20th March 2020, was the last day of school for many, as children, teachers and parents began a new way of learning at home. Schools have never been closed and many have remained open during holidays in order to support their local communities.

Schools that were Purple Mash subscribers began using it to support home learning and began to realise its potential as a fully cross curricular resource. Teachers have been contacting us to tell us about the engagement they have had from children and parents, the ease of use, safety features and the wide range of activities that they’re setting for their children.

Purple Mash saved us from day one of lockdown. We’ve had Purple Mash for years for our computing curriculum and have always been an advocate for it, but until now we never used it to its full potential! We have recently surveyed our parents and it came tops of the many resources we offer to our home learners. Not only has it kept up the learning, but the blogs have been our children’s ‘safe’ Facebook to keep up with friends. The support that we have had from Purple Mash is amazing too!

E Woodley, Whinstone Primary School

I signed our school up to Purple Mash a year ago and we have been using it for our Computing Curriculum and the occasional homework task.  Staff were slowly getting to grips with the potential of Purple Mash.  However, the lockdown forced all staff to learn how to work with Purple Mash.  I was inundated with questions, queries and problems to solve.  I messaged a couple of times on the Facebook page when I didn’t know the answer and had excellent and prompt support from other users and 2Simple.  As a school, we have used Purple Mash as our main platform for communication throughout lockdown.  It has helped us with record keeping and keeping in touch will all our children. Staff have enjoyed using Purple Mash and parents have given excellent feedback about it and how safe it is for their children to use.  The children have loved being able to independently communicate with their teacher.  In summary, Purple Mash has been the backbone of our COVID-19 management.  Thank you so much for providing such a responsive service for our school.  The staff, parents and children appreciate all that you have done.  

Holy Trinity Primary School, Dorset

I have been using Purple Mash with my reception class since the school closures. I personally think it is fantastic! My parents and children at Fir Bank Primary love it! For keeping in touch with my children Purple Mash is perfect! 2do's, email, voice comments, mashcams etc.. I love creating blogs for the children to share their learning and the memories they are making with their family. It really is just like a safe Facebook newsfeed for my children. It is perfect to continue learning as a whole class. I am very lucky to have 2 amazing teaching assistants who are doing as much with the children on Purple Mash as I am. It has allowed us to remain as a teaching team, just as we are in school! It really is perfect! Simple to set up and use, perfect!  BIG, BIG thank you to the Purple Mash team from one of your biggest fans! 

Fir Bank Primary

We are fairly new users of Purple Mash and were using it to teach the Computing curriculum. Then . . . Well you know what happened. I (as computing lead) was stuck at home due to my medical condition and took the role of home learning teacher for the whole school. Our school was a hub for the local hospital, so all our teachers were in school weekends and holidays. I learnt more about Purple Mash in a week than I could have imagined. As a school we kept directly in touch with our 170 pupils daily through email, blogs and setting work. I uploaded videos of our therapy dog who they miss terribly and set competitions for the whole school. Each week a different challenge is set for the school, that the children can then post to our display board. I cannot express how Purple Mash kept the staff sane, the whole school together, safe and in touch. What’s more, we're still doing it! 33% of our children are back but the others are accessing Purple Mash daily for work and to keep in touch. Parents have welcomed the safety and security of the site and the quality of work being accessed. Purple Mash you are our heroes. 

Mill Hill School, North Yorkshire

Since Purple Mash, our computing curriculum has had a real lift off. Children engaged with the child-centered, safe platform to do so many wonderful activities like creating games, coding, presenting and communicating their thoughts in different layouts etc. As the school's computing lead, it was a dream come true! In addition, I continued championing the use of 2Blog as a way for children to communicate with each other and interact in a very safe way. But since the COVID school closures, we effectively began using 2Blog and developing other ICT skills that did not link to coding or programming. Our school decided that home learning would be via the school website but it wasn't a platform where the children could add their work and make it visible for the teacher for feedback. This is where 2Blog came in and it was a game changer. Children realised that they could communicate with the teacher and other pupils in the most safest manner, and regularly whilst also setting up 2Dos to supplement the home learning, and it included the EYFS team too. After the webinar Danica ran online, my Reception teacher set up 2Dos for her class and that changed the motivation and inspiration among the reception children.

The support from Katie, Danica and the 2Simple team was fantastic too. Any question put up on the FB page not only got me an answer but also a resolution. 2Simple have been brilliant, as always. Thank you Purple Mash. You were a life saver.

Sunnyfields Primary School, Barnet