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Apple Augmented Reality in your classroom

Mobile technology is providing new opportunities for learning in the classroom and teachers now have access to resources that can further enhance the learning experience. Alongside a teacher’s expertise in igniting curiosity and stimulating great questions, Augmented Reality (AR) can alter the learning environment and allow children to explore opportunities that weren’t previously possible.

Have you ever wondered what it was like to walk alongside dinosaurs?

Maybe you always struggled in science lessons when it came to learning about the human body?

Perhaps things would have been easier if you could have seen the human body in every detail, and see for yourself how all joints fit together.

AR in the classroom allows students to visualise what they cannot immediately see. Teachers now have the capability to bring this concept to life, and deliver some of the most inspiring lessons that pupils will ever experience.

XMA want to provide you with some inspiration for AR in the classroom, because there is a world out there ready to be explored – and it can all happen right there in the classroom!
 
Here are our favourite apps which can easily be incorporated into lesson plans:

Augmented Reality apps

My Very Hungry Caterpillar

Ideal for: early primary school
Requires: iOS 11.0 or later
This is a 3D interactive app, suited to early primary years. This is the perfect way to start introducing younger pupils to the world of AR and technology.
My Very Hungry Caterpillar teaches them the vital skills of responsibility; the children will need to nurture the caterpillar by feeding it and looking it after through every stage of growth until it turns into a butterfly.
This app will also teach them about evolution of growth; they will witness the caterpillar growing bigger and bigger until it turns into a beautiful butterfly.
 

Froggipedia

Ideal for: secondary school
Requires: iOS 11.0 or later
This apps provides new ways in bringing anatomy to life in your biology lessons, exploring intricate anatomical systems of a frog and its life cycle.
This app will help students to understand how a single celled egg can turn into a tadpole, then into a froglet and eventually to a full grown frog. By using this app, it means that there’s no need to physically dissect a frog in order to understand the full structure. This is interactive learning at its finest!

If you like this Augmented Reality app – try out ‘Brainapse’:
This is the same concept as Froggipedia, only this time with the human brain. Use this interactive app to engage your classroom in the functions of the human skull and brain. You can teach them about the different brain cells, experience how the brain communicates with the five senses and understand the timeline of the human brain evolution.
 

Complete Anatomy 2019

Ideal for: secondary school
Requires: iOS device
Used by 200 of the world’s top universities, this app is regarded as one of the worlds most accurate and advanced 3D anatomy apps.
This app includes a betting and dissectible human heart in 3D – there is no better way for your pupils to get up close and hands-on with the human anatomy. This app clearly explains and demonstrates pain and growth simulation and the different functions of the human body. Welcome to the future of science lessons.

Want to learn more about how to use iPad and apps in the classroom?
Get in touch with our team today

In the 25th year of the CRN Channel Awards, it is with immense pride that we officially announce XMA has been named Public Sector VAR of the Year for the 2nd year running.

Ian Cunningham, Director of Sales & Marketing at XMA, who accepted the awards with the rest of the XMA Board commented “‘The level of competition this year was extremely tough and we were up against a range of industry peers who we admire and respect and who we knew would be formidable opponents, so winning against them makes it even more special.

I am beyond delighted XMA have been named CRN’s Public Sector VAR of the Year, proving that all of the hard work and determination across our company this year from top to bottom has really made a difference and is now publicly recognised.  The proposals to win these awards told the story of our people and the tremendous service they have provided our customers across the year, but also it is a story of transformation and change in our company. We are being rewarded for investing in our people, evolving our systems and processes, to ultimately give our customers best in class solutions, products and services at the right time, right price and with fantastic service and relationships driven by our staff.

I’d like to extend a huge thank you not just to our staff, but to all our customers, partners and associates without whom we could not have reached such a fantastic milestone.  And the good news – we are by no means finished.

Success breeds growth and XMA are growing strongly for the future.”

One team, one dream

We are tremendously proud of our achievements over the past 12 months of which much is credit to our people who continue to go the extra mile. They are critical to our success and we recognised this through the introduction of a number of training and development programmes to help them reach their full potential.

Our investment in digitally transforming our business has enabled the development and implementation of new systems, helping streamline how we work and service our customers.

