Form of the Week: Form 5 Explore iPad Apps in the Classroom

Great excitement erupted from the children in Form 5 when they discovered that they would be trialling the use of iPads in their classroom for the autumn term. They couldn’t wait to get their hands on iPads, which made the first part of my job pretty easy!

Using iPads in the classroom has been a way of engaging the children, and exposing them to real-life technologies, used in creative ways, to enhance and extend their learning. It has promoted collaboration, cooperation and sparked creativity and imagination among the children, which has been delightful to watch.

We have used a range of apps, which have involved experimenting with presentation of information, note-taking, internet research, map work, voice recording and drawing.

We have now used a long list of apps for a variety of uses, but we would like to share some of our favourite apps, so far:

Tapose

A digital journal app, which we have used to record our findings from the internet and, when using Google maps, to locate places studied during history and geography topics this term.

See an example from our geography work:See an example from our history work:

Comic Life

Comic life was used to create a comic about showing what life was like for Aztec men and women:

PicCollage

This is a favourite, purely because it is so simple to use, creating a very professional presentation. This app used allows users to create collages with pictures, text or a combination of the two.

The children used PicCollage for various activities involving sharing pictures and information in English, science and geography.

The write up of an evaporation experiment and the geography work on Brighton were particular favourites of mine.

View the examples below:

Sketch Nation

This week, we are working on creating a video game using Sketch Nation. This game will support our English topic of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, where the children are aiming to create a game from a favourite part of the story.

Miss S. Williamson