School Bells replacement by PC notifcations.

[Berttielp]

Hi All,

 

Some of the SLT are asking if we can replace the school bell system with software that pushes alerts to teachers PCs.

 

1) Has anyone come accross a system to do this at all ?

2) If you have has it worked well for the teaching staff ?

3) Apparently some schools have done away with most of the lesson change over bells and rely on teachers using the classroom clock or their watches ?

 

 

Any feedback welcome.

 

 

Thanks

[Mark182]

Have a look at this we use it but not to replace the bells

[synaesthesia]

We have limited bells between lessons, however would argue that software is probably using technology for the sake of it.

[DavR]

Not quite on the same track, but we've been having similar discussions with our lockdown planning.... The problem with having a PC based alert is that it relies on video / audio of the screen being available at time of alert. Practical lessons, especially PE, won't necessarily be in visual of a screen at the time, loud lessons such as drama or music you may not hear it.

 

If you've got a bell system in place I'd say that's already superior!

 

Perhaps speak to your bell system people, when I was at BETT last year I spoke to a few people who said their systems could kick off a script to run on a computer network, that might do your notifications.

Edited January 11, 2019 by DavR

[Berttielp]

Hi Synaesthesia,

 

thanks for your reply …. would you be able to provide a little detail on Limiting the bells please ?

 

Regards

 

Rob

[synaesthesia]

The only bells are now between major changeovers (so start of day, end of break, end of lunch, end of day) rather than between every single lesson.

[IrritableTech]

There hasn't been a school bell system here for more than 15 years. Lesson change over is simply done by staff telling the pupils its time to go - whether they keep track of time on their own watch or the PC clock will vary I guess. We have netsupport notify (party for a lock down situation), but don't use it for regular notifications.

 

Using a PC to replace a bell system is always going to be hit or miss - rooms where speakers are swtiched off, muted etc. Rooms where the teacher hasn't (or can't) logged on for some reason etc.

[howartp]

Our bells were rewired from the manual timer in premises office to a timer on the same radio-controlled system as all our clocks (Pimex Wireless).

 

There's 8 preset patterns, of which the default is between every lesson/break/etc/etc, but we have another with an additional bell at 11am (Remembrance) and at 11.45/12.00 (last-day-of-term) and also no times (holidays).

 

The times are set from a PC which has a USB/Serial connection to the transmitter.

 

It can also run in "online" mode so the PC software controls all the bells live, rather than the preset times stored offline.

[spluckrose]

Hi howartp - We are currently looking in to replacing bell system, we have quite a large site and currently have 4 manual programmable systems which are a nightmare to get in sync with each other. Could you send me some more details about your system

[howartp]

Hi @spluckrose,

 

https://www.primexinc.com/clocks/xr-series/

 

https://www.primexinc.com/products/xr-series-bell-scheduling

 

Three radio transmitters with small GPS time receiver stuck to the window or mounted outside and 1 meter high antenna inside to give coverage!

 

Clocks and timers receive signal from the transmitters, for On 1-3 seconds, or 1-3 pulses every second, or On-Off-On, or a couple of other combinations. Thus it *could* be used for fire or lockdown as well.

 

The timer also has a manual button that rings the bells whenever you press/hold it.

 

Looking at the website, it looks like it might be possible to put the timers on the network instead of needing the radio transmitter stuff, thus giving you four network controlled timers for your bells? I wasn't involved in the setup so never investigated this.

 

Feel free to ask further.

 

Peter

[spluckrose]

@howartp

 

Thanks for the info, i will take a look. SMT are wanting something we can control centrally

 

Simon

[DrBeaker]

There hasn't been a school bell system here for more than 15 years. Lesson change over is simply done by staff telling the pupils its time to go - whether they keep track of time on their own watch or the PC clock will vary I guess. We have netsupport notify (party for a lock down situation), but don't use it for regular notifications.

 

Using a PC to replace a bell system is always going to be hit or miss - rooms where speakers are swtiched off, muted etc. Rooms where the teacher hasn't (or can't) logged on for some reason etc.

 

 

There's far more things to go wrong with a computer-based setup for the purpose of the bells, than a "low-tech solution" of bells etc on a timer or a manually push-button etc. I think this is a bit of over-engineering for a simple problem that there's already solutions for.

[DrBeaker]

Hi howartp - We are currently looking in to replacing bell system, we have quite a large site and currently have 4 manual programmable systems which are a nightmare to get in sync with each other. Could you send me some more details about your system

 

One school I worked at the bells were never in sync, never on time etc. Sometimes the bell in the classroom next door would ring at a different time to the one next to it. I never considered it to be an IT problem of any kind as it was well outside the scope of IT support as to me that was a facilities issue, not an IT one. Don't mean that to sound harsh but IT have enough essential systems already without adequate resources to manage them without taking on something like that.

[ZP-Benji]

We don't have any bells for lesson changeover. There is a fire alarm system for fires and whistles for a lockdown. All students and teachers are expected to keep their own time and get to lessons on time. It all works pretty well for us. Most students have notifications on their phones and laptops through outlook using a progresso notification to sync their timetable.

[Berttielp]

So … we have closed this off …. thanks for all your replies … very helpful

 

In the end ...we now have bells for P1, End of break and End of lunch .... all works very well indeed!! No tech involved !!

[DrBeaker]

So … we have closed this off …. thanks for all your replies … very helpful

 

In the end ...we now have bells for P1, End of break and End of lunch .... all works very well indeed!! No tech involved !!

Out of interest would you let us know in a few months/Easter/summer how this went using the "low-tech" solution compared to something else? More to prove a point than anything. But a testimony from another school would be useful.

 

Thanks