Google Earth Gallery Now Available on iPads & Android Tablets

Yesterday the Google announced some nice updates to the Google Earth app for iOS and Android. For schools using iPads or Android tablets in their classrooms, the most significant update is access to the Google Earth Gallery. Along with access to the Google Earth Gallery came support for viewing KML files on your iPad or Android device. Now you can browse the gallery of public KML files and open them on your favorite iOS or Android device.

Android users will now be able to capture a screenshot of the Google Earth map you're viewing and share it via Google+, Gmail, and other social networks.

Applications for Education
As mentioned above, for schools using such devices, being able to browse and open KML files on iPads and Android tablets is a great enhancement to the Google Earth mobile app. The screenshot option on Android devices could also be a great feature for teachers who want to share a specific view with all of their students.

H/T to the Google Earth Blog. 

Inversion Invasion - iPad App to Teach Students About Chords

Inversion Invasion is an iPad app that teaches students about keyboard chords in an arcade-style game. To "defend" various scenes like city centers students have to play the correct notes and chords while "aliens" "invade." The app comes from Jambots who produces other music education apps like Lo-Fi Folk Arranger and Pedal to the Steel.

The video below provides a demonstration of Inversion Invasion.


Applications for Education
Music educators looking for an engaging way for students to practice chords when they don't have access to pianos or keyboards, Inversion Invasion could be a helpful app.

Save Meeting - Audio Recordings and Transcriptions of Meetings

Save Meeting is a meeting recording app for iOS and Android devices. The app allows you to record the audio of your meetings, transcribe the audio, and share the recordings and transcriptions with others. The transcription options that I tried were somewhat limited (30 seconds of automatic transcription and 5 minutes of manual transcription) but should be sufficient for recording quick notes during a meeting. Save Meeting uses a freemium pricing model. At the free level you can save up to 1,000 minutes of audio.

The video below contains a short overview of Save Meeting.

SaveMeeting presentation from SaveMeeting on Vimeo.

Applications for Education
Save Meeting could be a good app for students to use to make quick reminder notes for themselves. The app could also be used by students who are conducting interviews that they are going write about at a later time.

Project 365 App Helps You Organize Your Photos Throughout the Year

On Sunday I shared that thanks to Ken Shelton, I finally "get" the purpose of participating in Project 365. In short, committing to a 365 project is a good way to build up a private media library that you and your students can access when you media for your presentations.

Last night I was somewhat aimlessly browsing the App Store when I discovered the Project 365 app for iPhone and iPad. The app provides a place to organize your images in a calendar format and share you images via Facebook, Twitter, and email. The "pro" version of the app ($0.99) removes advertising, includes image cropping tools, and offers immediate upload to your Flickr account.

Applications for Education
If your school is using iPads, the Project 365 apps could be handy for creating image galleries that your students can use whenever they need images for slideshows, videos, or other digital stories. By using their own images, all concerns about Copyright are removed from their projects.

Listen to Customized Bite-sized News

Snackr is a free iPhone and iPad app that allows you to listen to a set of customized news channels. Snackr's goal is to provide you with headlines and summaries of news that is most important to you. You can used the app to hear tech news, world news, sports news, weather, and more. Watch and overview of Snack in action in the video below.

Snackr Demo v1.0 from Snackr App on Vimeo.

Applications for Education
When I taught Contemporary Global Studies my students were responsible for reading and watching the news. If you teach a similar course, Snackr could be good app for your students to use to get an overview of headlines and hear a bit of the stories. After listening to their Snackr news channel, they can select a story or two to investigate in further detail.

H/T to Joyce Valenza. 

Does a $399 Price Point Make the iPad a Better Choice for Schools?

The new iPad was unveiled to the world today. From what I've read the big improvement to it lies in the screen resolution. The big news for cheapskates like me is that the iPad 2 dropped $100 in price to $399. I've long said that I prefer to see schools invest in building a 1:1 program with netbooks or laptops before putting their money into iPads. But now that the iPad 2 can be had at a price that is very comparable to netbooks and Chromebooks, I wonder how many more schools will give more thought to going the iPad route instead of the netbook or Chromebook route. Even at the new price point, for now I still prefer to see schools use iPads as secondary devices instead of primary devices. Read more of my thoughts and about this choice in I Don't Hate iPads, But...

