Microsoft Classroom is ending!

[MrFrostmaul]

We given up with Microsofts constant changes and just use Office365 for email, OneDrive and a SharePoint site for staff.

[vikpaw]

We've recently started using Teams and it works well for communications between various folk scattered around different offices/schools. Saved on a bunch of emails which would have been full of large attachments.

 

I'm not sure I like the way it's organised. It makes a sharepoint site for each team and then folders for the channels within.

 

It's ok for comms and admin/project work. I'm not sure how well it will lend itself to education and teaching.

[mikkydoos]

Is it wrong those of us on G Suite feel even more smug about our choice at the moment?!

 

I use GSuite for my personal stuff. The main problem I find is that the web interface is HORRIBLE. Especially on a PC/chromebook.

So hard to navigate. I think that's why a lot go for O365. And the backend is more configurable especially for hybrid etc.

 

And amazingly... I cant believe I'm saying this... but the MS phone support is excellent. The best out of any of our service providers.

 

** I am in no way a MS fan.

 

MS have said that they will move Classroom stuff into Teams.

At the moment you can't compare the two but I would expect Teams to become something much better rather quickly

 

They better hurry up. Its live for us !

 

I've had a quick look at Microsoft Teams today, it doesn't even appear to be a similar product. It's like comparing Word with Excel !

 

Totally agree. What is it ???

 

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I'm quite miffed about this. It looked really good.

 

The hardest part of implementing something like this is getting staff to use it. This would have been great cos our lot are all using O365 already.

 

I've tried pushing Moodle, Frog, Sharepoint etc in our place and can't get it off the ground for more than a couple of weeks.

 

Looks like it has to be GAFE

Edited May 5, 2017 by mikkydoos

[Primus]

I use GSuite for my personal stuff. The main problem I find is that the web interface is HORRIBLE. Especially on a PC/chromebook.

So hard to navigate. I think that's why a lot go for O365. And the backend is more configurable especially for hybrid etc.

 

And amazingly... I cant believe I'm saying this... but the MS phone support is excellent. The best out of any of our service providers.

 

** I am in no way a MS fan.

 

 

 

They better hurry up. Its live for us !

 

 

 

Totally agree. What is it ???

 

------------------------------------------------

 

I'm quite miffed about this. It looked really good.

 

The hardest part of implementing something like this is getting staff to use it. This would have been great cos our lot are all using O365 already.

 

I've tried pushing Moodle, Frog, Sharepoint etc in our place and can't get it off the ground for more than a couple of weeks.

 

Looks like it has to be GAFE

 

Couldn't disagree more, G Suite is far easier to use, the UI is intuitive and their phone support is also excellent.

 

I look at local schools who went O365, paid for loads of training, spent hours of CPD and take up is minimal.

 

We've gone G Suite, provided minimal CPD yet take up has been huge.

[2ilent8cho]

I look at local schools who went O365, paid for loads of training, spent hours of CPD and take up is minimal.

 

We've gone G Suite, provided minimal CPD yet take up has been huge.

 

I wish we could dump O365, its not really liked by anyone here and i want to burn it to the ground some days. OneDrive is nothing but a heap of junk (and thats being nice) , weaning people off Word , Excel and PowerPoint is a difficult task.

[Lonix]

Couldn't disagree more, G Suite is far easier to use, the UI is intuitive and their phone support is also excellent.

 

I look at local schools who went O365, paid for loads of training, spent hours of CPD and take up is minimal.

 

We've gone G Suite, provided minimal CPD yet take up has been huge.

 

We've got both, preference here is O365 by far. As for training shouldn't that be available for both products regardless if you like O365 or Google.

 

It's always going to boil down on preference which doesn't mean one product is easier to use than another. I find managing both a walk in the park. Only thing I can't compare is support because we've not needed any for either product.

 

Only thing in my view that Google is missing is a good Office product, we tried for an entire year using the Google Docs etc and found they were missing a ton functions (given was 12 months ago) which even Google said "does not exist". So we reverted to providing Office to an entire year and we didn't get a person in the door regarding "how do I do this" and having to google it to find out we can't. When it comes to free I'd always recommend the likes of OpenOffice or O365 Edu.

 

And all that is before I get stared on the software reliance on Office - all the above was done mainly to consider leaving Windows costs entirely which I will admit is still on the cards.

Edited May 5, 2017 by Lonix

[mjk]

weaning people off Word , Excel and PowerPoint is a difficult task.

Our SLT did it quite easily. They told everyone that our system is Google and told us to uninstall MSOffice.

It is only difficult if you make it difficult for yourself.

[maark]

Wish we hadn't gone so far down the 365 route here - my old school has been using google classroom for years with no problems.

Much prefer google - works better, clearer support and documentation.

Onedrive is a PITA as is windows 10 - if I was setting a school up from scratch I would really consider chromebooks for majority of IT use now.

