iPad Apps for School

The Best iOS Apps for Students and Teachers

writing

Use Little Story Maker to Create Custom Books on Your ipad

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Screen Shot 2012-12-21 at 9.04.38 AM Little Story Maker is a great little app that adults and children can use to create their own custom books on their iPads. The app provides book templates that you complete with your own images, text, and voice narration. All of the books that you create are stored in your Little Story Maker bookshelf.

To create a book in Little Story Maker start by adding a title, add a cover image by selecting from your iPad’s camera roll, then choose a template for your book. On each page you can add an image from your camera roll and type the text for your page. If you want to add narration to your book simply click the “record audio” button after typing your text. Then you can add narration that will play on the page.

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After you create your book it is saved in your Little Story Maker bookshelf. When you read the book you will have three options to choose from. You can read it on your own, have it read to you, or you can tap “auto play” to have the book read and pages turned for you.

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Little Story Maker is a free app that could be used by elementary school students to create short stories about real events that they’ve observed and photographed with their iPads. For example, you could take your students on a walking tour of the neighborhood and have them write a story about it when they return to your classroom.

Two Apps to Help Children Learn to Write the Alphabet

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Screen Shot 2012-12-13 at 11.15.31 PM Even though children today are growing up in a digital world, they still need to learn basic handwriting. When you and I learned to write it was on paper that had extra large lines to help us form our letters. Today, that same concept is applied to many apps in the App Store. I recently tried out a bunch of these apps and found two that I like.

Alphabet Tracing is a free app that shows students how to draw uppercase and lowercase letters and allows them to trace on the letters on the app. The app also shows children how to write numbers one through nine. Alphabet Tracing uses little toy trains and caterpillars to show students which way to trace each letter and number. It’s a simple app that lacks sound, but I like its simplicity.

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ABC Writing Zoo Animals is the other alphabet app that I like. The app has two basic modes; writing letters and writing words. In the writing letters mode students see an animal whose name starts with the same letter that they have to trace. In the writing words mode students see a word and hear it read then trace the letters to spell the word. ABC Writing Zoo Animals is a freemium app. Up to letter “H” is free. For the full alphabet the app costs $1.99.

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