We’re thrilled to have been able to attend the 2023 MAT Digital Acceleration Programme, hosted by Microsoft at the stunning Microsoft Experience Centre in Oxford Circus. Aimed at multi academy trusts (MATs) in the UK, the event centred around the challenges and successes of digital transformation in education. “A highlight of the event … Read more
Teams
The Microsoft Translator app in Class Notebook allows students to capture a transcript of what the teacher is saying during a lesson, which can help support students who have a hearing impairment, struggle with auditory processing or simply find taking notes and listening at the same time a challenge. How to activate live captions with … Read more
The Microsoft Translator app is a free app that can be downloaded from the Google Play Store or the Apple Store on any mobile device. With many different features and tools, the app is excellent for working with EAL students and opening up conversations who face language barriers in the classroom. This guide shows how … Read more
Suggested replies in Microsoft Teams can help you save time and quickly respond to messages without typing. Responding to messages and emails takes up a lot of time. And, often, these replies may only need to be a quick confirmation or standard reply. How many times have you typed something like “That’s great, thanks”, or … Read more
Cloud Design Box is sponsoring ArborFest 2023, which brings together over 400 schools and MATs in what is predicted to be Arbor’s biggest in-person conference. Exploring the theme of “Transforming the way schools work”, the one-day event is full of inspiring talks from experts within the education sector and representatives from schools who use … Read more
Microsoft Forms are a great way to engage students in their learning and get them to reflect on a recent lesson or revise a topic for an upcoming exam or assessment. In this guide, we show you how to attach a Form to a Microsoft Teams Assignment. With Forms, you can make interactive quizzes for … Read more
The new Import functionality in Microsoft Forms allows you to import your existing Word and PDF documents and turn them into interactive forms. Note: This function is not currently available on Office.com. Instead, you need to be on forms.office.com. (correct at the time of publishing September 2022). Converting Word and PDF documents to Microsoft Forms is … Read more
Cloud Design Box is hosting two free webinars for schools and multi academy trusts as part of a Microsoft 365 summer training series. The virtual sessions take place in August and are completely free for teachers and senior leadership teams to attend. CDB Trainer Keith (right) and the rest of the CDB Team at … Read more
The collaboration space in Class Notebook allows students and teachers to work together on a learning resource in real-time. This is a great opportunity for students to get more involved in working as a group as they can add text, digital ink (drawing) and insert images and videos. Although letting your class loose on a … Read more
The ability to hand in work on behalf of students in Microsoft Teams Assignments has been long-awaited by teachers, alongside being able to view assignment history of individual students. In this guide, we show you how to view assignment history and submit student work as a teacher in Teams Assignments. How to view assignment history … Read more
The late turn in notification in Microsoft Teams Assignments allows you to be alerted if a student hands in their homework late. The notification appears in the bottom corner of your screen, as well as the activity bell in the top-left of your Microsoft Teams. This can be activated per assignment, or for all assignments … Read more
The new Parent Connection app in Microsoft Teams allows teachers to directly communicate with students’ parents/guardians via the chat function. Here’s how to get started with messaging parents/guardians via Teams. Firstly, the Parent Connection app must be enabled by an IT admin. Here’s how to set up the Parent Connection app in Microsoft Teams. When … Read more
Microsoft Teams has launched a new parent connection tool, allowing teachers and parents to directly communicate via the chat function. In this guide, we show you how to enable the connection app using data provisioned by School Data Sync. There are a few requirements that are essential for setting up the Parent Connection app in … Read more
In this podcast episode, we spoke to Microsoft specialist and TweetMeet lead Marjolein Hoekstra about her journey with Microsoft, TweetMeets, MVPs, MSEduCentral and much more. She reveals three must-have resources designed especially for educators and school leaders. Marjolein first became connected with Microsoft after diving deep into OneNote and designing an example of what features … Read more
In this podcast episode, we caught up with Mark Fuller, IT Director for Bridge Academy Trust (BAT) – a multi academy trust based in Essex – about how they have extended Microsoft 365 with Cloud Box to improve communication and collaboration between their 12 schools. Bridge Academy Trust is a large MAT made up of … Read more
In this quick video, Tony shows you how to add assignments in Microsoft Teams to student and teacher calendars. When you next go to set a task in Assignments in Teams, look for the option to Add assignment to calendars. Here you have four options: None – The default setting and will not add … Read more
Teachers can easily and quickly reassign homework tasks to individual students in Microsoft Teams Assignments when students have missed out on learning. Over the last few years, many students have inevitably lost hours of learning due to higher absences, adjusting to learning from home and dealing with abrupt changes in restrictions. On top of this, … Read more
Cloud Design Box has been working with St Kevin’s Community College in Dublin to support them in becoming one of the first DEIS (Delivery Equality of Opportunity in Schools) schools in Ireland. The DEIS Connect Project aims to bridge the digital divide in schools and provide digital devices for all learners. It was launched by … Read more
Cloud Design Box is partnering with Arbor to deliver two free virtual training sessions designed especially for schools, academies and multi-academy trusts (MATs). Arbor works with over 2,500 primary, secondary and special schools and is the UK’s fasted-growing MIS community. Arbor MIS – which is featured in both of the upcoming webinars – gives schools … Read more
We have recently updated our video guide on how to start online lessons in Microsoft Teams. As January approaches, many schools will be forced into full or partly online lessons due to sickness and self-isolation. Microsoft Teams as evolved to become easier to use for teachers over the past year and the video below reflects … Read more