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I've been looking for this thread or one like it all day - hurray. I'm about to do the same thing. In addition to the suggestions above, I am including: Audacity Scratch QuickMark (and .NET) There's also a handy website called Ninite which allows you to select various freeware utility programmes and automates the installation for you. Though I've not used it yet, someone recommended it on another thread.

@Lorfarius, Ok then, will see what dates are around in June and come up with somthing. @GrumbleDook, thanks for the offer - that could be very very helpful, but I think we'll need to boost our numbers a bit first to make a speaker or vendors visit worthwhile. Can I ask - how do you promote the Northants ones, apart from on edugeek? We were going to use the DNfL intranet but that's down and all info is being passed on via headteachers which relies on them forwarding info onto the correct staff. Any ideas to get the word out?

Just checked and the games are no more. Such as shame as they were great little fun things to do that really fitted in with each of the Mr Men and Little Misses characters. Somewhere there must be a programmer weeping into their pint at all that genius which is now sadly gone. The Mr Grumpy game will be especially missed.

I'm currently creating a list of software to set up on a netbook as a master image. Thing is, I know I've seen on edugeek somewhere a list of suggested software. But can I find the thread? Can I heck! Can anyone point me in the right direction to save me having to start a new thread and duplicating what's already out there? Thanks

Oh no, that's really sad - we liked that website in our house too. Is that the one with the games on where you had to get birds to poo on Mr Grumpy's head?

The last one was in Old Whittington near Chesterfield and we discussed keeping that as a venue because it's fairly central .... how does that sit with you coming over from Glossop??

Oh yes, very regular :-) We initiated it last term for the first time and agreed to see if we could get something going once a term ... so that means we are due another one soon! Would you be interested in coming along?

I remember that! It was brilliant as they always started off somewhere really remote like the African desert or the Siberian tundra. There was another one (also C4 I think) where contestants had to go on the run for a week and at the end of the week there was a live programme, during which they had to stay in a phone box for the hour. Professional trackers used to have to try and find them during the week by guessing where they might head for, tracing their movements through bank cards being used etc.

A female techie is worth more than 50 male ones, I'm sure :-)

Sometimes I feel I don't qualify as a "techie" - I am crap at tech-speak, and in forums I really struggle to explain stuff. But I do think (IMHO) I'm pretty good at human-speak and fooling the management! Am also happy up a ladder changing a projector, under a desk plugging in cables but I do draw the line at being the school unoffical electrician. I'm trying to think of how many women I've worked with in IT, both in education and in the private sector. I've come up with a big fat 0 so far - always been the lone lass in all-male teams. I did come across a female school tech who was my tutor on an OU course though.

Thanks for those recommendations, I'll take a look at the models and specs and see what costs we can come up with for the toner & related supplies. The ICT Co-ordinator has just added scanners to the wishlist as well ... seems that the new IT curriculum is going to specify that kids need to be able to scan documents .... so we might be looking for multi-function machines now or just buy some scanners as well!. Oh the joys of an ever-changing education system.

Maybe ... to be honest it's a bit of a complex site with lots of different pages to click through and I've only looked at a couple of the main sections to try and work out the best way of approaching the task. If somewhere else could host these documents then that'd be great, but I get the impression everything is going to be superceded by a new curriculum with new documentation to accompany it - but the teachers still want their old stuff :-)

Apologies for the typo in the thread title, have just tried to edit it and don't think I can now. We are assigning TAs to do this as well. Lucky them. Does the plug-in download all pdfs on a single page? In the Primary Framework, each pdf is on a single page mostly. There are a few pages with multiple documents on, but not many!

The "New Primary Framework" documents at The National Strategies are apparently going to be taken off-line soon, and teachers at my school want to be able to download the documentation from there before it all disappears. I've had a quick look and it so far it appears to be a case of clicking through to each page, clicking through to open it as a pdf file, saving the pdf file, closing it and clicking through to repeat to the next document. Has anyone else had this had this request and found a quicker way of downloading the documents?

