An introductory guide to iPads for Teachers I’m delivering some iPad training to a school tomorrow, so thought it might be useful to collate some of the links I’ve been putting together for the session. The session is concentrating mainly on teachers using the iPads for their own professional use, rather than being used as a classroom resource, but a lot of the apps below will be suitable for use by students too. I’ll do another post sometime of great apps for different subject areas. Here’s some of the useful apps I’d recommend investigating. Some are free, others the price of a pint or so. Links are to the UK version of iTunes so other readers may need to do a search in the App Store to find the version for their region. File storage / Transfer Dropbox Dropbox is probably one of the most useful applications I’ve used in years. Other apps also work with Dropbox too. Word Processing / Office Capability Documents to Go Microsoft have yet to release an Office app for the iPad – so there’s a need to look at alternatives. Note taking
Apps in Education Tips for iPads in Classroom We are starting our second year of having iPads in our elementary classrooms, our Title I CCJH classrooms, and some of our AJHS classrooms. We've created a list of tips for managing the equipment in our classrooms. Tip 1: Team decisions regarding equity Will you break the cart up across your grade level? If so, who will host the cart in their room?Or, will you rotate the cart from class to class? Each of our carts has its own MacBook Air computers dedicated to your iPads. This list of tips is a good starting point, but I'm sure there are many items I've missed. What tips would you add to this list?
Harvard and MIT Put $60-Million Into New Platform for Free Online Courses - Wired Campus The group of elite universities offering free online courses just got bigger. Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology today announced a partnership that will host online courses from both institutions free of charge. The platform, its creators say, has the potential to improve face-to-face classes on the home campuses while giving students around the world access to a blue-ribbon education. The new venture, called edX, grew out of MIT’s announcement last year that it would offer free online courses on a platform called MITx. Students who complete the courses on the edX platform will not receive university credit, although they could earn certificates. At a news conference, the leaders of edX described it as a tool that colleges can use to experiment with online courses and study how students learn. edX plans to host its first courses this fall, across an array of disciplines. L. “Is there a sustainability model in place for these initiatives?” Return to Top
Preparation for Implementation When making the move towards using mobile devices in the classroom, there are a number of practical considerations to bear in mind. This article will draw on the experience we have had this year, in implementing an iPad 1 to 1 scheme with our 6th form. We’ve made many mistakes, and I hope have learnt from them. In the spirit of collaboration, I will share some of them below, in the hope that other schools learn from both what has worked, and what hasn’t. 1. This is a no brainer, but I have heard of many schools who didn’t really take this into consideration when they brought in mobile devices like the iPad. So, your biggest investment in the year before you go mobile has to be wireless. 2. You need to know one thing: your VLE won’t work very well with your iPads. 3. This entails trying to get your network manager’s head around the idea that not having everything on the school network is not going to end his or her job/world. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. Make contact. 10. Like this: Like Loading...