Working together with one common goal, we have achieved huge growth across our Corporate, Public Sector and Ecommerce business, achieving an extended route to market and an empowered workforce.

XMA would like to extend a huge congratulations to all the finalists and winners at this year’s CRN Channel Awards. We are proud to be part of such an exciting and innovative industry and look forward to continuing to exceed expectations by delivering the best IT solutions to our customers throughout 2019.

With the unveiling of the 2018 budget last week, it was announced that the government would be investing an additional £400m into schools across England and Wales.

This additional investment was described as giving schools the extra budget for “the odd little piece of kit that they need*” – more specifically, “whiteboards and a couple of computers*”. This will be a one off capital payment direct to schools, averaging £10k per primary and £50k per secondary school.

The government have experienced a huge backlash across the country, with Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, saying “It is a sign of the government’s priorities that it is spending more on fixing potholes than on fixing the school funding crisis.”**

We agree that it is a small investment, and it certainly isn’t enough to help schools stretch to all the necessities they need. However, with our help we can make that additional budget go a lot further than just “a few little extras”. Our experience in doing more with less has supported schools in meeting their goals despite restricted budgets. Innovative technology solutions needn’t cost the earth. They just require careful planning, consideration and future proofing.

We pride ourselves in taking a consultative approach, by taking the time to understand your environment, challenges you currently face, and what your objectives are as a school.

Our specialist Schools team are ready to help you do a little extra with your “little extras”. Get in touch with us today so we can help your budget stretch further.

If you would like a member of our Schools team to contact you to discuss doing a little extra with “Little Extras”, please complete the fields below:

*The Guardian, 2018

** Schools Week, 2018

Atrium Studio School is Devon’s first school that specialises in the Built Environment. Atrium offers their students a contemporary education in areas including Architecture, Structural Engineering and Ecology alongside traditional GCSEs such as Triple Science, English Literature and Language and Maths.

The Studio School wanted to enhance their envisioned modern technology environment, and support their extensive syllabus by making ICT an integral part of learning. In addition, Atrium needed facilities that could support teachers and the Senior Leadership Team to become flexible and stimulating educators.

XMA won Atrium’s contract through an extensively detailed design, supply, delivery, install, testing and commissioning of the entire ICT infrastructure. By working closely with Atrium, XMA was able to successfully provide the School with a high quality service, state-of-the-art devices and support.

Atrium Studio School recognised the Value Added offering from XMA designed to support Education Impact. XMA’s offer included employer engagement to help contextualise and enrich the curriculum for their students, who benefit from the Studio School model’s blend of academic and vocational education.

Samantha Morcumb, Assistant Principal at the Studio School explains,

“Our students benefit from regular employer visits and employer led projects.
These are principally within the construction industry but our students wish to benefit from a broad understanding of industry and commerce. XMA interests us as an employer partner because they specialise in ICT for new-build schools and work closely with architects, mechanical, electrical and building contractors to create a great built environment.”

Samantha continues,

“In December 2016, we wanted our Year 9 and Year 10 students to gain insight and practical experience in the field of Logistics and Supply Chain Management, so we invited XMA and parent company Westcoast to come in and meet our students.

They were delighted to support and the Group’s Chief Operations Officer Andy Newberry and Guy Bates, STEM Ambassador volunteered to run a workshop. They suggested an overview of the businesses, logistics and supply chain career opportunities and a set of practical activities, so that our students got a real feel for the roles and skills involved in running efficient and environmentally considerate logistics services on a global scale.”

Luke, a Year 10 student with an interest in IT, supported XMA in running the activities with Year 9,

“Students learned about Westcoast and XMA’s supply chain, specifically for the UK assembly of Viglen PCs, workstations and servers. We then formed teams representing source countries, transportation and assembly. We had PC parts and had to bring them together using the transport options provided considering time, cost and environmental factors.

We learned how to assemble a PC, although I have personally done this before, so I coached the Y9s. We also learned that the UK is the world leader in cardboard box manufacture!

We use Viglen Omnino All-In-One PCs here at Atrium, so it was great to learn about how the business works that makes them.”

Sam Westaway, 3D Art and Design Teacher supported the day with Samantha,

“We worked with XMA prior to the day to ensure that the taught element and practical exercises helped embed life skills including critical thinking, communication and teamwork. Working with Andy and Guy of XMA helped us do that, because they were able to illustrate how important these skills are in their business, so they can serve their clients effectively and manage an innovative, ethical and environmentally considerate operation.”