That's a good point - we have had Ricoh out for quotes on the classroom printers and they have done a cost comparison for a per-click cost vs the traditional purchasing consumables method. The cost for a per-click copy seems quite high (7.44p colour and 1.64p mono) but "high" is quite subjective and based on the price per copy through the main printer/scanner/copier. The cost if we stick to purchasing consumables when needed is 0.06 per copy, either colour or b&w which is a lot less! We haven't considered leasing these printers at this stage, just buying them outright.

We are moving to a new school building (in July ready for September). We have an existing Ricoh copy/printer/scanner which is coming with us and which will be the main printer for colour and b & w printing especially for 10+ copies. We will be having 5 classrooms and an office which each require their own printer. Again we want the facility to print in b&w or colour, but these will be low-volume printers (for print runs of approx 10 copies or less). I'm on a hunt to try and fit suitable printers. I'm looking at something not too expensive to buy, thinking around £100 a printer max. Also we need a low-ish TCO - ideally we don't want to be buying 4 x £50 cartridges for these printers every time. The quality of the printouts is not really important either as the Ricoh machine we have does high-quality printing should this be needed. Can anybody recommend any good makes / models or chip in thoughts on whether inkjet or deskjet would be best? Has anyone got any recommendations?

Great link - thanks for sharing it. Interesting how Microsoft want you install Silverlight to watch it!

Sorry for the double post, just started going through some more pages on this thread and found the answer to my question on price already! Nil points for me for trying to save some time and skim-read the thread to get to the end!

Hi, we are a school moving to a new site in July so now is as good a time as any to start looking at our licenses. We have calculated 21 FTE staff (200+ and needing to use a computer) and at the new site will have 101 machines (90 netbooks & 11 desktops) requiring licenses for CALs, Windows 7 Professional and Microsoft Office 2010 Professional. Plus 1 server which will need licensing for Windows Server 2008 R2. Having looked at the prices for EES vs Schools Licensing, it seems that EES is the way to go. Just for my own peace of mind, I'm wondering we've got this right or is it too good to be true. Has anyone found any restrictions that have made them decide not to go for EES? Also, does a price of £35 per unit per year for the 21 FTEs seem reasonable? (And to be straight, I'm not asking for quotes as we're placing a bulk order for other things as well - just checking we're not being ripped off).

Today I've added another section to the plan as well, about identifying the eqpt we are not taking, wiping hard drives where necessary etc. and decommissioning items ready for disposal or resale. The major issue to solve at the moment is who is doing what. Like you say, michaelf I am assuming nothing! We are getting a list of questions together to ask about what is included as part of the build contract vs what we will need to do ourselves. This also affects the budget, which is not my headache thank goodness. It's funny you should mention the server room with no air-con. I have been told we can't have air-con because it doesn't fit in with the eco-friendliness of the rest of the school. I am waiting to see if they accept any of the "green" alternatives I have suggested. Or if the SMT just want the server to keep falling over in the summer when the room gets too hot.

Nice one, I suppose we can set everything up but if no-one can access it, it's not much use really! Have added that to the plan pronto.

As we were ... the ads are now gone again.

Bump .... have created 4 sections in my plan: Network infrastructure - covering the server, physical cabling, wireless network, cabinet, switches/routers Hardware - fixed computers, laptops/netbooks, printers, projectors + smartboards, Software & Licenses - Data transfer - from old server to new server, any computer hard drives with data on e.g. admin PCs Anyone think I am missing anything?

I can now see the ads on Edugeek, e.g. the one above the list of forums. I think they were blocked previously. Has Embc changed or relaxed its filtering levels?

Our primary school is moving from a split infants/junior site to a brand new school site for primary and juniors in July this year. I'm currently drafting a plan of action to address the IT points on the move, but am just wondering if anyone has done anything similar recently and would be willing to share their info? I'm including everything in my plan - hardware, software, licenses, data etc. Many thanks