Developing children's independence

Garretts Green Children's Centre have been using Bim! Bam! Boogaloo! for a year now.

Garretts Green, in Birmingham, purchased Bim! Bam! Boogaloo! in October 2010. They were looking for some software to develop children’s independence in the area of ICT.

Over the year of our study into the work done at Garretts Green, we found that children became much more independent and made more choices for themselves in their ICT work. Children began incorporating the software into their daily routine. Staff found children being more creative than they had been with other ICT resources and it was often a focus for speaking opportunities for children reluctant to communicate.
 
Bim! Bam! Boogaloo! also aided observations and assessment of children throughout the setting, sometimes in unexpected ways. For example staff found the software was a great way of engaging family members in children’s education.

Throughout the setting the experience of the staff was an overwhelmingly positive one and the software is used every day as part of the daily routine. When using Bim! Bam! Boogaloo! staff no longer have to tackle the disrupting technical issues they experienced when using other software.

The children of this new year’s intake have taken to Bim! Bam! Boogaloo! quickly and samples of their experiences with the software are already being added to their individual ‘learning journey’ documents. Staff are now planning to collect together image banks for the coming year to import images to the software for their themes and topics throughout the year.