[mikkydoos]

Couldn't disagree more, G Suite is far easier to use, the UI is intuitive and their phone support is also excellent.

 

I look at local schools who went O365, paid for loads of training, spent hours of CPD and take up is minimal.

 

We've gone G Suite, provided minimal CPD yet take up has been huge.

 

@Primus, thats great, and I was in a school the other day who had adopted GAFE 100% and the way they operated looks amazing. A big success story and a massive improvement in student attainment. 1:1 chromebooks, the lot.

 

The thing is that its six of one and half a dozen of the other.

 

Those who are on O365 are on it for a good reason, or they chose it in the first place for good reason.

It is a good product, especially for the office integration, the mail client is nice, and its syncs AD quite nicely. Those using Azure or cloud VM's or whatever, it makes perfect sense.

The downside is that although its supposedly O365 for Edu, but its feature set isn't in any way being targetted at education. Its targetted at big business. They've just priced it down or given it away and called it 'Education'.

 

I was hoping Classroom would differentiate it from being a business product and focus more towards schools ways of working, but they've scuttled it.

 

On the other hand GAFE is definitely targetted at education, especially down to the worded terminology they use in the interface. They call a class a class, not a team, and the feature set is excellent, but not without flaws.

The interface.. I don't personally like it but that's just me

 

I've also seen many schools who've sunk themselves into Frog 100%... really successfully.

 

Who's to say that in 2 years someone else won't come out with a platform that blows both away.

 

I think some of the O365 egeekers here (and me) are p***ed off because to get a proper collaborative solution up and going the choice now looks like it has to be something other than O365, which might mean changing to another platform wholesale and losing the valuable effort they have put into O365 and their MS network as a whole.

 

Those who've said M$ are inconsistent are bang on. Its a shame they constantly muck about and create problems for us. Out of touch I think the phrase is.

 

and @maark. Spot on m8 re. chromebooks and Win10.

Edited May 5, 2017 by mikkydoos

[jnfarmer]

For those of you wondering about Classroom moving to Teams, this quick vid might clear it up. I'm sure some of you have seen it already...

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VSh61vUhSA

[woody]

I've been taking a look at teams and a big problem is going to be duplication of work for teachers. Yes, SDS will create the classes and memberships, but after that, It's all down to the teacher. Under each team (class), I imagine the teacher would create a separate 'Channel' for each topic or course, whatever you want to call it. The problem is, these channels can't be copied into other Teams. Therefore, if you teach 3 year 8 classes, you have to create the Channels separately for each one, even if they are identical. If you have assignments, these can't be copied between Teams and channels so you have to create them all again.

 

This is basic VLE type stuff and most teachers won't want to bother with the hassle. Businesses who want to use Teams are asking for the same functionality already, and according to Microsoft, it won't be easy for them to achieve it because of the underlying structure. Instead, they are asking customers to suggest workarounds!!!

 

Microsoft Suggestions - Move channels into other teams

[vikpaw]

^ Typical attitude!

[jonathan.lees]

We've been trialling Teacher Dashboard for a while now and the few teachers that use it, love it. We're hoping to get more departments interested and using it, SLT are very keen. Also the price is very good. I honestly can't think of anything we don't like about it, but the biggest pro is the interface as it's very modern and easy to navigate. We have trialled a few others - ruler & skooler.

[Bob_the_Goon]

Microsoft Teams for Education is now apparently live and rolling out across Education tenants.

 

Here is some resources that I found online that may help in the rollout of this solution.

 

https://padlet.com/pad184/Microsoft_Teams_Education_Resource_Collection

[adamsund]

We've been trialling Teacher Dashboard for a while now and the few teachers that use it, love it. We're hoping to get more departments interested and using it, SLT are very keen. Also the price is very good. I honestly can't think of anything we don't like about it, but the biggest pro is the interface as it's very modern and easy to navigate. We have trialled a few others - ruler & skooler.

 

We're currently looking at this a replacement for Show My Homework. I really like it and it's a fraction of the price. It's being trialled at the moment. The only downside is parent integration. I know that it's coming but Show My Homework is great for it and I worry it will be the stumbling block for us. I have asked if we can bulk import parent details so they get an email when homework is set. Can I ask if you have a solution? Have you managed to get SDS setup to sync automatically? I believe I've got it figured out in my head, just haven't got round to implementation yet!

[TwistedHelixis]

Lots of the primary schools round me went with Office 365 because that's the only choice the LA gave them. At all my schools I gave a big demo of each and let the schools decide for themselves, they all went with GAFE, which is lucky as it means I only have one solution to look after. From my point of view, there are lots of schools using 365 when GAFE might have been a better option, although for businesses 365 is probably the better option.

