iLearn Update

Yours truly attempts to be in the schools no less than twice per week.  The point of emphasis of late has been the high school classroom and the implementation of iLearn.  There is so much good, it would be difficult to list it all but here is my feeble attempt.

Apps and Such

• Edmodo allows teachers to connect to students via network. All assignments, grades and badges assigned or awarded through Edmodo are stored and easily accessible.
• Google Drive allows students and teachers store and access your files anywhere on the web, on the hard drive, or on the go. Google Drive is a cloud storage service. Teachers and students can store your documents, photos, music, videos, etc. all in one place. It syncs with mobile devices and the computer, so if changes are made on one gadget, it will automatically show up if you access it elsewhere. It tracks your changes too, so if you make an edit to the document and hit save, you can still look back at all your revisions from the past 30 days. It allows one to create Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides. Google Drive lets you choose exactly who – friends, family, colleagues – gets your files. You don’t need email attachments anymore. Just share your file, folder, or Google Doc from any device.

• Educreate turns the iPad into a recordable whiteboard. Creating a great video of homework is as simple as touching, tapping and talking. Explain a math formula... Create an animated lesson... Add commentary to photos... Diagram a sports play...
• AirServer - There are times when a teacher needs to show content to the class to engage the audience, using an iPad. With AirServer teachers can wirelessly beam their iPad display to the Mac or PC and from there to the projector. This gives the teacher the freedom to move around the class with their iPad in hand. AirServer also supports multiple simultaneous connections, so one or more students could mirror their iPads to share their ideas and their work with the rest of the class.
• Free Graphing Calculator-  A new TI 83 graphing calculator from Radio Shack costs $109.  Per our minis, the app is free.  The iPad app is less pixelated and has color options as opposed to the TI 83. Neat! Neat! Neat!  The drawback is that the mini cannot be used to take the ACT.
  

Updates and Infrastructure

• The IOS 7 update has prevented a few opportunities for our IT department.  Within a week, most students have completed their updates and iPads with the all-new design and features are working as they should.  
• The infrastructure is of some concern, especially when an entire class attempts to download an entire unit at once.  In the future, especially as we add grades 9 and 10 to the infrastructure, we may have to free up some band width by disabling digital phone access to the schools' internet.

Books

• It is not easy to impress students with digital content, but we have.  The interactive books contain embedded videos, links and photos.  When text is cut, book information such as page location is automatically pasted.
• Books in pdf format are being used.  The advantage over traditional text is that there is no wear-and-tear. The only drawback is that the pages are numbered differently than the textbook.

Battery Life

• Students say that they need to charge the mini every other day, pending their settings.  As to date, I have only seen 3 on charge in the classroom.

Damage and Inappropriate Use

• Yes, we have more than one cracked screen. Most of the screens, though cracked, are still useable.  
• Yes, we will check your history.   Yes, we will check your settings.  Yes, yes, and yes.