deerwood

try writing over it in dry erase marker, then rubbing it off.. sounds weird but it works ith perm marker on a whiteboard so may work on a lens too

Without seeing the pupil, it is difficult to make recommendations but have you considered a keyguard? this device will keep a child's fingers off the keys except when one is deliberately pressed. This means that kids with limited hand and finger movement can rest their hands over the keyboard. Otherwise, some kind of alternative keyboard may be of benefit. Something like Intellikeys, maybe? You should be able to refer the pupil to an Occupational Therapist, Physiotherapist or ACE centre, for advice.

Technical support for primary schools is a BIG issue. Generally, primaries get low amounts technical support. The most common arrangement is half day a week. This, quite simply, is not sufficient. It often results in a school 'building up' a list of problems for the technician to solve on his half day. This means that a problem can go a week before it is even reported to the technician. If that problem cannot be solved during the half day or if there are too many probkems to be solved in a half day, then problems can be carried over to the following week. If problems need to be reported to third parties (e.g. suppliers) then further delays can be experienced. I daresay many of us have experienced these problems, or worse. The point is, though, that we really need to address the issue of technical support for primary schools far more effectively if we are to expect our primaries to make best use of their ICT.

Thom, You have my sympathies on this one. If printing photos is not important, have you considered a colour laser rather than an inkjet? In the long term or if a lot of printing is done, they work out far more cost effective than an inkjet and usually quicker. Of course, the initial outlay in purchasing the machine is greater. So I guess if you only have £70 you might as well forget it. Then again you could put the lower cost idea to the head and see what she says.

As to the possible virus, Here's the reply I received from SMARTTECH "there is no virus in the SMART board software, but the SMART service does do some weird things that that some virus scanners may flag as a potential virus." Hence, I assume, the reason they advise turning off your anti-virus when installing the program update.

As Inspiration is a piece of software more geared to primary (juniors), I wouldn't be surprised if it was priced for a primary school (sorry) but only TAG will be able to tell you that. I'm sure, though, that they would not want to miss out on making some money, so you might be able to do a deal! Can you use ELCs to reduce the cost? For a secondary school and also for staff use, I'd still opt for MindManager, it seems to give a more professsional look and integrates much better with Office programs (at least MS Office). Talk to Mindjet to see if you can do an educational deal with them, you can now use ELCs to purchase Mindmanager.

I assume you have contacted Taglearning (www.taglearning.com). Their website says that a primary site licence is available.

For school staff, I'd certainly advise using Mindjet's Mindmanager pro6. This is an easy to use product and has excellent links with MS office, pdf creation and basic html creation. For secondary pupils I'd also recommend Mindmanager pro6. Inspiration (now in version eight) is a great product for pupils but tends to appear cluttered on the screen and the results tend to look more childish but would be great for juniors). For Juniors and Infants generally, I'd recommend 2Connect (though I do feel the version currently available is not fully ready) or Kidspiration. If you have Smartboards, then you may be able to get a discount on Mind Genius which is a good program but perhaps not as good as mind-manager.

When I installed the new version it triggered the anti-virus program (NOD32) and aborted. The anti-virus reported a possible heuristic trojan. My guess is that the AV was being a little 'over zealous' and there was not actually a virus or trojan in the download. However, this may be a problem others encounter. It is also worth noting that the new version uses new file extensions for notebook and gallery files (.notebook and .gallery). The 9.5 version will read old .xbk files but newly created files will not be compatible with old smartboard software installs. Also not sure if the new extensions will be accepted by Win98 A couple of reports have suggested the install program may abort when installing the Mac version.

I wonder if anyone can give me any advice or pointers for selecting a Learning Platform for primary schools. Are there any 'off the shelf products' available? What features should schools be looking for? How easy are they to install and run?

Just a thought, Is it the VCR that's at fault or the TV you are playing them on? Is it possible to bypass the PAL system of your TV (by using Scart, RGB, or whatever) or maybe even use a monitor rather than a TV tuner?