Putting Apps On Your iPads
- If you want to apply to have an app put on your iPads by the district, there is a form that you'll need to fill out. You need to be in the district to access this link: iPad App Request Form. Please know that this process necessitates that it will take several weeks for those apps to be installed.
- If you want to put apps on by yourself, you may use your own Apple ID to do so, but there are a few points that you'll need to understand....
- You MUST try the apps first. Don't add any app until you have really played with it. This is SO important!
- Be sure to log in AND OUT after installing apps on your devices. Opt into all the password security prompts that are offered during installation.
- If you add too many apps, your device will run slower and may even run out of storage/memory. Please take some time every few months to go through what you have and delete any that aren't really benefiting your students.
- The district reserves the right to remove apps in order to free up space on your iPads or because they are not educationally beneficial.
- IF the district needs to push out new images that require your iPad to sync with the "master image", please know that any apps you installed independently may be lost. (You can reinstall them, but you may lose some data depending on the app.)
- Call me if you need help and I can teach you how to install apps.
- This is a privilege. Until THIS WEEK, we were not permitted to install anything on our own, and the form was required for everything. We really need to respect these rules & understandings so that we continue to enjoy the freedom & autonomy to install apps on our own.
iPad Resources, Recommendations, and Information
Seesaw is the very first app that I'm going to recommend to everyone in K-2 who has those shiny new iPads! This is the app that is seriously going to change your world and the way you teach. To describe it simply, it creates a digital portfolio for all of your students and also encourages parent communication. But it can DO SO MUCH! To get started, I recommend watching this video from one of the nation's leading & greatest experts. But once you get hooked, there are gobs of videos & tutorials on Seesaw, there's a Facebook page, you can follow on Twitter, and there is TONS of stuff on Pinterest.
I like apps that let students create, and a really great one that you'll want to try is Book Creator! It lets your students create and publish cool e-books, and it's super simple to use! There's a free version and a paid version - let's try the free for now and if many of you love it, we'll put in for the paid version.
Educreations is a unique interactive whiteboard and screencasting tool that's simple, powerful, and fun to use. Annotate, animate, and narrate nearly any type of content as you explain any concept. Teachers can create short instructional videos and share them instantly with students, or ask students to show what they know and help friends learn something new. |
It's SplashMath!!! Instead of a single grade, kids can now practice content for all elementary Grades 1 through 5. Kids who have completed their grade level, can now go beyond and practice the next grade level; and the kid who needs revision of previous grade skills, can go back and strengthen them. This app comes with cross-platform accessibility; kids can access Splash Math on the desktop or on iPad using the same login.
Thousands of popular, high-quality books for K - 5 ! Epic! is 100% free for Elementary School teachers and librarians in the U.S. and Canada. This app has tons of popular, high-quality books for K - 5. Excellent for Literacy stations, direct instruction, enrichment, homework, and beyond..... |
Nearpod: This one is INCREDIBLE! Teachers can create PowerPoints and Sways that integrate with this iPad app beautifully! Additionally, there are tons of already-created Nearpod content packs that you can use and adapt to meet the needs of your students.
The Nearpod platform enables teachers, schools and districts, to use their iPads to manage content on students' iPads, iPhones, iPods or Macs. It seamlessly combines interactive presentation, collaboration, and real-time assessment tools into one integrated solution.
The Nearpod platform enables teachers, schools and districts, to use their iPads to manage content on students' iPads, iPhones, iPods or Macs. It seamlessly combines interactive presentation, collaboration, and real-time assessment tools into one integrated solution.
- Ooooh, you're going to LOVE the Quiver app! Quiver lets your students bring print images to life through the magic of augmented reality! All you do is print the pages that go with your lesson or curricular objective. They can be photocopied. Give each child one to color and personalize, and then open the app! The scanner feature will make the page turn blue and then the picture comes to life! Be sure the volume is turned on; some have sounds, too!
It seems like everyone knows Starfall! Most of the students are already familiar with it and just love playing the interactive Reading and Literacy games within this app. Starfall has been teaching kids phonics and reading skills for a long time, and there's really something for all levels, abilities, and interests. Most of the pages within this app have the embedded ability to read parts TO the students, so even your beginner readers will be able to access the content here.
Millions of kids, parents, and teachers visit ABCya.com each month (it's a website, too!) For over ten years ABCya has been one of the most popular K-5 educational gaming websites in the world! The ABCya app features six free games each week. The students are all familiar with this site from computer class, and so they'll be especially happy to find it on their iPads.
This one was requested by many Twp. teachers! Spelling City is a great app to use as an independent station. Your students can practice their Word Study words in a variety of fun formats and game-type lessons.
Kids of all ages are going to love creating talking avatars using Voki! It takes clever creativity to design just the right avatar to get your message across - whether it's retelling a story, practicing using vocabulary, explaining Math/Science/anything concepts, or making a persuasive speech - there are so many options for infusing this app into your curriculum! The voices can be supplied by your students, or choose from a list of male and female voices with all kinds of interesting accents. Make any lesson come to life with Voki.
ChatterPix Kids is so much fun! Students can take any photo, draw a little line where a "mouth" should go, and instantly create a talking.....whatever! They record their own voice, and the picture seems to come to life with your students' words. A photo of Abraham Lincoln can suddenly "talk" and explain why he's on the penny. A photo of a basketball can "speak" and tell why it's the best sport of all. The possibilities are endless!
Toontastic is the name of this app. It's a creative storytelling app that allows kids to draw, animate, and share their own cartoons with others. It's as easy as putting on a puppet show - just press the record button, move your characters on screen, and start telling your story! Toontastic records your animation and voice as a cartoon video to share with family and friends.
