Digital Learning Reimbursement 9- Discovering Apps

The app I have chosen to explore is Apps Gone Free.  This app consists of daily freebie apps.  I have not figured out if there is a way to restrict the apps shown to categories or age groups. 

Professionally this app is great because it will help me find school appropriate apps that I could use in my classroom.  I can share these apps with my team and the media specialist and potentially get the apps on the school iPads or iPods.  Thus, allowing many people to access the great apps.   I found a free app called PDF Scanner which allows you to use the ipad to scan any document into a PDF file.  I thought this would be cool to take scan in student work and they could add it to their Google Account and they would always have access to it.  With a little bit of work, students could potentially create an electronic portfolio of their work for the school year.  

Personally, Apps Gone Free is going to help me find fre learning apps that my own children can use.  While I was exploring I found five apps that I downloaded for my four year old.   All the apps dealt with shapes, numbers, and writing skills.  One was a memory game with shapes and colors.  I like to find new things to keep my daughter interested in learning, just like I do I with my students.

My students, would appreciate new apps that they can use.  I found a few free apps that worked with addition and multiplication facts.  Multiplication and division facts are something my tier two and three fifth graders really need to practice. I found an app that is for tallying.  I think this would be so cool during our probability and graphing units. We would save paper because they students could create multiple online or electronic tally marks rather than using several pieces of paper.  It would be cleaner than using mini white boards too.  I found a few spelling apps which would be fun during word work stations in language arts. 

 I think the best part about Apps Gone Free is that all of the apps are free for a short window if time.  Each day there are new apps and you can try an app without the fear of wasting money.  I think I will use this a lot.  

Digital Learning Reimbursement 2 - Mobile Device Features

I found many of the tips to be very helpful.  

Pass code - I knew I could have a pass code to lock the device but didn't realize I could lock individual apps.  This would be really helpful when my students are using my device.  I probably wouldn't want them to access some of my apps like the camera roll, my children's games, etc. 

Spotlight search - I thought this spotlight seRch was neat because then I am only searching for books or videos rather than all the options.  This option narrows the seRch and eliminates unnecessary items from showing up. 

Siri -  I didn't realize the ipad came with Siri and had no clue how to use it.  I think it is kind of cool how "she" can search or will tell you she cannot search for apps. 

4-5 finger pinch-   This is something I noticed but didn't really understand.  My one year old son would somehow slide the screen into different apps, screens, etc. I had no clue how he was able to do it.  I tried different buttons and couldn't figure it out.  Wow this makes total sense he grabs the screen with his hand (5 fingers) and pulls the screen. Makes me feel silly that a one year old figured it out and I couldn't. 

Dictation - I hunk the dictation piece is awesome.  Especially since you can use to for any piece of writing,  published pieces on Safari or anywhere else.  My students would love to listen to articles and places and animals.  What a cool feature! 

Shortcuts -  I learned how to make short cuts to the main screen and to make folders.  This will be helpful as I accumulate more apps and shortcuts.  

There were so many useful pieces. I wish I would have known these things when I first bought the ipad. 

Digital Learning Reimbursement 1 - Getting Started

I am new to iPads so right now I am using it mostly for personal use.  I use it to check email, social media sites, and searching sites like Pintrest for new teaching ideas and projects.  

I have used the iPads a few times in the classroom by having the students use Google Maps, research topics for reports, and have also used them for QR code assignments. I have also tried Educreations for a few math lessons. 

I hope to use iPads for the core subjects to keep the students engaged in their learning.  They could use iPads to show what they know by using apps like pic collage and prezzi.  I am certain there are many ways I could use iPads in the room, I just done know about them yet.