Assignment #7: App Shopping

One of the greatest benefits of the iPad over the laptop is all of the apps it offers. We want to know what resources you use to find new apps...a website, an app, the appstore itunes genius feature... 
Please comment to this post by Monday, October 10th.

iPad Checkout

The Technology Department now has 5 iPads for teacher checkout.  If there is an activity that you would like to do with a group of students on the iPad, you can come down and check out up to five iPads from us.

Save the Date: iPad Lunch and Learns

We will be holding two iPad Lunch and Learns over the next few weeks. Both sessions will be held in the meeting room inside the high school library 12:40-1:30. These meetings are not mandatory.  If you would like to join us for either, please bring your lunch and iPad.
Wednesday, September 21st: Pages and Keynote on the iPad
Wednesday, October 5th: iMovie on the iPad

Assignment#6: Class Researchers

Sandy Jordan recently sent the following note to the technology department:
"Today was my first day with JH math students, and rather than dive right into the boring organizational stuff with the kids, I decided to start off with a discussion about what math is, how it has developed, why it has developed - the more philosophical side of it.  In each class, the discussions have been great, but an interesting thing happened last period.  This group (Jennifer and Tony's class) all showed up with their iPads.  As different questions came up I realized the kids were looking up information to add to the discussion as fast as they could.  From "when did zero first appear" to "what were African cultures doing mathematically hundreds of years ago," they were generating and trying to answer questions in an incredibly engaged and active way.  It was fabulous.  That immediate access to information kept the conversation going, made them more involved in the lesson, and helped them dig deeper faster.  They were looking for facts, but that opened the door for ruminations and discussion about the "whys" behind the "whats."  It was a great experience for me (and I hope for them!), and really illustrated some of the many, many ways this kind of technology is going to change how we teach."

For assignment #6, we would like you to assign a class researcher each day for a week in at least one of your classes.  Let the Daily Researcher(s) use the iPad and be in charge of answering any questions that arise in your class. Write about your experience in your comment.

Open Thread

 Comment on this post when you:

• have information to share
• want to ask a question of the whole group
• have an "Aha!" moment
• find a fabulous App that everyone should know about
• anything else pertaining to the ipad that doesn't fit into the other posts

(Summer) Assignment #5: One Transformed Classroom

Everyone found some really useful articles and blogs for Assignment #3.  We highly recommend that you go back and check some of them out.  Brian E. found the video below that features a classroom that uses the iPads from opening to closing bell.  Watch the video and then think about what it would be like if you had more than one iPad in your classroom.  In your comment to this post, write up a daily schedule (or weekly schedule if you are in HS and teach the same course throughout the day) for your classroom and describe how you would incorporate the iPads in each activity.

(Summer) Assignment #4: This would be great if....

All of us have found apps that are great, but don't quite fit into our curriculum.  For this post, please share an app for a subject that you don't teach, but you would definitely use if you did. In your comment, please put the name of the app, the cost, a brief description, and how you think you would use it. 

Reminder: summer assignments are due on August 16th.