Andy Newberry, Chief Operations Officer, Westcoast Ltd comments,

“We knew this was a great school and so different from my own school experience. It was terrific to experience the Studio School approach first hand and see the enthusiasm of their students to learn about careers and routes to university.”

Guy Bates, XMA Business Development Director and STEM Ambassador says,

“Having been a part of the original project team during the bid, design and implementation of the IT solution, it was wonderful to see and use the ICT solution we and the School designed together. Anyone who has presented to and collaborated with a large audience will know that you really want the ICT to work first time, so working with XMA partner schools in this way gives a great insight into the ease of use and functionality of the Solution, when you depend on it in front of a group of teenagers!”

Guy continues,

“It is particularly exciting to see how the Atrium ICT Solution supports Project Based Learning, together with flexible spaces at the School, which are designed to enable whole year group, whole class, group, paired and individual learning. It must be working well! Activities were a joy to deliver and the hospitality and attitudes of the students and staff were amazing!”

HPE Synergy is the world’s first truly Composable Infrastructure and today’s new hybrid IT engine. Synergy enables you to maintain the structure and security of traditional IT, whilst still having flexibility and speed for new applications.

1. Cloud-like speed Composable Infrastructure enables DevOps teams to spin up new services in minutes to get new experiences into customers’ hands faster, delivering cloud-like speed from your own secure datacentre.	2. Single platform Run traditional applications and cloud-native apps from a single platform that supports everything from bare-metal deployment to virtual machines and containers. This allows IT to align behind a single platform to reduce datacentre complexity and cost.
3. Software-defined Intelligent software recognises and automatically integrates compute, storage, and fabric into resource pools that can be aggregated and disaggregated to meet the needs of any application. Template-driven provisioning helps ensure policy compliance and reduces risk exposure.	4. Operational efficiency Remove the need to stand up separate siloed environments for different applications. Automated provisioning via templates and a unified API enables application infrastructure provisioning in minutes instead of days, bringing cloud-giant efficiency to your datacentre.
5. Continuous development Developers can request exactly the amount of compute, storage, and networking fabric their applications need, directly from code. The unified API aggregates physical resources just like virtual and public-cloud resources, giving developers true infrastructure-as-code capabilities.	6. Fluid IT Accelerate application development by giving DevOps teams more control over their environments. Fluid resource pools allow developers to execute non-disruptive changes and to continuously refine applications to meet customer needs as they arise.
7. IT economics Template-driven provisioning and non-disruptive updates mean IT spends less time maintaining infrastructure, reducing labour costs. Fluid pools of resources that can be aggregated on demand increase utilisation and reduce over-provisioning and stranded capacity.	8. Competitive advantages Bridging the performance and control of dedicated infrastructure with the flexibility of the cloud allows lines-of-business to accelerate delivery of new customer experiences and revenue opportunities to stay ahead of the competition.
9. Future-proofed datacentre Be ready for whatever the future might bring with a scalable and extendable infrastructure and robust partner ecosystem that provides a firm foundation for today’s hybrid IT and the capacity and flexibility to take future innovations in stride.	10. Seamless evolution Starting with as little as a half-rack of gear, Composable Infrastructure can be deployed easily and incrementally, side-by-side with your existing infrastructure. Deploy it as part of your standard refresh cycle to grow your capabilities at a pace that makes sense for your business.

If you would like to learn more about any of the technologies mentioned or discuss other ideas for revolutionising your infrastructure, our team are on hand to help. Contact us at info@xma.co.uk or call 0115 846 4000. Alternatively, you can complete our contact form below.

The uniforms are ironed, the shoes are polished and parents are breathing a small sigh of relief – the summer holidays are over and it’s time to get back to business!

As the new academic year commences, it brings with it a fresh beginning, a blank canvas for new opportunities and endless possibilities. It’s an exciting time as students embark on the next chapter in their educational journey.

But it’s an exciting time for us too! There’s nothing more rewarding than seeing our young learners achieve their dreams, especially now that so much more is possible through the innovative application of IT.

Technology has opened up a whole new world for learning. Students have flexibility over what mediums they can learn with, they have immediate access to information and are no longer restricted to the classroom.

