Digital signage in education is big business. Schools are keen to bring their signage up to date and paper notices have long had their day. If you’re looking for digital signage software for your elementary or K-12 school then this blog is your get-started guide. Taking you through everything from choosing hardware, to adding software and using playlists and scheduling.

But if you’re looking for specific help on coming up with a digital signage plan for your elementary school, then stay right where you are.

In this guide we’ll walk you through:

• Making a plan for your digital signage strategy
• Choosing content that’s right for your elementary school
• Examples of great digital signage in use by elementary schools

Let’s get to work.

Making a plan for your school’s digital signage

Once you have your digital screens setup on your walls and a simple software solution like ScreenCloud to help you put content on them, the hard bit’s over right? Truth be told, this is the point where many IT integrators and school visionaries in elementary and K-12 schools become stuck.

Putting content on your screens is a big statement. Even if you know that you want to showcase student work examples or the latest timetables, exactly how you do that can seem tricky.

To help you devise a plan for how and why you want to use digital screens, take a look at these questions:

1. Who is your audience?

Deciding whether your screens are aimed at pupils, staff members or parents will make a difference to the content played.

2. What purpose do you want your screens to have?

Are you aiding learning by sharing maths quizzes, or do you want pupils to remember to bring their homework in? Screens can be used to entertain, advise, engage and even be used as an additional pair of hands. Choosing the purpose of your screens will help you determine which content to show.

3. What time will your audience spend in front of your screen?

It’s all very well filling a playlist with great content but if your audience are only going to see your screens on a Monday, or for less than 30 seconds at a time, this will make a huge difference to what content you schedule and play.

Choosing content that’s right for your elementary school

Once you know your who, what and when, you can begin looking at content.

With ScreenCloud you have two core choices: content you already own and content you can set up using the App Store.

Content you already own might be website URLs, images, presentations or videos. ScreenCloud allows you to upload files from wherever they’re saved - your computer, Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive and so on, so it’s easy to manage your brand content.

ScreenCloud also supports the majority of file types including jpeg, gif, png, and svg, PDFs and Office/iWorks formats to make uploading your content easier. Simply select “Content Library”, then “Upload” and select your content.

If you don’t have content already created, or you want to experiment with new content for your school’s digital screens, here are some scenarios and ideas that may help.

1. Increase pupil knowledge

To use the digital screens as an additional learning tool you may wish to use:

• World clocks to share times from around the world
• Notice boards to create puzzles and problem solving questions
• Google slides to share learning materials or examples of pupil work

2. Improve communication with parents

If you’re using digital screens as outward facing communication for parents you could try:

• Event calendar app to show upcoming school events
• Notice boards for parent reminders
• Vimeo to share videos from school events

3. Share news with staff members

Screens can also be used in staff rooms for internal communication. Apps that might help include:

• News apps for keeping staff members up to date with world events
• A digital dashboard for sharing student and school KPIs and benchmarks
• Google Calendar for staff events and schedules
• Slack for communication and notices

Examples of great elementary school digital signage

Merchant Taylors’ Schools, that are based in Liverpool and include a elementary school, use digital signage screens and content in two interesting ways:

To allow department heads to manage content and communication with students:

“In the English department we have a screen which shows what’s happening within the department, mixed with general news from around the world which sparks debate and topic discussions in class. Our students stop to read the screens and the congestion in the corridors shows that they're taking note of what’s on there! The Head of Literacy then uses the screen to promote reading clubs, book clubs, literacy sessions and all sorts of things.”

To spark discussion in class:

“The screen at the Boys’ Sixth Form uses ScreenCloud apps to show current exchange rates, weather and news from the Financial Times, CNN and BBC. When the students are doing A Levels, real time events happening around the world are discussed in lessons and used to illustrate principles.”

At North Valley Baptist Schools, a K-12 school in San Francisco, they use digital signage in two core ways:

To communicate more effectively and personally with students and share information:

“We use ScreenCloud to inform both staff and students on campus of daily, weekly and upcoming events, to display announcements and reminders, to recognize student achievement, to display student photography and other digital projects, and to celebrate student & staff birthdays and milestones.”

To allow students to take control of screens and use design skills to manage content:

“It’s been a terrific way for my media students to learn graphic design skills and then be able to show off their handiwork in real-time. Their assignments are for the “real world,” and I’ve enjoyed seeing each student take careful, diligent ownership of our screens on campus.”

Get started with digital signage for your elementary school

With a plan, the ideas and content at your fingertips, creating great digital signage for your elementary school is simple. Get started today with a 14-day free trial of ScreenCloud and remember - we offer a 5% discount for non-profit organizations across all accounts and all screens. Just email us at hello@screen.cloud when you start your trial and we’ll add it in.