Audio Memos - A Voice Recorder for iPad & iPhone

Audio Memos is an iOS app for creating and sharing audio messages. The app is available in three versions. The free version is limited to 3MB recordings, the $0.99 version is limited to 15MB recordings, and the "pro" $9.99 version has a nice selection of audio editing tools built-in. Some of the features that are available in all three versions of the app are automatic pause if a call comes in while you're recording, recording volume controls, and recording even when your iPhone or iPad goes to sleep.

Here is a video tutorial on Audio Memos.


Applications for Education
I learned about Audio Memos from Silvia Tolisano's recent post about using voice recordings and QR codes in a lesson that integrates Art and Language Arts. I encourage you to read Silvia's post.

In addition to the ways in which Silvia described using Audio Memos, the app could be great for journalism students to record interviews and then play back the recordings while creating the written version of the their interviews.

Bunsella Bedtime Stories - An App for Narrating Stories

Bunsella Bedtime Stories is a free iPhone and iPad app for creating and narrating bedtime stories. I learned about the app through an email from its developer, who built it as part of her dissertation work in universal design learning technologies.

Bunsella Bedtime Stories features claymation-like characters to which you lend your voice to tell a story. You can upload your own images through the app too. Completed stories can be shared through email, Facebook, or YouTube. Watch a sample story in the video below.


Applications for Education
Bunsella Bedtime Stories was originally designed for parents to narrate stories for their children. The app could also be used by students to create and share stories. If you had a classroom set of iPads you could have students exchange stories and respond to each other with a "part II" or response story.

iPad Apps to Meet 14 Learning Objectives

This evening Greg Kulowiec shared with me an excellent iPad project that he and Beth Holland recently published for Ed Tech Teacher. iPad As... is a large selection of high-quality iPad-apps designed to meet fourteen different learning objectives.

When you visit iPad As... you can click on any of the objectives to be taken to a grid of free and paid apps that can be used to meet that objective. For example, if I want my students to create digital stories on their iPads, I would click on that objective and instantly see a list of the apps that my students could use for that purpose. Each app is accompanied by a description, price, and ease-of-use rating.

Applications for Education
If your school is using iPads now or is considering getting iPads, but you're not sure what apps are out there for your learning objectives, iPad As... could be a great reference for you to bookmark and share with your colleagues.

Disclosure: I occasionally work for Ed Tech Teacher and they are an advertiser on Free Technology for Teachers. 

Plizy - Save Videos for Later on Your iPad or Android Tablet

Two weeks ago I wrote about Chill which is kind of like Pinterest for videos. This morning I started trying another service for sharing and discovering video content. That service is Plizy.

Plizy is a service that allows you to browse for and save videos to playback later on your iPad or Android tablet. Plizy has many video channels to choose from. If the videos you see in default Plizy channels are not to your liking, you can create your own custom channels. Unlike some apps that only pull content from YouTube, Plizy pulls content from many  popular sources including TED, National Geographic, and CNET. Watch the short video below to learn more about Plizy.


To get started using Plizy you do need to install either the iPad app or the Android app. After installing the app you can register for Plizy through the app.

Applications for Education
If your school is using iPads or Android tablets, Plizy could be a good way to discover, organize, share, and play educational content through those devices. You could have students in your class currate and share a channel of content related to topics that they're studying.

Math Chimp Expands to Middle School

Math Chimp is a catalog of mathematics games and activities that I initially wrote about last fall. At that time they only listed resources for elementary school. Now they have expanded to cover activities and games for middle school mathematics students. While Math Chimp is far from being a revolutionary mathematics resource, the catalog is handy for teachers looking for materials that their students can use independently. Teachers can find games on Math Chimp by selecting the grade that they teach then selecting a standard or objective. After you make those selections Math Chimp will direct you to an appropriate mathematics game for your students.

On a related note, one of the sponsors of Free Technology for Teachers, ABCYa offers great elementary school mathematics games that can be played online and on an iPad.

iNaturalist - Record and Share Observations of Nature

iNaturalist is a community website for sharing pictures and observations of plants and animals. To enable easy sharing of observations, iNaturalist offers a free Android app and a free iOS app. Using the apps you can take a picture, geo-locate it, write your observations, and upload to the iNaturalist community. If your observation is incomplete, for example if you're not sure of a scientific name, you can ask the community to add comments to improve the recording of your observation.

If you don't want to join the iNaturalist community, you can simply explore members' observations through the iNaturalist Google Map.

