Thursday, July 19, 2012

App Happy Linky Party

I'm so excited that Hope King at 2nd Grade Shenanigans is having an App Happy Linky Party (love the Book Retriever app she posted about!) because over this past weekend I was searching for apps to use with my iPad in the classroom. Click Hope's button to check out other apps that make teachers happy!

Second Grade Shenanigans


Here are a few apps I want to try out in the classroom and thoughts on how to use them:
1. Evernote (free): You can create files of digital notebooks for anything and everything. I want to create a digital notebook for each student and have the notebook serve as an e-portfolio. You can upload pictures of student work, use the audio feature to record a student reading, etc. Wouldn't this be great to show parents at conferences? Soaring Through Second Grade wrote a great post on using Evernote too.



2. Penultimate ($0.99): An amazing handwriting app (the best on the market I've heard)! You can use your finger or stylus to write notes or draw pictures. Penultimate is owned by the Evernote people so for example, if you write anecdotal notes about a student, you can easily send it to that student's notebook in Evernote. I also want to use this app in place of an easel during small group work. If I didn't have this app, I would only be able to type any kind of notes, and I'd rather be able to write them.



3. Show Me (free): An interactive whiteboard app. You can create (and watch) tutorials on anything! The app has a record-voice over feature too so for example, you could (or even the students could!) make a tutorial on how to do double digit addition with step-by-step visuals while also giving an explanation. This could be used as a student assessment. Or you could post your Show Me on your class website for students to review material at home.




4. Puppet Pals (free): A super fun animated movie app (it's won an award too)! I learned about this app at a conference in June from a third grade teacher. In his classroom, he had the students take stories they had written and turn them into short animated movies. He said his students' writing improved dramatically...their stories became more interesting because when creating the movies they needed to have included dialogue and more details in their writing. This app also helped with fluency because students were reading aloud and using expression to, again, be more interesting. You can upgrade to Puppet Pals Director's Pass ($2.99) for a lot more characters and features. I can't wait to experiment with Puppet Pals with my second graders!

I'd love to hear any other ideas you have with using these apps! :)


8 comments:

  1. Hi Alex!

    I have an award waiting for you. Visit my blog to pick it up.

    Mona
    First Grade Schoolhouse

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks so much, Mona!!!! I appreciate your thoughtfulness!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Puppet Pals looks great! I am off to check it out. Thanks for sharing. I am a new follower!
    Eileen
    Second Grade Sunshine

    ReplyDelete
  4. I have nominated you for an award! Stop by my blog to pick it up!
    Brigid
    Brigid's Daily Lesson Log

    ReplyDelete
  5. Love puppet pals and evernote. I found you through the App Happy linky. I am nominating you for a blog award. I see you have been nominated already but you can accept it from both of us on the same page.

    http://ilive2learnilove2grow.blogspot.com/2012/07/blog-award.html

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thanks so much for linking up! I can't wait to check these out! Have a great year! ;)

    Hope

    ReplyDelete
  7. Great great finds....that first one is just what I was wanting to do with my iPad! Thanks for great recommendations!

    ReplyDelete

Thanks so much! Have a Happy Day! :)

 
Site Design By Designer Blogs