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"Almost two years ago to the day, I wrote a post, "The iPad: Why Teachers Should Care." Flash forward to today, both of the schools I work at have purchased one iPad for each classroom. Although I've already mastered how to manage all the iDevices in my personal household, learning to manage iPads in an institutional environment involved a bit more learning due to the complexities of software licensing and the necessity to keep institutional accounts separate from personal ones."

"No matter what level of educational iPad user you are, the following list of iPad specific web sites provides a depth and breadth of resources."

* Teachers use our Web site to select existing courses or to create new courses by mixing and matching items from our library with their own educational material. * Students use our iPad app to download and use these courses, filled with videos, slideshows, e-books, PDFs, text, audiobooks, and Web links. Whether reading the latest e-book that has been assigned, or watching a video for the next homework assignment, students will feel more engaged and in charge of their learning.

"Welcome to the world of the iPad! I hope that you, like I have, will find this amazing device transforming in your approach to the utilization of technology for teaching and learning. Hopefully, we will soon be saying goodbye to the fifty pound backpacks our students carry around, and all of their textbooks and learning resources will be available on this one, small device! Whether you are currently using iPads in your school or for yourself...or if you are just beginning to explore the possibilities, I hope you will find resources here to benefit you in your journey. Enjoy this site, share the information with others, and feel free to contact me with any questions or to share your experiences! Below are some of my "musings" as I reflect on where we currently are in our journey with the utilization of technology with our students. Enjoy!"

"Tis the season to be jolly, especially with the newest interactive and multimedia apps available to celebrate. Children, adolescents, and teens can create very meaningful gifts for friends and family members or get into the holiday spirit by using the suggested apps below. The apps are very easy to use, often free, and have various multimedia options. These apps integrate images, audio, text, video and extras."

look at the bottom of the page for some apps

Technology shapes the way students interact with the world. Apple makes it easy to teach them with the tools and media they're already using.

"Lately, I have discovered many cool free apps that are incredible for creating digital stories, reading stories, and interacting with stories. These apps are incredibly engaging and meet the needs of our diverse learners. They allow learners to interact with the plot, characters, and even design of the story. They also support multiple learning styles because they are visual, have sound, and animation."

What latest gadgets and gizmos are going to change your classroom in 2013? It's hard to know exactly what will catch on and what won't, but the following list showcases some of the emerging new technologies, software, and platforms available. With their innovation and practicality, many of these are poised to enter the classroom and change the way students and teachers learn permanently.

"One question I seem to get a lot about the iPad is what apps do I recommend that are free. I am hearing from a lot of teachers that they have no way to add paid apps and thus are stuck trying to find free apps. My experience is that many free apps stink. They have many adds, require in app purchases to be useful, or are just junk. I tend to stay away from most free apps. So what are you to do if the district controls adding paid apps? My suggestion is to build relationships with the decision makers. Don't just ask for a bunch of apps, instead provide documentation and purpose for a few apps you would like to have. I know this process takes time and effort but if you can show the purpose and learning you have a much better chance. If you need lesson ideas I suggest checking out my Pinterest page, and three of my favorite Pinterest pages: iPadsammy, TechChef4u, and Sue Gorman. Look for apps and lesson ideas there and modify them to fit your standards and kids. If I was starting from scratch this is the $10 iPad app setup I would push for in my kindergarten classroom. (I will be posting a $20 setup later)"

"At a recent teachers meeting we discussed some of the apps that we used during reading time. The idea was put forward that having apps that would focus on, or be used for specific areas of the Assessment Foci would be very useful - so here we are."

"A very techno-skilled young teacher, Lindsay, was in a session with me on Friday. I could tell pretty quickly that she is keen on learning and has a lot of iPad expertise. During a discussion on uses for Dragon Dictation (an app that converts voice to text), Lindsay shared the speak selection feature of iOS as a complimentary technology. Great! I had never thought of tying dragon dictation to the voice over feature of the iPad before to give you a fully integrated speech-to-text-to-speech again experience."

"Lots of people have been asking about using the iPad as a way of teaching young students to write. I personally would not advocate this as the primary way of teaching youngsters the intricacies of handwriting and letter recognition but as fun supplementary activity it might provide some motivation. Here are a couple of fun apps that reinforce some of the basic writing skills taught by parents and teachers. "

"Last Thursday was a great day of professional development as 30 educators from around the Northwest visited Westside's iPad Open House. This was an opportunity for IT directors, teachers and administrators to see students in action and learn about the process of deploying a 1-to-1 iPad program."