Applications for Education
I learned about iNaturalist through an excellent post on the Google Lat Long Blog that outlined the efforts of a group to compile a large collection of observations about the Pepperwood Preserve in California. Pick a woodlot or nature preserve in your area and have your school build a record of observations about that area.

SyncSpace - A Whiteboard App for iPads and Android Tablets

SyncSpace is a collaborative whiteboard app that I recently featured on my other blog Android 4 Schools. Since writing that post, I've had a couple of people ask if SyncSpace is available for iPads. The answer is yes. You can get the SyncSpace app for iPad here and the Android app here.

You can use SyncSpace to create drawings and documents on your tablet. You can create using free-hand drawing tools, using typing tools, or a combination of the two tool sets. Your drawings and documents can be sent to and synced with other users so that they can comment and edit your drawings and documents. Learn more about SyncSpace in the video below.


Applications for Education
SyncSpace could be a great app for collaborative brainstorming sessions across multiple devices.

Collaborize Classroom Offers an iOS App

Collaborize Classroom is a free service that host websites for teachers that I wrote about last spring. I recently revisited Collaborize Classroom and learned that they now offer an iPad and iPhone app for teachers and students. The app provides access to the discussion features, assignment posts, other elements that teachers add to their Collaborize Classroom websites.

Applications for Education
The Collaborize Classroom iOS app could be a handy app for students to use to access important course information and activities. If a student has multiple teachers that use Collaborize Classroom he or she can access all of those teachers' sites through one app.

Use Air Sketch with Dropbox for Wireless iPad Presentations

Many times I find myself in a situation where I want to do a presentation with the ability to stay mobile and move around the room, but I don’t have access to install software on the computer. Many remote apps have a small footprint, but even if you do have access to install something on the computer it can very easily stutter and interrupt the flow of your presentation if the network isn’t running perfectly. I found a better solution - one that I feel safe enough to depend on when I am being evaluated and need everything to work smoothly. The nice thing about Air Sketch is that all the action happens on your iPad and it sends updates wirelessly to the browser(s) for the computer to send to the projector. This gives you much smoother feedback as you are drawing directly on the iPad and seeing immediate feedback and responsiveness. At first glance Air Sketch looks like a typical standalone whiteboard sketch app but it can do so much more.


Air Sketch Free serves as a basic free wireless whiteboard. You can move around the room and draw on the projected screen using this free app without installing anything on your computer. Simply press the wireless button on the toolbar and point your browser to the address and port listed inside Air Sketch or use Safari’s Bonjour bookmarks. The basic version uses the same drawing and wireless engine as the Pro version so you can test it to see if it meets your needs before you upgrade. 

If you can splurge a little... Air Sketch Pro adds some features that are definitely worth it. These extra features include the ability to import pictures from your photos, import PDFs from webpages or Dropbox/Box.net, export screenshots of your presentation to your photos, email as PDF, or email as an image file. By combining this program with the helpfulness of Dropbox (or Box.net) I came up with a few interesting scenarios:


Basic Whiteboard:
Sketch on Air Sketch and point your projector-connected computer to the web address in Air Sketch. Use your wireless connection or create an ad-hoc network from your computer to make it work without any Internet connection.

Document Camera:
Take a picture of your document using the camera on your phone/ipad2 or even use a scanning app to make a PDF or image of it.
Save the picture or PDF to Dropbox.
Open the picture or PDF in Air Sketch.
Annotate wirelessly.
Allow students to use the iPad to annotate wirelessly as well so they can interact with the board without standing in front of the projector.

Wireless Presentation:
Convert your PowerPoint or Keynote presentation to PDF.
Save PDF version of PowerPoint/Keynote to Dropbox/Box.net.
Open PDF in Air Sketch.
Annotate over your presentation.
Change slides and Air Sketch resets annotations and remembers what annotations go with which page. When you go back to a page, the annotations for that page reappear.
Export annotaions as a PDF to email to your class.

Screencast:
Use a free online screencasting program such as Screenr to record your wireless presentation and host it online. Screenr gives you embed codes you can use on your classroom website.


Air Sketch is a powerful but simple tool that is easy to use and dependable. Check out their website at: http://www.qrayon.com/home/airsketch/

Please see the embedded video to see Air Sketch in action.