[mjk]

We're currently looking at this a replacement for Show My Homework. I really like it and it's a fraction of the price. It's being trialled at the moment. The only downside is parent integration.!

We use Google Classroom as a replacement for ShowMyHomework, it does have the parent integration, you can use a third party to import parents directly from SIMS and it's free.

[vikpaw]

From my point of view, there are lots of schools using 365 when GAFE might have been a better option, although for businesses 365 is probably the better option.

 

Why would you say O365 is better for business?

 

Should we encourage staff and students to use 365 and bear with any perceived issues if in the long run, we're preparing students to go into the world of work and ultimately use the best tools for business?

 

We use 365 for corporate and moved one school away from GAFE, another likes it too much. I can see why it's 'friendly', however I'm wondering if we should insist on the change as it's really for the better.

[TwistedHelixis]

I am assuming you are in IT support and not the head teacher in the following

 

Why would you say O365 is better for business?

 

I just think it has aspects that lend themselves slightly better to businesses, mainly the fact that they probably already have all their work in an office format, but nothing massive either way.

 

Should we encourage staff and students to use 365 and bear with any perceived issues if in the long run, we're preparing students to go into the world of work and ultimately use the best tools for business?

 

Sorry but you have no idea what might be 'the best tools' in a few years time, surely you make a choice for your schools based on what works for the school not what you think might possibly be using in X years, or at the very least it is not the main reason for your choices.

 

We use 365 for corporate and moved one school away from GAFE, another likes it too much. I can see why it's 'friendly', however I'm wondering if we should insist on the change as it's really for the better.

Better for who? you? I have noticed a fair few 365 schools looking at moving to Google recently, so are they all wrong? Surely it's the IT's job to assist each school in whichever direction they think is best. By all means give them all the evidence, but how can it be a good thing if IT support are taking away options that the school have said they like.

 

BTW, I am not in a good mood today as I have a bad cold, so sorry if I come across angrily.

[FN-GM]

"we're preparing students to go into the world of work"

 

Personally I believe the job of a Secondary school is to prepare students for further education and then it is upto the further education provider to prepare them for the work place. Either through apprenticeships, A Levels etc.

[vikpaw]

I am assuming you are in IT support and not the head teacher in the following

I just think it has aspects that lend themselves slightly better to businesses, mainly the fact that they probably already have all their work in an office format, but nothing massive either way.

Sorry but you have no idea what might be 'the best tools' in a few years time, surely you make a choice for your schools based on what works for the school not what you think might possibly be using in X years, or at the very least it is not the main reason for your choices.

Better for who? you? I have noticed a fair few 365 schools looking at moving to Google recently, so are they all wrong? Surely it's the IT's job to assist each school in whichever direction they think is best. By all means give them all the evidence, but how can it be a good thing if IT support are taking away options that the school have said they like.

BTW, I am not in a good mood today as I have a bad cold, so sorry if I come across angrily.

"we're preparing students to go into the world of work"

Personally I believe the job of a Secondary school is to prepare students for further education and then it is upto the further education provider to prepare them for the work place. Either through apprenticeships, A Levels etc.

 

I'm not sure what different it makes whether I am IT support or the Head Teacher. I'm not stopping a school from doing anything, if we asked a school to change it would be after discussion with senior management and would be backed up with their support and evidence. I'm just asking the question, since you stated it was better for business, it got me thinking. It's our job as IT 'experts' to provide the evidence to the management. I'm asking for views. It seems like you've experienced an LA where they aren't as open to options.

 

People often say we're preparing students for the real world and our staff are often lagging when it comes to IT skills, so it's a hard thing to balance. If Google is the best option for a school, then I'm all for that. If it's Office then I would say that's better if it seems to be the norm to use Microsoft in commercial environments. At least in the UK corporate sector Google doesn't seem to be pervasive. I can imagine staff find using Google easier than Microsoft, but is that a good enough reason to opt for it.

 

I don't envisage making judgements on what will be used in the future, we should be looking at what is used now. So if a student does finish at 16, 18 or whatever age, they are equipped for the world of work or whatever environment they want to be in.

 

Ultimately, we want to provide transferable skills that can be used with any system. Apologies if you thought I was having a dig. I don't want to derail this thread, was just interested in your view.

Edited June 28, 2017 by vikpaw

[PotNoodleTech]

Whatever happened to the old adage of "teaching skills, not software"? Surely if you teach a) what the cloud is, b) how to use it and c) how to stay safe whilst doing it, then they will be able to transfer those skills to any cloud based solution any where for any employer, and hit the ground running?

[zag]

I was also annoyed about this when I heard but... Our teachers have been using Teams since the start of term and have given some really good feedback.

 

Other than writing some new documentation for the system, its basically identical to the old classroom software.

 

I've seen some impressive stuff on onenote teaching as well from our teachers without any guidance they seem to have got it. I'm quite impressed!