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Category Archives: apps

Cursive App

This is my attempt to generalize a skill. ‘Generalize’ is when a learned skill is used in different situations. In this case I worry that improving cursive on an iPad does not necessarily translate to the ability to do neater cursive on paper. Here is my solution. The app is Intro to Cursive from Montessorium. The student traces a letter with a stylus on the iPad then must write the same letter on a cue card. This seems to be far less overwhelming then simply giving the student a cursive worksheet (although I am hoping we can work up to that). Keep generalization in mind when teaching a new skill.

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A Google App

We are finding the GOOGLE Read and Write extension helpful. My students are using it for word prediction as they type and reading websites or written work aloud. The extension even has a dictionary and speech to text tool. It shows up in the student’s google toolbar everytime and anywhere they log in. You can download a trial. We think it’s great!

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Teaching About Nonfiction Text

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We were learning about the features of nonfiction text. We put these flip books in our interactive notebook. It was free at the TPT store. Check it out here.

After this, we took iPads to the library, took pictures of different features and the students made a shadow puppet, emailing the final product to me.
Check out this one (see if you can find the one misake):

Appy Friday

This app is free right now (I subscribe to “Apps Gone Free” and “Appsfire” to try many apps when they come on sale):

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This looks like a great app for the early learners! It first requires the child to match letters in the alphabet, then put the letters in order, and then moves on to finding the missing letters. The activities can be done with upper or lowercase letters.

Appy Friday

Useful app this week: Intro to Cursive. It was free one day on Apps Gone Free so I tried it with a third grader and definitely recommend it for extra cursive practice at home or at school.

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Another Appy Friday

20140110-145756.jpg A friend at lunch one day said,” I know an app that you will love.” Well, he was right! Shadow Puppet allows you to narrate photos and saves it all as a video. I have used it with a study group, taking pictures of the whiteboard with our notes, recording info, then emailing the video of this to each student making studying at home much easier and much more independent. I used it today to take a picture of an old heater vent in my classroom and record the rattles so that I could send the resulting video to our VP to get the needed repairs. I have snapped photos of a student’s review sheet, recorded myself reading it, then sent it to students to help them study for a test.
This is a video I made for a student explaining Pyramid Facts (she joined our class after I had already taught it to everyone else, this got her caught up.)


The emailed videos can also be viewed on a PC.

Pre-teaching Vocabulary

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Working on pre-reading (is that the right word?) strategies I thought I was pretty clever today. I had the vocabulary on cards:

20130919-193754.jpgthen made up QR Codes that students could scan with their iPod or iPad and be taken directly to websites.

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One website was a YouTube video of harpsichord playing, another had a definition of the harpsichord, and the third had a YouTube video of Mozart’s music. Pretty cool, right?

Well, students were told that it is a good strategy to ask yourself questions before reading so that their mind is “in gear” and ready for the topic. I asked them to write some questions.

20130919-194418.jpg The first question I got:

Do only old people listen to this music?

sigh

Click here for a copy of the Before Reading Poster.

Appy Friday!

Today some students read a short nonfiction passage, then scanned the question sheet that went with it, highlighted their answers right on their iPod or iPad, then emailed it to me.

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The app was Fasterscan.

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Students were so excited with this today! No pencil, just their iPod or iPad! AND they were gladly reading!! A win win.

A Fun App for an English Language Learner

I had fun with this one:

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“Over” from Potluck.
It allows you to type over a photo.
A new student, that spoke no English, wandered the school with me and with my ipad. He took pictures of his classmates and teachers. Together we added names over the photos. After that I used the Pic Stitch app from Big Blue Clip to put the labelled photos into a collage and print them.
It was a fun way to begin learning names.

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Speech Therapy App

Another app. I like this one for articulation practice. You can choose a target sound and record the speech for instant feedback. You can choose whether the target sound will be in the beginning, middle, or end of the word. Best of all, it’s free!

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