iPad
Weekly News Roundup
By Audrey Watters March 8 – 10 marked the inaugural SXSWedu, an education technology conference held in Austin, Texas right before the main South by Southwest event that includes one of the most popular technology conferences in the world. SXSWedu was sponsored by SXSW and TEA, the Texas Education Agency and featured three days of [...]
Teachers Get Trained with the iPad
One of the many obstacles for educators when it comes to using technology in the classroom is training them on how exactly to do it. We know by now that simply handing out gadgets to teachers is not enough — they need to know how to maximize the potential and what best to use the [...]
Faster Than a Speeding Bullet…
You’d have to be on the moon not to have heard about the release of the iPad 2 today. All of what had been predicted about the successor to the original iPad has been confirmed: It’s lighter, thinner, faster, and has two cameras. And it’s got a new SmartCover, which attaches magnetically to the screen [...]
Is a Kid’s iPad Addiction a Bad Thing?
David Pogue, the New York Times’ tech columnist, has been doing a lot of thinking lately. His 6-year-old son, he says, is addicted to the iPad. But rather than automatically whisking it away from him, he has other ideas. “Is a gadget automatically bad for our children just because it’s electronic? What if it’s fostering [...]
Pearson Tries Out the Tablet
I’ve been focusing the last couple of weeks on exploring Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s algebra iPad pilot program, but it’s worth noting that they’re not the only ones testing the waters. Pearson Education, Inc. is piloting a similar program in Virginia with social studies curriculum, according to an article in the Boston Globe. Clearly, it’s in [...]
Videos + Teacher in Class = Learning
Jeannetta Mitchell asks her students to watch videos in class. That may sound counter-intuitive — why have them watch a video when she’s right there? Because, as both she and her students put it, sometimes they understand on the third try, or when it’s explained differently. “There’s more than one way to solve something,” Mitchell [...]
What Do Students Like About the iPad?
Eighth-grade students at the Presidio Middle School are trying out using the iPad instead of the textbook as part of a pilot study. Here’s what they have to say about it. Lenny Gonzalez KATE NAKATO You can watch videos and it explains stuff to you. The “view in motion” goes step by step with you [...]
Teaching With a Tablet: One Educator’s Experience
For more detail about my visit to the Presidio Middle School’s iPad algebra class, here’s the complete Q&A with eighth-grade teacher Jeannetta Mitchell. She talks about the practicalities of forgoing the traditional textbook and seeing students find different ways of learning the material. Far from being afraid of the technology — or believing that it [...]
A Day in the Life of the iPad Classroom
Lenny Gonzalez “This is not a magic wand. This just makes it more fun for them to learn.” Halfway through a year-long pilot study using iPads instead of textbooks, a San Francisco eighth-grade algebra class is showing signs of every teacher’s dream: the spark of engagement in her students’ eyes. Jeannetta Mitchell, a veteran teacher [...]
A New Tool in the Classroom Grabs the Spotlight
It’s easy to figure out why a 13-year-old’s eyes would light up if you give her an iPad. Think of all the possibilities: YouTube! Movies! Music! Angry Birds! But what about algebra? Would she be as excited about learning the quadratic equation just because it’s presented on a shiny tablet? Turns out that — at [...]
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