Overdrive - eBooks

A not so recent discovery that has been a fantastic find is the app 'Overdrive' which is a eBook reader for the NZ and worldwide libraries.  I was led to this app through the Auckland City Council and my love of books.  It's a great app for adults and even better for students with devices and it's simple and free to access and use.

I'm going to share from the perspective of Auckland City Library - as this is the library I use. However, a quick google, led me to an article saying around 40 NZ libraries had signed up to using Overdrive as one of their core apps (there are several others) to deliver eBooks through.  All you need is to be a member of the particular library in order to issue books.

To use Overdrive, you simply need to download the app which is available on apple and android, as well as a web version.  From here you need to add a library through the side bar, log in using your library card number and you are away.  The app is simple to navigate and move through.  The tool bar on the left hand side gives you access to your library, bookshelf and more.

When searching for books a small symbol on the top right hand corner tells you automatically if they are in (black book) or currently issued (grey book).

 By tapping on the book cover, it takes you to more in-depth information about the book where you can download a small sample of the book, read a blurb, see how many copies are available and how many 'holds' there may currently be on a title.

If the book is currently issued you are able to reserve a book by using the 'Borrow' function. You are able to change options easily and see how many people are ahead of you in the queue before you can get your hands on the book.  The brilliance of this 'holds' area is that you can set up an email alert to let you know when the book has become available for you.  You can set the book to automatically be added to your shelf when it is yours to read. Very handy!

A simple layout of the 'Wish List' - which are the books you would like to come back to at another time.

The account area gives you a quick glance to where you are for issues, holds and how many books are currently available from your wish list too.

I know I have enjoyed watching the range grow and develop.  Overdrive is also involved in the library Big Read - a global event which happens once a year, where 2 books for children/teens are available to read.  People are also invited to take part in the discussion through twitter and blogs.  

Just a quick overview of the Overdrive app - my students have enjoyed beginning to use it and the luxury of having free eBooks at their fingertips.  Happy reading!

Digital Modelling Books - Part 2

This is Part 2 of the previous blog post detailing how I create digital modelling books.

My class setup is an apple TV and TV.  When I am working with a group I link my iPad to the TV via the apple TV through airplay.  This allows whatever is on the iPad to be shown on screen.  My go to app for modelling books has been the handwriting app Penultimate, because it is part of the Evernote family and easily links back to Evernote for keeping.  Penultimate allows you to keep handwritten notebooks of information, which can then be kept in the app or shared to a number of other apps/websites e.g. Google Drive etc.

Penultimate is basic and it's one of the things that I love about it.  It does it's job and does it well without trying to be overly complicated.  It has different coloured pens, eraser, cut, paste and different options for paper types.  Everything I need with no pointless extras.  Everything has a purpose and it serves it well!  It is one of my go to apps in a lot of areas.

Throughout the teaching workshop students and myself record key ideas, information, working out etc into our notebook and at the end of the session it is shared across from Penultimate to Evernote.  Because of the way I have it set up as being a shared notebook, it means that as soon as the Penultimate notebook is synced to Evernote the students can access it via our class website straight away.  This is a huge bonus for me, as the teacher, as I don't need to go back and post content, change it etc - it's available with minimum time.

Adding Content to Shared Evernote Notebooks

Open up Penultimate and it will ask you to sign in - this is to your Evernote account.  So you can enter the same details from your Evernote account above.  If it doesn't ask for this straight away click on the cog in the top left hand corner to link Penultimate to your Evernote account.

Now you are free to start a new notebook by clicking on the plus symbol in the bottom left hand corner.  It will open a new notebook for you to work in.  You will see the main tools, such as pens, eraser, cut, undo etc, down the right hand side.  Extra tools such as adding pictures, changing the paper type, sharing options and more down the left hand side of the screen.

Once you have completed working in the Penultimate notebook click on the home button which is on the top left hand side (it looks like a house).  This will return you to the home screen.  The next step is to share this notebook to Evernote and place it in the correct Evernote maths groups notebook.

The home screen in Penultimate is where you can access all of your Penultimate notebooks. To view them all scroll across to view the different notebooks you have. 

On the home screen you will see three options directly underneath the notebook you are working on or wanting to share.  Click on the first option for 'share' which then gives you the option to 'open in...'

