Thursday, 14 December 2017

Bingel

                                                                              Bingel


At the school where I work, we have started to work more consciously with ICT. We have started using a web-based learning platform called Bingel. This platform is created by the publisher Samona. Bingel is a virtual complement to the publisher's own teaching material, which makes it more fun for the pupils to study and learn different subjects.  Bingel is a digital tool where the students train skills in a new, fun and motivating way.

To access Bingel, the school needs to buy an annual subscription. However, you can try Bingel for 30 days free of charge. Even though Bingel is based on the publisher´s teaching material, you do not have to work with or have access to the physical book. However, the idea is that Bingel is a complement the book and help students to repeat and understand a certain field of work through a more varied approach. The system needs an administrator who controls who has the access to what within the system, both students and teachers.

The teacher can control the tasks the students work with. This means that the teacher can choose to limit the students to work with tasks in certain areas of work or let the students work freely. However, the risk of allowing students to work alone in their own pace may be that some students may finish all tasks relatively quickly and get way forward while others may not be able to do more than a few tasks, depending on the students' ability and interest. Furthermore, using Bingel as a tool in teaching facilitates the teacher's work because the teacher does not need to develop new material for each subject area because it already exists in the platform. The task packages also work well as self-correcting homework. Also, Bingel helps the teacher to adapt exercises according to each student’s level or to the whole class. Meanwhile the teacher has an overview of who has completed the task and how they did but also when they did it. I think it is good for teachers to know where mostly of the exercises are done because this helps the teacher to adapt the teaching. Bingel enables teachers to better adapt information to students' level of knowledge, which challenges students at their level and based on their individual ability. This is possible because data can be linked to students based on different grades and different teaching materials placed on the platform. As a teacher, you have full insight into how students work at the student and class level. You can communicate by giving formative feedback but also giving praise and encouragement.

Viewed from a student´s perspective, Bingel is an adventure game mixed with concrete subject knowledge to help solve various problems that arise. Students are rewarded through various tools like medals, stickers or most importantly, points. These points can be used by the students to buy their avatars new clothes as an example. Furthermore, students can choose which tasks they want to implement and work with them at their own pace. This helps the material to be used individually, based on the student´s interests and abilities.

How can students start to bingel? Everything that is needed to bingle is an internet connection and a login. No program needs to be installed because everything is web-based. Each student receives his own login and can bingle both at school and at home.


You must have in mind when working with Bingel, like with every other ICT tool that you should always have a backup plan if planning to work during class. This is because even if you as a teacher add exercises to the island, it is not guaranteed that the students have access to the task. This can lead to misunderstanding and upset studenst, so make sure to have a backup plan during class. But even though this problem may occur, my students really enjoy working with Bingel. You try it too with your students and you will see a great joy and progress in learning. 

//Katarina Kasmarvik

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