, so you might pick up some gems you can share with colleagues in other departments or you might come across an idea that will give you a more cross-curricular theme for your own schemes of work. Why not make use of Google Maps in conjunction with the geography department or use Wordle to help students assess their own vocabulary skills by pasting in an English essay?
Some of the ideas are ideal for primary, some for secondary. Some are great for ICT, some are great for geography, some will give you great ideas for assemblies. And if you spot a gap, send a message to Mark Warner who runs the site and watch the ideas come flooding in.
www.ideastoinspire.co.ukMark Clarkson is head of ICT and computing at Egglescliffe School in Stockton-on-Tees. mwclarkson.co.ukICT forum
