Communication is so important while we are being forced to embrace a blended learning environment. It is extra important to be vigilant with the progress - or lack thereof - that a child is making while they are working remotely. Purple Mash has several tools that allow you to keep tabs on every child's progress from afar and ensure that the learner knows you are thinking of them and they are still a valued part of their school community.

2Email is an obvious one as it allows you to touch base with the learner and ensure they know you are thinking of them and tracking their development. This program allows you to send through instructions, ask them how they are doing and generally ensure they know how to get hold of you when they need to. It allows you the one-on-one contact that is often missing from a distance learning situation and offers the opportunity for the child to share what they are going through and to contact you directly should they have any queries about their work.

Another tool you could use is 2Blog in Purple Mash. This program allows a simple and versatile way of setting up Blogs for the classes, groups and individuals within your school.

Blogs are viewable from the Purple Mash Home screen Sharing section.

• You can create a blog for a particular class topic, a particular piece of work or any other project of your choice.
• Teachers can view and approve blog posts and comments before they can be seen 'live'.
• Blogs can be viewable by selected groups, selected classes, by the whole school or they may be public (if you choose).

• If a blog is public then members of the public can also be set to comment on blog posts.
• Pupils can be set up so that they can add blog posts, comment on others' posts or have view only access to blogs.  Access to each blog is easily customisable.
• Children can attach their work to blog posts and it will be "live", so if a child has (for example) created a game in 2Code, that game will be playable from the blog.
• Pupils can create their own Blogs using the My Blogs tool.  Any pupil made Blogs are private and viewable only by the teacher and pupil unless the teacher makes them visible to others.

In these anxious time it is so important to keep the lines of communication open. Children are anxious about whether they are keeping up with the rest of the class. They want to know they have not been forgotten and want to remain part of the community that their school represents. Added to that, these tools are great fro keeping tabs on how the learner is doing, both from an Educationally developmental aspect as well as emotionally. So go forth and communicate!