Scroll across to the right and you will see an option for 'Open in Evernote' - click on this.

It will process your notebook into a PDF format and then open up Evernote with the following image.  This is your new note inside Evernote.  The PDF option you see inside the note area is your Penultimate notebook that you have just created.  On this screen you need to rename your note (the first line) and then also choose the notebook you would like it placed inside (the second line).  From here you can save your note and it will be accessible once you have synced your account.

While there are several steps to get these digital notebooks up and running, once you have them set up they are quick and easy to use.  I find that we are able to have a workshop and then have modelling books available straight after a workshop.  There has been a lot of trial and error of finding a way that digital modelling books work for my students.  We have trialled Google presentations and other formats but I am finding this is the easiest option that doesn't require a huge load of work and time to make it useable for the students and myself.  Once the initial setup was complete it has been easy to continue using the modelling books.

Remember, Evernote is the equivalent of a digital book - you can create notebooks and create individual notes that go inside your notebook, just like pages of a book.  This works the same when creating a digital modelling book.  In the case of these digital modelling books Penultimate creates the pages that go inside the Evernote modelling book.

Every time I open Penultimate for a new workshop I simply start a brand new Penultimate notebook by clicking on the plus symbol on the bottom left hand corner.  We add in the notes from our session and then when the workshop is complete I repeat the steps I have outlined above in 'Adding Content to Shared Notebook'.  Always check the second line to ensure that your note is going into your correct shared Evernote notebook, as it will always default to the last Evernote notebook you added content to.  This sounds confusing - but makes sense when you are adding content to your Evernote as you will see which of your groups notebooks it is going to be placed into.

When the students click on the link from our class google site it shows up the whole notebook with all of the workshop notes inside (like in the image below).  Students can easily locate the workshop and click to see all the notes we took as part of that session - exactly as it would be for a paper modelling book.  The accessibility from a range of devices and places and for a number of people at the same time means that it far outweighs the 1 in class paper modelling book I had previously been using.

Digital Modelling Books - Part 1

I have been trialling digital modelling books for mathematics with my students and they seem to be working really well for both my students and my self.  There are a number of key elements that make up this system and in this blog post I will outline the system I am using.  If you are new to using Evernote you may want to have a look at a previous presentation I shared at a mobile learning conference.  It gives you a bit of background as to what it is, however, if in doubt please leave a comment and I will help you out!

Evernote is the equivalent of a digital notebook - you can create notebooks and create individual notes that go inside your notebook, just like pages of a book.

4 main components I use to create digital modelling books:

1. Apple TV with an iPad

2. Penultimate app

3. Evernote app and online/desktop version

4. Google Sites

Setting up Shared Evernote Notebooks:

Notebooks in Evernote are private by default - this allows for your notes to only be seen by you.  However there are options to share these notebooks and to allow others to work on notebooks as well.  The last option is a paid feature of Evernote.  All the steps I talk about below are able to be completed with a free Evernote account and free Penultimate app.

Firstly, in our class Evernote account, I set up a notebook for each of my groups, for example; maths groups.  Notebooks are able to be created on both the app and online, however, I prefer to do this part through Evernote on a browser or the desktop version.  These notebooks are set up in our class Evernote account - we have 1 shared account for my entire class that we all use.

Once a notebook has been set up for each group, I set up a shared link for each of the notebooks that I want to have public access to.  To do this hover over the notebook and choose the share icon (there are a number of ways to do this):

It gives you several options to choose from - choose the last option: Publish. 

This allows people to access your Evernote notebook if they have the link.

It will take you to a new pop up window and the final step is to copy the Public URL - this is what I use so students are able to access the notebooks from our class website.  

These notebooks are accessed by my students through our class google site - so from here I copy the link and paste it on our maths area on our google site.  This makes our maths content accessible from one place for my students from home and school.  It allows them to easily find the information and support that they need.  Also parents can access them to support students with their learning.

If you are going to send students directly to this URL you may want to use a web link shortening service like bit.ly to make the link more accessible for students as the link Evernote provides is very long.

Your final step here is to open up Penultimate and link the app to your Evernote account.  To do this click on the 'Settings' button in the top left hand corner and add your Evernote account details.  Once they are linked you will not have to do this again, unless you sign out.

