Today we are Spotlighting MIE Expert Annette Iafrate, Geography Teacher from Gryffe High School in Scotland. Annette uses technology in the classroom as a tool to enhance the learning of her students, engage them and allow them to take responsibility for their own learning.

Annette is one of Microsoft's Skype Master Teachers and uses Skype in the Classroom effectively to break down cultural and physical barriers in her classroom. This has allowed her to deliver some of the key skills within the Geography curriculum in an engaging, exciting and real life way; rather than just through a textbook.

As well as using Skype in her classroom, Annette makes full use of the Office 365 tools available through GLOW, Scotland's digital Learning portal, to enhance teaching and learning. She has used Yammer to set up a class group for her S3 class to allow them to collaborate and communicate effectively together, within and outwith school hours. She also uses OneNote Class Notebook for her course content and lesson resources, which allows her students to access these from anywhere and on any device; including absent students. Annette makes excellent use of technology to give timely and effective feedback to her students by using the screen recording feature in PowerPoint, annotating and speaking over their work; supporting them in their next steps in learning.

Annette was chosen as one of the top teachers in Scotland to attend Microsoft's Global Teacher Exchange (E2) in Budapest in 2016, where she was able to share this incredible practice with teachers around the globe.

You can follow Annette on Twitter @yifrati to keep up to date with the fantastic work she is doing .

Watch the video below to hear more about Annette's development and classroom practices in own words!

Great to connect with teachers from Japan, India & Brunei today. All using @SkypeClassroom to enhance Ss' learning #SkypeMT #MIEExpert pic.twitter.com/NDJtRRrNsA

— Annette-I (@yifrati) October 1, 2016

Follow in the footsteps of our fantastic MIEE's and learn more about how Microsoft can transform your classroom with the Microsoft Educator Community.