Happy Easter folks!
This week’s update is different to usual because there’s a lot going on at Teacher Tapp Towers and we need to explain what’s happening
FIRST THING: WE HAVE A NEW VERSION OF THE APP – Here’s what you need to know…
1. When the update is out– DOWNLOAD ASAP
At some point this week a new vteachertapp.co.ukersion of Teacher Tapp will appear on the iPhone and Android App store.
If you already have Teacher Tapp, your phone will update automatically as long as you have updates switched on. If not, you will need to go into the app store and update manually.
We will switch off the old version of Teacher Tapp shortly, so if you don’t update you’ll find your questions soon just become ‘have you updated yet?’ repeated over and over again.
2. The new app has TWO cool features
The ‘More Questions’ Button: Each day, when you finish your 3 questions, you’ll see a button for ‘MORE QUESTIONS’. Choose to click, and it will ask 3 other questions you’ve missed in the past. You can keep clicking for 3 more questions for as long as you like. It’s totally optional. Not a requirement. But it helps us backfill answers, and if you’re bored and curious, it’s a good way to while away time!
Personal detail changes: In the top left corner of the new app, there is a menu button (it looks like three bars). Click on it and you can change your email address that you use to login, and you can change your school details when/if you move schools to make our analysis more accurate. There’s also an ‘app code’ line – you can ignore this for now. It’s for a future innovation, which we’ll tell you about when the future happens!
3. Watch out! You may need to log-in again.
Once the app has updated, you should see the questions as usual. But, in some cases, you may need to log-in again. To do this, use the email you originally signed up with; we’ll send an email to the address you used for sign up to remind you. Once you’re logged in, you’ll stay logged in
Second thing: WE CAN START ASKING PRIMARY/SECONDARY-SPECIFIC QUESTIONS!??
The new app allows us to target questions more specifically.
At the moment, asking a question about ‘your subject’, or about SPAG preparation, is difficult because we cover both primary and secondary.
In future, we can ask different groups more relevant questions, and point towards more relevant blogs/tips.
For example, we could occasionally share science-specific questions and blogs with a science teacher, rather than always having to share generic ones.
That said, we don’t want to lose the communal feel of Teacher Tapp. So most questions will be asked of everyone, and we’ll still be doing lots of analysis and sharing data on social media so you can learn what everyone else is saying. The new app just means we can ask more of the questions you’ve asked us to investigate, and make the information even more relevant to you.
Third thing: AN UNEXPECTED EXPERIMENT WITH ‘NO QUESTION’ DAYS
On Friday we didn’t ask any questions. Instead, users saw a message telling them to ‘enjoy their holiday’. Some Tappsters were very happy and applauded this; others were unhappy, because they love their daily Teacher Tapp routine!
In truth: we think the Easter Bunny got into the system, as we weren’t expecting to ask zero questions. It was a glitch.
But, it was a glitch that taught us something helpful.
The next day, instead of our usual 2,300 users only around 850 responded. Why? Because not asking questions breaks the notifications cycle. We have the app set so that it only goes off once per day – at 3.30pm. Doing this is tricky, (notifications are tricky to code), and the way we’ve done it relies on us asking questions each day. Not asking questions broke the notification cycle. Until people log back in, they won’t start getting notifications again.
Hence – if you’re reading this, go log in to your app and answer the questions for today. That will solve the notification problem.
Also, we learned that habits are important. The more we mess with the app, the more we risk the usefulness of the data because we end up with gaps. This is a shame, as we want to know what teachers are doing during holidays. For example, how often are teachers in revision classes? How often do they answer emails in holidays? We can ask after the hols, but the information is never as reliable as if we do it each day.
We’re therefore going to stick with our original plan of asking questions every day, including holidays.
Some people won’t like this. We know. And it was super lovely to get applause for not asking on Friday. But, if you were one, then we still have your back. If you really want to switch Teacher Tapp off over the holidays, you can change the notification settings on your phone for our app during the break. And we really hope you switch us back on in term time! ?
Finally – because it wouldn’t be a Teacher Tapp update without them – here are the links for last week’s tips:
What IBallisticSquid can teach us about writing
The Peter Principle – Promotion to level of incompetence
How to create a department-wide detention system
Ofsted robocop April Fool – can you get your staff to fall for it!
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Right folks – over and out for another week…
In the meantime, please keep sharing what we are doing. Remember, we need more of you before we can do the really exciting and detailed analysis!
Here’s the powerpoint slide (with script), a PDF, and a black-and-white one-pager to help out with that.
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