SIMS Assessment Manager and Profiles

We're looking at swopping to the above from Bromcom e-Markbook - it's trash.

We would like to set-up department level markbooks (so they meet most of the needs of individual departments) but then effectively 'overlay' these with layer of reports for whole school reporting.

I know this is a big job, setting up the sheets, formula, conditional formatting etc

It would be good to know in advance any isuues I am likely to hit and perhaps what I should avoid.

I've picked up so far - do not be the first to install patches/upgrades and do not install these wirelessly to laptops.

Any others folks?

My advice would be to get a bit of training. There are devices in AM that will make life a lot easier such as Result Sets but these take a little time to understand the implications of. Set up correctly AM will provide your school with easy means to set targets and report to parents.

Hi,

One of our deputy heads is going down this line right now - if yoy PM me your details perhaps you can talk to her.

Cheers

Peter

@Sleepmaster:
I would do as Phil has advised as it will not be as straight forward as creating the marksheets etc, you will probably have to use some other software to baseline the students so that the entries you make for them are correct. It will probably be a rolling procedure as the year eleven students will already have grades for Key stages already.

I am in the process of re-setting up marksheets as you are describing. It is a long and painful process, but I believe, ultimately worth it. Make sure you know exactly what you want to get out of it before you start making them.

I am probably teaching you to suck eggs but technology is never a solution, just a tool. If you have the best student tracking system in the world, but no-one uses it correctly, then it is worthless. Everyone has to buy into the idea or it will not work.

What is more, Ofsted will look at it and say (I know this because I had this conversation not two months ago) "So what."

Ofsted: "Thats great, is everyone using it?"
Me: "Yes"
Ofsted: "Thats nice, so if I went into an ICT lesson and asked the teacher to show me their markbook, they would be comfortable with that."
Me: "Yes, I would hope so, as they have all had training from their Subject Leaders, they fed this back to me."
Ofsted: "So when I went into an ICT lesson today and they had never heard of the system, what do you say"
Me : ":censored:ing incompetent :censored:s you should remove the whole :censored:ing lot of them."
Ofsted: "What impact is it having on the student's education? Can you show me some proof?"
Me: "Bwahahahahahahaha, no seriously, tell me another.:drunken_smilie:"

However, we now have a (better I hope) plan in place to monitor the usage and impact of the system on student's learning so when Ofsted come back next term I shall be able to knock them out with a small swing of the Proof folder.

PM me if you want any more help/ideas.

Thanks all. We've had our initial training and have more planned. We're going with 'standardised' markbooks across all deparments/key stages for Phase 1, then picking off most departments, department by department over a 12 month period.

There are 1250 kids in our school so reasonable size. A markbook will have FFT, Level/Grade from last year, 5 fields for attitude to learning and 5 fields for attainment and average. That's it. I've estimated it will take one person five days to set this up but we'll see what the guru thinks on our next training day.

In September each member of staff will have 1 hour training on using the marksheets and a bit on the other things in Sims. We're setting up User Groups in Sims so that functionality will be limited to start with to make it easier to start with. New laptops to meet min spec on order. Server being upgraded. Hard wired points being setup in staffroom in case issues with wireless connectivity.

Sound about right - what am I missing?

Cheers

Sounds right.

I would take a look at the behaviour & attainment parts too as these have had measurable impact in schools. If you also assign the pupil summary page to teachers, rather than the admin view, you will have a very powerful desktop to look at in reviews.

It can all be done in the hour that you have already assigned for teachers training.

... Like with any system the key to success is in planning & training. I worked with Bromcom eMarkbook at my previous school and I believe that it had some nice features, and it could be setup and customised and setup to the inndividual schoool requirements!

Like with all assesment tracking tools; they have to be customised by the school.

To this end the system is only as good as its end users!

Dear Sleepmaster

I work for Bromcom and I'm sorry to hear that you think eMB is "trash".

At Bromcom we have always been open to our customers' criticism of our software products. I know it's too late for us to make amends - since you have now moved to SAM - but in order for us to learn from our mistakes - I would very much like to know what issues, gripes and problems you had with eMB at your school.

Thanks in advance.