Digimemo gets elearning credit approval

eLearning Credits are now available for the DigiMemo, the digitising note pad that is proving a boon to students and teachers alike.

eLearning Credits are now available for the DigiMemo, the digitising note pad that is proving a boon to students and teachers alike.

The DigiMemo looks like a futuristic clipboard, holding a paper pad onto which users write and sketch.

But below the pad is a sensitive electronic pressure pad that instantly creates an electronic file copy of whatever is written or drawn.

Sketches and diagrams can be saved to a computer, while text can be run through a handwriting recognition programme and converted into a word document.

Thus notes made during a lesson, on a fieldtrip, at home, or even while traveling can be instantly transferred to computer storage, emailed, edited, filed with related documents etc etc.

The DigiMemo is as portable and easy to use as a conventional clipboard, so is ideal for school and college based computing.

Both students and teachers find DigiMemo familiar and natural to use, and far more convenient than a laptop.

And it is not only in education - hospital staff, plant engineers, surveyors and field operatives, indeed anyone who does not sit in front of a PC all day - are adopting DigiMemo as the new way to interface with the virtual world.

Another advantage is that DigiMemo can be used by several people virtually simultaneously.

For instance it could be passed around students in a tutorial so that the whole class can contribute to a common file of notes.

Trupti Patel of suppliers Unimatic Engineers says: "Many schools are already using DigiMemo.

Most buy a couple to try out, but are soon ordering more because they want to use them in several different situations.

"One school for instance is pioneering their use in Special Educational Needs teaching.

The DigiMemo provides feedback on spelling and on handwriting.

The text recognition software helps evaluate performance on those two counts.

The better the handwriting and the better the spelling, the less correction is required to convert the handwriting into computer text.

The kids love it!".

Unimatic has written specific curricular material for use in the teaching of English, which supports handwriting, spelling and creative writing.

This curricular material is packaged with the DigiMemo, along with the two pieces of software which enable the DigiMemo to contribute so effectively to the curriculum in practically every subject.

For example, the DigiMemo can recognise words in a number of different languages (including French, German, Italian and Spanish), making it ideal for the teaching and learning of Modern Languages.

E-Learning Credits (eLCs) are money set aside by central government for individual schools to spend on educational software designed to support the teaching of the curriculum.

They cannot be spent on hardware such as computers or projectors, only on resources listed www.curriculumonline.gov.uk.

GBP330million has been put into the eLC scheme between 2002/3 and 2005/6.

This is allotted at a rate of GBP1000 per school, plus GBP9.47 per student.

It is permissible for several schools to 'club together' to buy shared big-ticket items and for schools to authorise their LEA or RBC (Regional Broadband Consortium) to spend eLC money on their behalf - for example, to obtain a greater diversity of products or to make bulk purchases.

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