About the Guest Blogger
Michael Carter is a computer lab teacher and Technology Coach at South-Doyle Middle School in Knoxville Tennessee. His nerdiest hobby includes developing educational database software which is now in use by several schools in 3 different counties in Tennessee. Michael may be found on Twitter, Google+, and on the web.

Using Show Me to Create Lessons on iPads - Guest Post

As the technology integration teacher for Seymour Public Schools in Seymour, CT, I get to spend a lot of time exploring new tools which make teaching and learning more engaging and ultimately more successful for students. Earlier this year, I discovered one of these tools called Show Me, which is an online learning community for students of all ages.  My initial thought was that it was just another Khan Academy.  The difference, I quickly discovered, was that on Show Me you can also create your own lessons...not just watch.  This makes Show Me a very powerful educational tool.

As a student looking to learn about a particular topic you can search Show Me by topic and subject.  As a teacher, you can create your own videos or assign one from the community for students to view.  If you would rather share your knowledge with your class (or the world) a la Khan Academy, you will need to download the free iOS app.  Currently there is not an app available for Android device but Show Me has plans to develop one in the future.  Once you have created something on Show Me you can share it with the world or keep it personal.  Sharing is made easy with one click posting to Facebook and Twitter as well as through the use of the embed code for websites.


Moving forward, Show Me seems to be in the initial stages of building a database of SAT preparation videos.  This would be a tremendous resource for high school students and also can be used as an exemplar for how to create an effective tutorial on Show Me.  On the website there is also a link to their blog called the Show Me Voice which has some great information for teachers looking to integrate Show Me into their classroom.  I found a “How To” section and some featured videos from the public community to be very useful.


Using Show Me, teachers and students have the ability to both teach and learn from the community of videos.  Used as a student directed activity, Show Me empowers students to think about a topic and how it should be presented.  As educators, we know that the highest level of understanding is achieved when a student knows the material well enough to teach it.  Show me give students that opportunity through the use of technology.  Below is an example of a simple lesson on the parts of the tuba created by a Seymour High School student in @Brandt Schneider’s class:







Now What?
If you have some iPads in your classroom it’s time to get recording!  Use Show Me to assess your students rather than using a paper and pencil.  Creating an account on Show Me is free and will have you up and running in seconds.  A tip for beginners is to use a stylus with the iPad to have more control over your drawing.  Also, In order to create more advanced videos you can pause your recording and then clear the canvas which will simulate a multi-page file.  Have fun!
About the Guest Blogger

Mike Oberdick is a Technology Integration Teacher for Grades 6-12 in Seymour, CT. His blog is Tech Messages and he Tweets at @mikeoberdick

Blog  |  Website  |  Twitter

Try Yahoo to Find Your Next iPad or Android App

For a lot of us Yahoo is kind of the forgotten search engine. I honestly can't tell you when the last time I used it was until today when I learned through Android Central that Yahoo has an app search setting.

At Apps.Search.Yahoo.com you can search for Android and iOS apps. You can filter results according to OS, price, and category. I gave it a try and I have to say that the search results page is quite a bit nicer than that of the search results page in the Android Market. The look doesn't affect the effectiveness of the search tool, but it is a nice aspect of Yahoo App Search. Give Yahoo App Search a try the next time you're looking for a new app for your Android or iOS device.

Cross posted on Android4Schools.com

Hot Apps for Higher Order Thinking

Hot Apps 4 HOTS (link opens to iTunes) is a free ebook about iOS apps that can be used to help students practice and develop higher order thinking skills. The book takes readers through a series of apps that are aligned to the various parts of Bloom's Revised Taxonomy. Examples and suggestions for app use are included in the book. As Hot Apps 4 HOTS is an ibook, it can only be viewed on an iOS device.

Applications for Education
If your school is one that is rolling-out iPads for student use, check out Hot Apps 4 HOTS to find some good apps and ideas that you can bring into your classroom.

A couple of other good places to find iOS apps for your classroom use are Kinder Town and IEAR.

Alien Buddies - An iPad App for Learning Shapes, Numbers, Letters

Alien Buddies is an iPad and iPhone app designed for pre-k students to practice recognizing shapes, letters, and numbers. The app provides leveled games in which students practice recognizing patterns and sequences. The activities for recognizing letters and numbers have audio and visual prompting modes. Alien Buddies normally costs $1.99 but I received an email from the app's publisher informing me that it is available for free today, January 27th.