Exciting new technologies are emerging, breaking down the boundaries of traditional learning and enriching the educational experience. With so many new innovations designed to make learning more fun, we have narrowed down the selection to a few of our favourites…

3D Print

Building the vision into a tangible outcome
Print no longer means “Print”! Sitting perfectly within STEAM curricula, 3D print provides a truly creative and immersive learning environment. By producing tangible results, students are instantly engaged, developing a real motivation to learn. This hands-on-learning approach brings complex concepts to life and 3D print helps bridge the gap between traditional classroom concepts and reality.

Virtual Reality

Immerse learners in a simulated learning environment
Virtual Reality (VR) was a thing of the future but now it’s here and making waves through the education sector by changing the way educational content is delivered, allowing users to interact with it within a virtual world.

Students can explore a subject in detail, without having to read up about it. They can develop an understanding of how things work in a more practical environment. And they can scale learning experiences, making them more engaging and dynamic.

Microsoft Surface Go

Effortless 2:1 computing
The latest addition to the Surface family! The device is a 10-inch screen and 3:2 display with Microsoft claiming it is the ‘smallest, lightest and most affordable Surface yet’. It’s revolutionary 2:1 model enables the mobility of a tablet with the performance of a laptop and includes enhanced lesson customisation with Office 365 and seamless tools like Microsoft Teams enable assignment creation, progress tracker.

Sphero

Teaching students to code
We love this little guy! Sphero is an app-enabled robot which uses basic code to programme its actions – whether that be jumping, moving in a particular direction, dancing or changing colour. With its own Edu App providing heaps of collaborative STEAM activities such as Draw & Drive to learn real JavaScript, Sphero captures and nurture imaginations instantly.

Spongy Elephant

Award winning bite-sized training for schools and trusts
Ok, so it’s not exactly tech but we still see Spongy Elephant having a huge presence in ed this term! Put simply, Spongy Elephant provides your staff with bite-size learning bursts that are easy-to-access, easy-to-consume and easy-to-implement when they need them, rather than have them scheduled for school INSET sessions and offsite formal training.

We are helping schools similar to yours, to introduce the latest and greatest tech to their classrooms, giving them the confidence and reassurance that they are providing their students with the best learning experience possible.

If you would like to learn more about any of the technologies mentioned or discuss other ideas for revolutionising your classroom, our Education team are on hand to help.

There are two rules when it comes to modernising your datacentre but what it boils down to is focusing on a good outcome.

Rule #1: Keep it simple

When technology needs an update, some organisations choose to modernise over time, following the same problem-by-problem approach they used to build the original data centre. This piecemeal approach is complex and can be agonisingly slow. What’s worse, all that time and effort won’t necessarily lead to a better end product or even lower costs.

Instead of focusing on daily problems that arise, hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) lets you focus on the outcome: a simpler data centre that’s cost-effective and easy to manage. HCI takes a building block approach to architecture, consolidating compute, storage, network switching, replication, and backup in a single integrated system. The consolidation of these IT functions onto virtualized hardware can greatly simplify environments that have been divided by siloed point solutions.

VM-centric HCI systems are also simple for IT administrators to manage, and require much less data centre space than traditional IT devices.

Rule #2: Don’t overspend

Hyperconvergence requires some upfront investment, but it can deliver a huge return on that investment. In this study based on research with real world customers, Forrester Consulting found that HCI reduces TCO by 69% on average compared to traditional IT. Converging the entire IT stack – firmware, hypervisor, and data virtualisation software – has additional advantages, according to that same study. Data centre footprint can be reduced 10:1, backups and disaster recovery become simple and straightforward, and upgrades are managed for the whole stack. The most efficient solutions also free up significant staff time, boosting the economic benefits even further. IDC reports an 81% increase in time available to focus on new projects as a direct result of hyperconverged deployment.

Our data centre solutions guarantee high availability, reliability and security for your infrastructure

Read More

Avoid awkward privacy and security vulnerability questions with a secure print set-up.

Network-connected printers can be a route into your company for cyber criminals. For example, if default passwords are still in use or your Wi-Fi network is unsecure, your printing is vulnerable. By failing to tackle these potential weak spots, your business is in danger of GDPR’s heavy-weight penalties.

