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Smart Strategies for Using your iPad at Work

There is a lot of power under the hood of your iPad. The Apple tablet can do almost everything for you that can be done from your computer. With your keyboard and your Apple Pencil, turn your iPad into a miniature workstation.

App Library

The App library is located on the dock, to find and organize apps on your iPad.

The ability to Search at top of screen.
Hide Home Screen pages: Touch and hold an empty area on your home screen, tap the dots near the bottom of your screen, tap the circle under the page that you want to hide and tape done.

Know your Shortcuts

To see a list of shortcuts --> Press and Hold the Command ⌘ key

cmd + H = Go Home
cmd + tab = Open your last used app
Hold cmd and press tab - Display recent apps, use tab key or arrow keys to select
cmd + space bar - Opens universal search bar

Want to add an emoji? Within a text field, quickly find the emoji keyboard.

Multi-window Apps

Some apps support multiple windows (Safari, Notes, Files, Mail) - hidden yet powerful iPad feature!

Touch and hold the app icon in the Dock
Tap " Show All Windows"
Tap "New Window"

Notes App Enhancements

Math-Aware Notes Recognizes and formats equations

To get an in-line solution:

Open or create a new note within the Notes app.
Write or type a math expression (ex: 153 x 3), include an equal sign (=) at the end.
The app will often display the solution automatically.

To create a graph:

Write or type an equation with x and y variables, with y on the left side (ex: y = 5x+3)
Tap the equal sign in the equation.
A menu will appear; tap Insert Graph.

Additionally, create a 3-D graph:

Open the Calculator and select Math Notes (the Math Note will appear within the Notes app)
Enter a function beginning with a Z: (ex: z = 3 - x - 2y)
When equation is recognized, tap on "Insert 3D graph" button.
1. Interact with graph:
  1. Rotate by dragging across it with your finger or Apple Pencil
  2. Zoom in/out with pinch gestures.
  3. Move the graph around in your note by dragging.
  4. You can also resize it by dragging edges or corners.

You can copy the graph and paste into into other apps such as Pages, Keynote, or Mail.

Handwriting Cleanup (Apple Pencil)

This feature, smooths and straightens your handwriting to make it more legible without loosing your personal style.

In the Notes app, open a note where you use the Apple Pencil.
Tap the Markup tool button (pencil icon)
Tap the More button (3 dots)
Turn on Auto-refine Handwriting. Your writing should cleaned up as you write.

To Manually Refine (clean up existing writing):

In a note, use the Lasso tool (dotted line icon in the Markup toolbar) to select the handwriting you want to clean up.
Tap the selected handwriting.
In the options that appear, tap Refine to make it smoother and straighter.

Audio Recording + Audio Transcription

This allows you to record an audio clip directly into a Note and instantly generate a searchable, readable transcript.

To Record and Transcribe:

Open a new note within the Notes app.
Tap the Attachment button (paperclip icon) tap Record Audio.
Tap the Record button (red circle) to start and stop to finish.
Once the recoding is saved, tap the audio recoding block in your note and tap 3 dots.
Select from menu, Add Transcript to Note, Copy Transcript, Find in Transcript, ect...

Live Collaboration Updates

This feature enhances sharing by providing real-time notification about changes made to shared note.

To set up a collaborative note:

Pen the note you want to share in the Notes app.
Tap the Share button and tap Collaborate (instead of send copy)
Set your access and permission options
Send the invitation via Messages or Mail.

In the note itself, swipe right on the note in the Notes list to see the Activity Card, which show who made changes and when.

Scribble Anywhere

Use your Apple Pencil to write anywhere that accepts text entry, Scribble will convert your handwriting to text, great for quickly entering text without putting your pencil down.

From the Notes app, select the pen icon. Then select the pen with letter A on it.

Draw a wavy line to delete a word.
Circle some text to select .
Triple tap - any word to highlight an entire paragraph.

