Visual Login and other primary related stuff?

[Bluetooth]

Hi guys

Have a quick question and some theory based stuff.

I work primarily in primary schools and have around 200 - 300 devices across 6 schools. I have a large junior school while most of my other schools are mid size juniors/infant schools.

Once thing i have found is that teachers and eta's spend a lot of (wasted) time logging machines in and setting them up etc.

I wanted to know if there are any other primary oriented techies out there and if they have found any useful tools to help children and teachers alike log into machines and run things quicker etc.

Basically i was thinking of something along the lines of some kind of graphical login where you simply click on a box (like the normal non domain xp login) where there is a name and a password box.

Then the same requirement for the desktop, i have all the most used icons listed on the desktop i just wondered if there were any cute tweaks people could use etc to make things easier for staff and children alike.

Thanks in advance peeps!

B

[Bluetooth]

take it thats a no then =-)

[SYSMAN_MK]

Once thing i have found is that teachers and eta's spend a lot of (wasted) time logging machines in and setting them up etc.

In what way is time wasted? What are they having to set up?

[TechSupp]

I too work across four primaries and I'm afraid at some point they wil haveto learn how to log on. We have two scenarios:
No.1
The children have their class name along with the same for the password, they just learn from an early stage (some get help in the early years lower KS1)

No.2
The only concession we give is that we shorted the login names (class based) i.e. foundation children have FS or FS1 etc with no password, further up KS1 they have y2, no password and in KS2 they have year5 with a password, helps to get them used to secondary wherethey will have to log in.

Not really the answer you were looking for but a better way to go, providing a graphical interface for logging in is just putting off the inevitable and a vital skill they really need to learn. The teachers just need to take the time to teach them these skills unfortunately.

[Bluetooth]

Well;

Teachers often push eta's to head to the ict room to login the class (as mentioned above i already have the same idea with logons yearr, year1, year2 etc depending on what the ict coordinator wants) most have either simple passwords or none.

But the eta has to come up login the class then run the program (most time 2simple software or edcity) and get the kids to the right area for them to come in.

This school is only reception and y1 and y2 so the lower kids really arent capable of loging in so i dunno, just wondered if there was soething i could do, ah well =-)

[sted]

if they all want to log in as say r for reception you can use italc to log them all in from a master workstation

winsuite does give you a visual interface for login (3.51 4 dosent iirc) but if you havnt got it dont bother its usually more hassle than its worth and dosent work on vista/2008/7

[TechSupp]

Well;

But the eta has to come up login the class then run the program (most time 2simple software or edcity) and get the kids to the right area for them to come in

Quick but not teaching the kids anything just delaying the time they have to learn.

This school is only reception and y1 and y2 so the lower kids really arent capable of loging in

Why? You may be surprised how capable they are.

[SYSMAN_MK]

Have to agree with TechSupp

After seeing Y2s recording videos using a laptops webcam and movie maker, logging on is nothing.

[p858snake]

I know some monitoring programs such as AbTutor and i'm pretty sure LanSchool can login a set of computers remotely and then issue commands to them (eg: Run program X), Although I don't know how well it works since i have never tried it.

[Jamman960]

We generally issue our pupils with their own usernames with randomly generated passwords half way through year 2 which they then keep until they leave the school in year 8(pre-prep/prep). They struggle at first but they usually get the hang of it in a few lessons.

as above using Something like ABtutor/netop/italc(never tried this one) to log all of the pc's on and launch the required program would probably help.

[laserblazer]

We introduced student passwords last year. Previously we had Winsuite. I made the passwords a little too complicated and staff were for ever having to consult the list to get the kids logged on. This year, I've simplified it for Y5, so it is fairly easy to remember and for staff to work out. The passwords are primarily there to get them used to passwords, it's not a big deal if they are not particularly secure.

Even with this level of simplicity, it can still take some Y5 classes 10-15 minutes to get 30 computers logged on but they are getting better and at least we know by the time they get to the High School, they should be able to spell their names.

[Tricky_Dicky]

Our year 1s and 2s are more than capable of logging in themselves and under some direction can find what program the teacher wants them to work with.
I haven't been working in schools long but with most of the children I've seen it is a case of show them once, maybe twice and away you go.
I think the problem may well be convincing the teachers or TAs to let the kids have a go.
Rich

[witch]

iTALC, which is free, has a 'log on all computers' option which may be what you are looking for.
I do have to agree with others though, when I worked in a first school, our reception, yr1 and yr2 children learned to log on quite quickly

[BrianG]

I agree with Techsupp. I work in primaries and the teachers are happy to have the children log themselves on. It allows them to learn the procedure for logging on, and helps them later on in school. At somepoint they are going to have to learn, it might aswel be sooner rather than later. We do shorten the usernames to help them though. 9SJ for example would be a John Smith who started in 2009.

One of my schools uses winsuite to help log on. It gives the users in a list, from which they pick their name and log straight on. This, in my opinion, is the only good part of winsuite though

[Oakie]

I am the computer teacher at a primary school with 850 kids. About 300 of the children are between the ages of 4 1/2 to 6 years old. I run an XP computer lab. I use AB tutor to restart the machines after every 1/2 hour class. I also use Faronics Deep Freeze so the computers are rolled back to original configuration after the restart. Since I only have 5 minutes between classes, I restart the machines in masse with ABtutor, then once the new group of little kiddies is seated, I log the whole lab in to a generic student account in masse with ABtutor. There's a logon button on ABtutor and then I just type in the account name like this: student@castlebay.lab and all the computers I selected from the list will logon with that account.