Exploring the impact of Apple's iPad on schools & schooling. dotEPUB — download any webpage as an e-book Plagiarism Detectives at Work (plus 5 Top Plagiarism Detection Applications) Guest Post collaboratively written with Jennifer Scottson. Since the beginning of time, man has tried to find ways to beat the system and get away with less work. Today’s computer technologies have made it easy for individuals to try to use different methods to get away with turning in work that is not theirs. Technology has also helped to expose this in ways that are more effective and easier to use than ever before. Plagiarism detectors help to detect and prevent plagiarism and keep people honest in their approaches to claiming works. How do plagiarism detectors work? Who uses plagiarism detectors? Five top plagiarism detectors There are many plagiarism tools on the Internet. 1. 2. iThenticate. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Are you using any of these applications at your school? Jennifer Scottson is a professional writer who enjoys writing on many different subjects. About Kelly Walsh Print This Post
iPad Tips: Getting Started with the iPad Have you just got a shiny new iPad as a holiday gift, or maybe just bought one for yourself? Here’s an easy Getting Started Guide that will help you get the most out of your new favorite tablet: The iPad has been a huge hit ever since it first hit the market back in 2010. It’s an amazing and powerful device, and a joy to use – whether for work or play. This guide is divided up into short sections covering key topics, so you can dive in and out of them as needed for subjects you are interested in. iPad External Buttons – Turn It On and Off and Lots More You’ve probably noticed that the iPad has very few buttons. How to Power Off the iPad: To power off the iPad, hold down the Power button for a few seconds, until you see the ‘Slide to Power Off’ bar across the top of the screen. Uses for the Home Button: The home button is your key to navigating your way around the iPad. A double-press on the home button brings up the Multitasking Bar. Software Controls & Basics The iPad Dock: Some iPad Tips
The iPad and Maths – Are we there yet? Pt 1 My last two posts on iPads and good teaching have focused on teaching and learning writing. Now I’m moving on to my favorite subject as a teacher – Mathematics. I love Maths – both learning and teaching it. For those who don’t know me ( which is obviously most of you reading ), I am a Primary ( Elementary ) School teacher but I have spent most of my 25 year teaching career also tutoring High School Maths on the side, supporting many children who have missed out on understanding important Mathematics concepts. Maths involves an incredibly diverse range of processes, ideas, skills and concepts. Both children and teachers alike enter into Maths teaching and learning at different levels, depending on their personal experiences, successes and challenges with the subject. The state of Maths apps on iPads at the moment There’s a lot of potential in the apps available on iOS devices for Mathematics but overall I think they fall a little short of what I would like. Maths Bingo Mathemagics Aydox
iPads can’t improve learning without good teaching Pt 1 Clearly there is a lot of buzz around iPads in schools at the moment. You can’t log on to the Web without reading about another school or entire district or department investing massive coin in a sparkling set of the Wonder Tablets, excited that they will cure all the ills of the current education systems around the world. From reading my blog, you would be no doubt convinced that I am very much in this Pro-iPad camp. Make no mistake I am. However, no matter how versatile and potentially powerful a product the iPad is, it is merely an extremely expensive placemat without creative, well planned teaching behind its use. Its about Teaching and Learning, not iPads The kind of shift in learning the iPad (and other tablets) can initiate is dependent on good teaching practice and preparation. So let’s look at how we have gone about teaching up until now and examine how the iPad can fit in to our current programs. NEXT POST – Writing
How To Decide Which EdTech Resource Is Right For You I’ve spent many years analyzing, understanding, and deploying education technology. As Edudemic grows up into a more professional site (slowly but surely), I’ve noticed that I get pitched a lot of products in hopes that I write a review / share it with you. Terry, Edudemic’s editor, and I routinely go through pitches and submissions to see if they have some worth. We’ve been using a rubric that I thought teachers around the world might benefit from. Basically, here’s the workflow we use: 1) Someone trying to sell / announce an education technology product contacts us. 2) We do some brief research on the product and try it ourselves (if possible) 3) We run it through our ‘review rubric’ to see if it should be added as a product we recommend on Edudemic. Simple as that! Click here to download the PDF version of our rubric!
First iPad Encounters The iPads are finally set up and ready to go into the classrooms! It happened to be our first graders who were the first ones to get their hands on them! A few days ago, I tested and reviewed a great new app: Book Creator. Students wrote a story, as a class, about the different stages of the butterfly. The first time, I brought the iPads into the class, we spent time talking about the care and handle of the devices. When picking the iPad up from the teacher we reminding them to carry the iPad with two hands to their deskset them down as quietly as possibledon’t hold the iPad from the SmartCoverdon’t walk around the classroom with an iPad in your handno pulling, showing or tugging on someone else’s iPad It was important to also introduce “iPad” vocabulary to our first graders, so we would all be able to use a common language when instructing or asking questions. Home buttonscreenswipingslidingtapappsiconspinch in/ pinch outfront cameraback camera Since this encounter involved: Like this: