Tablets & Apps for Education

Check this video out for the modern uses of tablets and iPads in classrooms.

iAnnotate

This component will focus on how tablets can be used as whiteboards, and I believe that the computer in this regard is still far more superior to them in terms of what it can do. However, there are many other things that tablets might do that computers might not or even won't be as good. The first thing that came into mind is how tablets and iPads can be used to read online materials, such as PDF files. An application that I came across recently is called iAnnotate PDF. This application is not free but it is not expensive either. It costs about $3.99 for a lifetime version.

You may open and edit PDF, PPT, and DOC files in this application. Students can read and highlight texts pretty easily. This is not all. Actually, students can add their notes either using a stylus pen or their own fingers. Alternatively, they may just type their notes. What I liked most about this application is that the user may add a voice note to the file and save it.

So comments, notes, and recorded notes can be now added to the course material with ease. The book does not have to be a static thing anymore. Students can now add what ever they want to it, including emoticons, pictures, and various forms of notes. These changes are not permanent, meaning that the user may decide to take out a selection that he made or delete a note that he wrote, etc. After all these changes have been added, the user may now save the document with all the changes inside it for future reference and may also share it with others.

Courseera

Another way of using tablets that I thought teachers might utilize is the use of some course-ware of some MOOCs. When I looked some of them up, I found that EDx.org has a mobile version that works only in smartphones but there is not tablet version. However, Coursera did provide a tablet version to access its content. I think this application can be of great use to students and teachers for educational purposes.

Once the application is installed into the device, you are required to log in or sign up for a free account. However, most of courses are not free, but not terribly expensive either. Some courses range between $20 to $45. Courses are categorized in a way that makes it east to access whatever course of interest the students might want to enroll in.

After choosing the course of interest, the student might look into the introduction and general contents of the course to get a hint of whether this course is of interest to them or not. A brief introduction video is usually provided in which a/the professor of the course gives a general overview of what to expect to learn in this course. Also, the topics to be discussed and explored will be shown but locked and can't be accessed until the student enrolls in the course and pays the fees.

It is important not to forget to mention that Coursera also provides some free courses that students might enroll in but without having a certificate. For example, a free course that is offered for free is a course in design and make infographics which is a project-oriented course and students need to meet some certain deadlines to pass the course. Overall, I believe that if all MOOC providers create a tablet application to help access their databases, it would be of great benefit for the students as well as the teachers.