Screenshot of the Notes app on an iPad. There are two sections shown on the screen. To the left, the first section is vertical and has a darker gray background. In the top left, there is a carrot icon pointing left and text that says Folders. To the top right of this section, there is a circle with three dots inside of it. Below that, to the left, there is bolded header text that says notes. Below that is a seach bar with a gray background. In the bar, there is a magnifying glass to the left and text to the right that says Search. In the right part of the search bar, there is a microphone icon. Below that, there are three options in the menu. They are Scribble Scribble (highlighted in yellow), Classroom technology, and Just for you. To the right, of this section is the second section which is wider than the first section. This section has a white background. In the top left of this section, there is an icon with two arrows pointing in opposite directions. In the top right, there are five icons. They are: a circle with a checkmark in it, a camera, a circle with a marker in it (and a pink circle around it), a circle with three dots in it, and a square with a pencil. Below that, there is headline text that says Scribble. Across the bottom, there is a tool bar that is centered on the screen and crossing both sections of the page. The tool bar is white and has rounded corners. The first icon in the tool bar is a gray circle with a dark gray arrow pointing left. The second icon in the toolbar is a grayed out icon of a circle with an arrow pointing right. To the right of that, there are four icons that resemble brushes. The first one has a gray tip and the letter A on it. Around it, is a pink circle. To the right of that, there are three brushes that look the same but have different colors. They are in gray, yellow, and blue. To the right of that, there is a pencil top with a red eraser. To the right of that is a pen icon that is all white. To the right of that, is a white ruler. To the right of that, there are six circles: two rows and three columns. Each circle has a different color, they are black, blue, green, yellow, red, and a circle with a bunch of different colors. To the right of that is a gray circle with three dots inside of it.

Make Perfect Shapes

From the Notes app, automatically recognize shapes. Keep holding the pencil down for a moment after making a shape, your sloppy drawing will turn into perfect geometry!

Take Notes from the Lock Screen

Take notes faster without unlocking your iPad and jump straight into the Notes app.

Tap the middle of the lock screen with your Apple pencil, the default is to create a new note every time.
Can change the default setting:
Settings > Notes > Access Notes from Lock Screen.

Screenshot of an iPad settings menu. To the left, there is a thin, vertical navigation menu with different options. Those options are: Battery (with a green battery icon to the left), Privacy (with a blue square and a white hand icon), App Store (with a blue square with a white "A" icon), Wallet (with a black square and a wallet icon), Passwords (with a gray square and a white key icon), Mail (with a blue square and a white envelope icon), Contacts (with a gray book with the silhouette of a person on the cover), Calendar (with a calendar icon), Notes (with a note pad icon and is highlighted in blue), Reminders (with a white icon with multi-colored dots on it), Voice Memos (with a black square with red sound waves on it), Messages (with a green square and a white speech bubble on it), FaceTime (with a green square and a white video camera icon on it), Safari (with a blue compass icon on it), and News (with a red "N" icon). To the right of this section is a wider section. This section has a gray background. At the top, in the center is bolded text that says Access Notes from Lock Screen. Below that are three options. They all have a white background and have thin lines between them. The options are Off, Always Create New Note (with a blue checkmark to the right), and Resume Last Note. Below this, there is text in gray that says Always create a new note when tapping anywhere on the Lock Screen with Apple Pencil, or pressing the Notes control in Control Center.

Quick Note from the Corner

Using an Apple Pencil or your finger, swipe inward from the bottom right corner of the iPad screen. You can sketch or write within the box with your Pencil or finger. Switch to the keyboard to type. Click on Done to save it.
From Control Center, tap Quick Note icon.
- If you don’t see , add it to Control Center.
  - Go to Settings, Control Center, then choose Quick Note.
- Keyboard short cut-- Press Globe key and Q.

Add a Battery Widget

Today View widgets show you current information from your favorite apps at a glance—today's headlines, weather, calendar events, battery levels, and more. You can add these widgets to your Home Screen to keep this information at your fingertips.

From the Home screen, within the Today View, touch and hold an empty area, tap the Add button (upper left) and select Batteries from list.

Edit a Widget

You can edit widgets from your Home Screen.

From the Home screen, touch and hold a widget to open the quick actions menu.
Tap Edit Widget and choose options.
Tap Done.

iPad home screen with editor menu dispaying

Multitasking: with Stage Manager (Default in iPadOS 26)

iPadOS 26 uses Stage Manager for most multitasking. You can open multiple resizable windows and arrange them freely.

Turn on Stage Manager

Swipe down from the top-right to open Control Center.
Tap the Stage Manager button (looks like a rectangle with smaller rectangles to the side).
Your apps will now open in floating, resizable windows.

Resize & Move Windows

Drag any corner to resize.
Drag the top bar to move a window.
Recent windows appear in a sidebar on the left.

Split View (Side-by-Side Apps)

Split View still works in iPadOS 26, but apps float first under Stage Manager.

