iPad Apps for School

The Best iOS Apps for Students and Teachers

Archives for June 2014

Shadow Puppet Releases an Edu Version Students Can Use to Create Videos

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Screen Shot 2014-06-27 at 7.08.29 AM Shadow Puppet is an iPad app for creating short audio slideshow videos. Yesterday, the same developers introduced Shadow Puppet Edu. Shadow Puppet Edu is a free iPad app that students can use to create audio slideshow videos. The app offers an integrated search tool that students can use to find pictures from the Library of Congress, to search for images from NASA, and to find Creative Commons licensed images from Flickr. Students can also import pictures from the camera roll on their iPads.

After selecting a set of images students can arrange them into any sequence by simply dragging and dropping them into order. Then to create a story students press the record button and talk while flipping through the images. Shadow Puppet Edu allows students to add text and stickers to each image too. When they’re happy with their work students can share their Shadow Puppet Edu projects through a variety of methods including YouTube and email. Shadow Puppet Edu projects are automatically saved to the camera roll on a student’s iPad.

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Shadow Puppet Edu is free. Students do not have to register for an account or have an email address to use Shadow Puppet Edu.

Create Short Biographies With Morfo 3D Faces

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Screen Shot 2014-06-26 at 6.05.58 PM Yesterday, at the Catholic Schools Foundation Summer Tech Conference at Boston College I saw a fantastic panel discussion on using technology in K-2 classrooms. One of the really neat things that I saw was an example of students using Morfo 3D Faces to create short biographies. Morfo 3D Faces is an iPad app that you can use to create a talking picture of person’s face. You can take a picture of a person or you can take a picture of a picture of a person (think taking a picture of a picture of George Washington). Once you’ve captured the picture you can customize the face by altering the eyes, mouth, and nose to move as you talk. After customizing the picture you can record yourself talking.

In the example that I saw yesterday students used Morpho 3D Faces to create short biographies about historical figures that they learned about in their history lessons. Students recorded themselves talking as if they were the historical figure. Students gave pieces of information like birthdate, what the person is known for, and when the person died.

Pocket Law Firm – A Civics Game for Students

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pocekt_law Pocket Law Firm is a fun iPad app created by iCivics and Filament Games. Pocket Law Firm is the iPad version of the popular iCivics online game called Do I Have a Right? In the game students play the role of the head of a law firm specializing in Constitutional Law. To succeed in the game students have to review the claims of the potential clients and match them to a lawyer who specializes in the appropriate aspect of Constitutional Law.

Students earn points in Pocket Law Firm by matching claims to suitable lawyers. Students also earn points by identifying the aspects of the Constitution that apply to a particular case. Students can use the points they earn to expand their law firms and to decorate their offices.

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How to Combine Tellagami Clips in iMovie

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tellagami Tellagami is a great app for creating short digital stories on an iPad or on an Android device. The shortcoming of the app is that you can only record one scene before you have to save the movie to your iPad. Today, I facilitated a workshop in which we created a bunch of Tellagami stories. Many people in the workshop wanted to combine their Tellagami clips to create a longer video. The easiest way to do that on an iPad is to use iMovie. In the video below I demonstrate how you can combine Tellagami video clips in iMovie.

Modio – Design 3D Robots for Printing

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modio Modio is a new and free iPad app that anyone can use to design model robots for 3D printing. The app features a large collection of robot parts that you snap together to design your 3D robot model. You can mix and match parts to heart’s content. Modio provides a visualization screen that will reveal the dimensions of your model before you print it. Included with those dimensions is an estimate of the time it will take to print the model.

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I tried Modio this morning and found the model robot design interface to be intuitive and easy to use. The downloading and printing options were not quite as easy to figure out. The download and print options are found by tapping the little model robot icon in the bottom-left corner of the screen that you see while constructing a model. You will probably have to reserve some time for teaching students the intricacies of printing options.