Coding and programming is so important for our kids to learn, and Scratch Jr. makes it easy for even our littlest ones to learn. Through the playful interface, students learn elementary concepts of coding: ordering & sequencing, problem solving, planning, revising, creation, and so much more! The students will LOVE if you let them learn (I mean play) with Scratch Jr.!
Adobe Spark Video, formerly Adobe Voice, is a presentation tool. Your students will be able to learn this quickly and make all kinds of creative presentations that are infused with pretty fonts, images, backgrounds, voice-overs, sounds, icons....all kinds of wonderful choices! You won't believe the professional quality of the presentations that your young students create!
Another requested app from a whole bunch of Twp. teachers - it's the Prodigy game! This Math game is also available on the web, and students & teachers are loving it! If you really want to 'hook' your students with some truly gamified Math instruction, Prodigy is just what you need. It aligns with the standards, so it's a perfect way to make your Math curriculum fun!
There is so, so, so much you can do with a QR scanner, and this is a nice, basic, easy-to-use one for kids. There are all kinds of fun lessons, worksheets, printables, scavenger hunts and more that use QR codes - and now that we all have iPad access, let the games begin!
Do you Kahoot? Well, if you haven't, you'll sure want to! Kahoot (also available as a website) has swept the globe in popularity! It is used by all levels from Kindergarten to college. It's basically a way to make quizzes, study guides, and reviews FUN because it turns them into a whole-class game! Kids love to choose from the 4 colored answers, see how quickly they can answer, challenge their classmates, and wait for the final scores! Teachers love it because it's SO easy to throw together a simple & fun review game.
Stop Motion Studio is exactly what it sounds like...a fun way for your students to create clever stop-motion videos. This app is so simple that your students will require almost no instruction. It takes a lot of patience to take that many pictures frame by frame, but the skill itself is pretty intuitive, and it's a really cool way for students to create a video!
Padlet is a simple site that lets you and your students interact on a virtual corkboard. You can design the background, and students respond to a prompt, theme, question, or prompt by adding virtual "post-its" to the wall. That's it! You will NEVER run out of ways to use this app!
Popplet Lite is a kid-friendly webbing or mapping tool. It puts a word or idea in a central bubble, and then the user creates "mind maps" or "story webs" that include peripheral ideas related to that central word. In other words, it can create graphic organizers that allow students to plan, organize thinking, summarize, brainstorm, and develop graphic relationships between words and ideas.
PicCollage lets your students make beautiful photo collages with pictures that they take using their iPads. There are a gazillion reasons to use this in every single subject area, and this app is often "app-smashed" with Seesaw, too!
With Thinglink, your students can make a static image an interactive smorgasbord of knowlege by adding virtual spots to the image - each one is a hyperlink to something else: photos, audio, websites, video....it's a pretty amazing way to demonstrate knowledge, present an idea, or even collect ideas related to a topic. There are tons of ideas for using ThingLink on their website, on Pinterest, or in the brains of your Technology Integration Specialists!
How would you like to have an app that would give your Spelling tests for you? Wouldn't it be awesome if it was super fun for the kids, too? What if it was ridiculously easy to add & edit words any time you want to? Oh, and can you imagine if it had a variety of ways for the kids to engage with those Spelling words (like games & activities - not just tests) and even collected/scored the data for you? Look no further....it's A+ Spelling Test! Here's a video that shows how to use it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulmBpMzq7HM
Shadow Puppet lets you create custom videos that are easy to share! Combine photos and video clips with your voice and favorite song. Draw on screen, add emoji stickers, zoom and pan. Create videos to tell a story, explain an idea, or send a personalized message. Again, this app smashes nicely with Seesaw!
For our littlest littles or cuties who could just use a little extra fine motor practice, ABC Letter Tracing App is exactly what it sounds like! It's that easy, too.
Moose Math is for Kindergarten and 1st grade Math levels and has basic number concepts such as 1:1 correspondence, simple sequential counting, number identification, patterns and matching. It's really adorable and is definitely kid-approved.
Duck Duck Moose Reading features Milo the Meerkat and his sidekick Puffs at the zoo on a phonics learning adventure! This app has 9 different word and letter activities that help kids learn by feeding and playing with flamingos, monkeys, lions, and more. Collect animals and make your own zoo scene as you learn more letter sounds. AGES 3-7.
Funbrain Jr. is one of those apps that seems like it's going to be all play - until you realize there's a lot of learning going on. Early literacy and phonics, math, patterns, logic, and motor skills are developed while the brain is having fun - hence the name of the app!
Buncee is a creation and presentation tool for students and teachers. Buncee makes it easy for you and your students to create content for all classroom purposes - whether you’re in need of an awesome presentation, an interactive story, an engaging lesson, or a beautiful card. With Buncee’s fun and educational media tools and graphics, you can open up your world and introduce your students to creativity on-the-go!
Number Frames help students structure numbers to five, ten, twenty, and one hundred. Students use the frames to count, represent, compare, and compute with numbers in a particular range. (For anyone keeping track, this app is really just an S on the SAMR model!)
EduKitty has a great set of alphabet learning games and ABC flashcards for kids to learn the letters, their names, tracing both upper case and lower case letters, alphabet sounds, phonics and a very unique alphabet song!
AR Alphabet Flashcards is adorable! Watch the alphabet come to life (via augmented reality) as you scan these flashcards that you can print right from the app! What a fun way to learn the ABC's!
Front Row Math - This has been a big request from teachers! It's gamified Math - and you get to dress up your piggies! This one is a fan favorite with both teachers and students!