Open Two Apps in Split View

Open the first app.
Swipe up to reveal the Dock.
Drag a second app to the far left or far right edge of the screen.
When you see the Split View divider appears, release to place the apps side-by-side.
Resize by dragging the divider between the apps.

Note:

If Stage Manager is ON, the apps appear as floating windows first. To force Split View, drag the second app all the way to the screen edge until the divider appears.

Close Split View

Drag the app divider to the left or right edge of the screen to close one app.

Open an App in Slide Over on iPad

Open your main app.
Swipe up to open the Dock.
Drag an app to the center of the screen, not the edge.
When it appears as a small floating window, release.

Move the Slide Over Window

Drag the top handle to move it left or right.
Use the edge bar to dock it slightly off-screen

Turn Slide Over into Split View

Drag the top handle of the Slide Over window to the left or right edge until the Split View divider appears.
Release to snap it into Split View.

Drag and Drop Between Apps

Drag text, images, links, or files between windows - a major productivity booster.

Touch and hold an item
Drag to the second app in Split View or Stage Manager
Works beautifully with: Files, Safari, Notes, Photos, Mail, and Microsoft apps

Take a Screen Capture

You can use Apple Pencil to quickly take a picture of the iPad screen, then mark it up to share with others or use in documents.

Using the Apple Pencil, swipe inward from the bottom left corner of the iPad screen. You can edit and save the screen shot to photos.

Set Do Not Disturb

From the Control Center, press and hold the Do Not Disturb icon (half Moon). Or from the Settings menu, click on Do Not Disturb.

Ensure your iPad is Backed Up

From the Settings menu > tap your Name > tap iCloud > iCloud Backup.

Drag & Drop

You can drag multiple items around on your iPad.

Tap the first item, move it, and keep your finger on the screen. You can now use your other fingers/hand to enter other apps and select other items.
All these items will be gathered in a pile under your first finger, with a number to let you know how many items you hold.
Navigate to the place you want to pop all these items in, and release your finger.

More Options Using Long Press

Long press the tab icon in Safari to display a range of useful commands.
Long press a link on a page and gently swipe up to access a whole bunch of options, including the ability to Add to Reading List.

iPad dock, with context menu displaying for Safari

Copy and Paste Across Devices

Devices logged into the same Apple ID (and Bluetooth and Wi-Fi are enabled) you can copy and paste between them with ease.

Just select what you want to copy across devices from your iPad, long press it and tap Copy.
Paste it on another device.

Convert to PDF

You can convert files from many common apps to PDFs. This works with Google files, Microsoft 365, Notability, Notes, and more.

Open the file.
Open the print menu (this location varies by application).
Click the Sharrow icon. The file will be converted to PDF by default.
AirDrop it to a different device, or use Save to Files to save it to your device or iCloud files. There are other options as well.

PDF Sharing options such as AirDrop, Mail, Notes, Freeform

Sign a PDF document

Press and hold on the file, then select Quick Look. Tap the pen icon (top right), select Pen, and sign the document using your Apple Pencil.

View Files and Folders in the Apple Files App

Within the Files app, view and open your documents, images, and other files.

From the side bar:

Tap Recents to view recently opened files.
To change the view, click on the icons (top right).

Screenshot of folder and file visibility options. There are three options listed. Each one has a black bullet in front of it. The options are View as icons: Tap (then there's a icon of four squares); View as a list: Tap (then there's an icon of three lines, each line has a bullet followed by a line); and the last is View as columns: Tap (then, there's an icon that shows a rectangle split into three equal sections).

How do I turn off text messaging on my Fisher iPad?

Text Messages as well as FaceTime calls can be distracting when using iPad while working. This can be turned off easily from the Settings menu.

From the Settings menu, tap iMessages and or FaceTime to toggle on or off these tools.

Mind Mapping Apps

A mind map is an intelligent approach to organizing information and representing ideas and concepts graphically.

MindMeister - Online mind mapping application that allows its users to visualize, share and present their thoughts via the cloud.

iThoughts - Mind Map - Enables you to visually organize your thoughts, ideas, and information. Try the free iThoughts2go app first.

Explain Everything - The collaborative whiteboard platform for any device. Note, Sketch, Record, Present. On the free plan, create up to 3 projects with 1 slide per project.

When using educational technology tools, be FERPA aware. To learn more, visit the Registrar's FERPA Guidelines site.

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