Just 22% of all businesses surveyed were completely assured their print infrastructure was secure.1

Companies operating a standardised printer fleet are 26% less likely to suffer data loss.1

Make sure printer security doesn’t put your business in peril—download the report by entering your details below

1 Quocirca Managed Print Services Landscape, 2017. European survey results of 180 midmarket (500-999 employees) and large (1000+ employees) organisations in UK, France and Germany using a managed print service.

With GCSE results out today and expected to have been the toughest yet with the new grading system, it got us thinking. How essential is technology to the way our students learn? 

When I think back to my school days, which actually weren’t too long ago (no, really!), the overhead projector was the latest mod-con to hit the assembly hall and the chalkboard was still the smartest way to share real-time lesson content.

Well, technology has come a long way since those days, yet we still managed back then. Students were still learning, achieving and prospering from their education. So if we were able to nurture success before the technology boom, why is it so important in today’s classroom?

Here are 4 reasons why we believe technology now plays a critical role in learning:

1. Students demand it

Teens spend nearly 9 hours every day consuming media and have grown up immersed in technology, so keeping up with this demand is essential. The innovative adoption of technology can also play a key role in the recruitment of the next student body but IT departments should ensure that core infrastructures and applications have the flexibility to support these changes.

2. Learn at their own pace

Traditional learning could often be fast paced, risking a drop off of concentration and understanding. With the integration of technology in the classroom and learning concepts such as flipped learning, students can learn at their own speed, pause, and recap whenever they need, meaning that the more advanced student can go ahead, freeing up the teacher to provide support 1:1 to those who need it.

3. Enhance Engagement

Feedback from our customers over the years suggests that students learn best being more interactive. This is particularly apparent in STEAM subjects where content is often more complex. Technologies such as 3D print and robotics are leading the way in STEAM by breaking down the learning barriers and offering more practical methods of learning, whilst future-proofing students as they enter the workplace.

4. Enable Collaboration

Technology permits a connected world and in this case, a connected learning environment. With intelligent applications such as Office 365 and G Suite, students and teachers can communicate, collaborate, chat and use the familiar productivity applications in a secure environment.

As experts in education technology, we are close to the market and its trends. Here are a few technologies that are already making a real impact in the classroom:

Chromebooks

Chromebooks are taking over the classroom and the reasons are simple. They are cost effective and affordable, feature an all-day battery life and instant on functionality; and with Chromecast, students and teachers can instantly share their screen.

If you are interested in Chromebook, you should check out our latest offer! You can get a HP Chromebook for as little as £65.00!

3D print

For reasons we’ve previously discussed, 3D printing can play a valuable part in STEAM subjects, transforming the classroom into an interactive learning environment.

iPad

iPad is the ideal computing companion both inside and outside of the classroom. Its portable format, instant load up time and touch screen makes life easy for teachers and students alike. Perfect for internet research, making videos and music, taking lesson notes and sharing and managing content.  What’s more, iPad is now much more cost effective and has full integration with cloud platforms such as Google and Microsoft.

So it’s clear, we have come a long way since school days were guided by a text book and piece of chalk. The dawn of the internet revolutionised the way we gained information and technology evolved around us – so much so, that teens today are technology native and would probably rather swap their right kidney than sacrifice their mobile phone.

That said, technology has enabled personalised, engaging and even mobile learning. Its enhanced collaboration and takes traditional subjects such as science, engineering and technology to the next level. Without it, the classroom struggles to thrive which is why building a technology environment that supports these trends is essential.

Is your tech up to the task?

Not sure how to enable cloud managed mobility, whether your network can support the load or how flipped learning can really make a difference? Our specialists have the answers and can help determine whether your existing IT is up to the job.

Ben Brown
Head of Schools

Simplifying All-flash with HPE Nimble

The path to an all-flash data centre and cloud may be complicated, but it doesn’t have to be disruptive. Like many other organisations, you may be planning to move to all flash as your primary storage technology because of the many advantages over traditional storage.

But there are many obstacles related to application performance, availability, manageability, scalability, investment protection, and disaster recovery that need to be considered first. With a few simple recommendations, your organisation can avoid the most common missteps and make the transition painless.

Download this FREE check list and find out how to overcome the obstacles related to the all flash data centre.