Education Today Education Today Magazine
As Northern Ireland’s business development agency, Invest Northern Ireland’s (Invest NI’s) role is to grow the local economy. The organisation does this by helping new and existing businesses to compete internationally, and by attracting new investment to the region.
With that in mind, it will travel to London Excel from 25 – 28 January 2017, to establish a Northern Ireland pavilion for the first time at one of the world’s leading education events, Bett. At the show, it will showcase six of the region’s exciting and upcoming edtech companies, and promote trade with Northern Ireland.
The six companies exhibiting in the Northern Ireland Pavilion are: Go-Berserk, Makematic, Qubizm, Synergy Learning, TakeTen Ltd and Wholeschool Software Ltd. All six will be showcasing a wealth of edtech expertise and knowledge at the event and each has its own area of specialism across the primary and secondary education sectors:
Go-Berserk is a multi-award winning company that has developed resources to help teach real code to everyone from eight years old and up. It currently has three hard copy books dealing with HTML, CSS and Javascript. It has produced an ibook version of the HTML book and has multiple videos produced by the BBC based on its HTML book. In the past few years, it has attracted sponsorship from numerous leading IT companies. Go-Berserk resources are in every school in Northern Ireland and the company is now keen to share its vision and resources with the rest of the world. (http://www.go-berserk.com/)
Makematic creates bitesize videos for students and teachers. Working on behalf of clients like the BBC and Barbican, MakeMatic develops original, engaging and practical short-form video content for use in the classroom – all focused on creative and digital skills. It is also launching a new CPD platform to help educators make better use of digital tools to improve educational outcomes for their students. (http://makematic.com/)
Qubizm is an education company with more than 30 years experience in the teaching and learning of mathematics. Its first product, Izak9, is a unique, radical, immersive, multi-media rich, active learning device designed for use by children at upper primary and lower secondary level and for the delivery of teachers’ personal and professional development training. Having been in use for just under three years, Izak9 has already been validated by universities, education authorities and the schools inspectorate and is in use in 40 per cent of schools in Northern Ireland. (http://qubizm.co.uk/)
Synergy Learning is a leading provider of open-source learning management system solutions for educational, commercial and public organisations. With over 20 successful years, partnering with over 800 organisations, within 40 different countries, it understands how to excite, engage and empower learners. (http://www.synergy-learning.com/)
TakeTen Ltd is an iPad based biofeedback programme for the management of emotions and behaviour. The TakeTen app is designed to help develop the skill of self-regulation; helping students to manage their emotions and improve concentration. The app uses heart rate biofeedback technology and gamifies the process of self-regulation. (http://www.letstaketen.co.uk/)
Wholeschool Software Ltd is a ground-breaking global education platform supporting:
- Wholeschool Software – school improvement through school development planning and school self-evaluation software.
- Wholeschool Learning – integrating with world class open source platforms including Moodle and Joomla.
- Wholeschool Academy – world class ICT on-line training by global leading industry authors. (https://whole.school/)
Alison Gowdy, director of trade at Invest NI, explains why exhibiting at Bett was a priority for the organisation: “Globally, we’ve certainly seen a boom in the edtech sector recently and this has had a ripple effect on Northern Ireland. Our growing edtech cluster is well positioned to take advantage of the projected growth in the global market. Bett is a leading edtech exhibition with global reach, so it’s the perfect platform for these companies to share their vision with the rest of the world.
“We’re looking forward to speaking to visitors, exhibitors and education game-changers at the show, and exploring the ways in which we can work together going forward.”
Visit the Northern Ireland pavilion at Bett, Stand C105 or visit InvestNI.com/Bett for more information.