You don't need to worry too much about your Evernote notebooks again until right at the end.  When you share your Penultimate notes to Evernote it will give you an option to choose the Evernote notebook you want to place the note into.

The next post will detail how to use Penultimate as your modelling books and then share these notes across to your Evernote notebooks to make them immediately accessible for your students.

QR Codes

I've been talking a lot to one of our fantastic school librarians about utilising QR Codes in the school library.  We decided that my class would have a go at creating QR Code reviews for our junior students.  As each class has 2 iPad 2's in their class, we thought that they could bring them to the library and use them to listen to reviews and recommendations about books.

After a bit of research and the amazing twitterverse I came across a site called QR Voice - which allows you to create voice QR Codes from text.  The only drawback is that it only allows 100 characters! Eek! But this worked out to be quite a fun element to creating our QR Code recommendations.

The following is the step through of the session for developing these in your class.

Developing Voice QR Codes using QRVoice.net

Prior to the creating the QR Codes:

Session 1:
Spend some time together talking about QR Codes - have the students seen them before? Most of my students had seen them out and about but only 1-2 had knowledge of what they were for.  We talked about where we had seen them and then I showed the kids an example of what we were going to do.  This had them hooked in as they loved the QR Code scanning process.

Session 2:
The students self selected a text from our school library that they thought would be a great read for a Year 1/2 student.  This was done a week before the session.  This gave them time to read it in class and to a year 2/3 buddy throughout the week.  It helped them to be more familiar with the text - which is important.

Creating the QR Codes:

We came together around the data projector and went over what we know about QR Codes.  The kids were buddied up in pairs, selected by the teacher for a range of abilities.  Each part was broken up to allow the students to work through each element.  As groups of kids finished I ran quick workshops sharing the next stage.  This worked really well as it allowed us a group of finishers who became experts helping out other students etc.

Step 1 - Creating the recommendation/review

To create the review we encouraged kids to come up with 2-3 keywords from the story that explains the story and would make people want to read that story.  We talked a bit about who our audience was - 5/6 year olds and what would interest them.  We discussed genres and how that would help someone decide if it was a good book for them or not.  The key here is to also remember that QRVoice.net will only allow 100 characters to be used for the QR Code it creates.

An example is the book Boy by Roald Dahl
(This was the class example I used with my year 5/6 students.  My students all used picture books aimed at year 1 and 2 students)

Keywords were:
Funny - funny stories
Tricks - Roald Dahl played a lot of tricks
Autobiography - Roald Dahl as a kid

The next step was to then use these keywords to create 2 sentences that landed under 100 characters.  They would form at least 2 sentences that used the keywords and recommended the book.

Example:

This autobiography is a great read for those that like funny stories and great tricks.

A great read for those people who like funny books, tricks, practical jokes and more in this great read.

An autobiography that shares Roald Dahls funny childhood. Tricks, practical jokes and more.  It's a must read!

From here they then used the 100 characters template to see if it would fit in 100 characters or less.

Step 2: Creating the QR Code

I created a folder on our server that contained everything the students needed for this session.  This included:

- A html link to the QRVoice.net website
(To create this just click on the website address and drag it down to the desktop - it will give you an icon you can quickly click on to link to that website.)
- The 100 hundred characters template
- 100 hundred characters example
- QR Code Template
- Folder for finished QR Codes to go into

You could easily do all of this through google docs but for this session we used Pages as the placeholder for the QR codes.  It was easier to collate them all again at the end and print them.

Students went to QR Voice and typed in their recommendation.

When they were complete they clicked on the blue button to the side and their QR Code was created.

The students then took a screen shot of the QR Code ready for the next step.

The QR Code template was then opened up in Pages.  Students deleted the example QR Code and dropped their new QR Code in it's place.  They then updated the title of the book and reviewer.  Once this was complete the students used 'File' and 'Save As' to create their own saved QR Code into the finished folder.

To help step through this process I included the instructions again on the bottom of the QR Code template - this allowed the students another place to refer to when creating their codes.

An example of the template is below:

The kids then stuck them to the front of their books.  We have been using the class iPod and student devices to access the codes using QR Reader or i-nigma.  The kids have loved sharing their learning with each other and seeing the end product.

QRVoice is a great wee tool - the voice is a bit robotic but it's a bit of fun.  Our next step is to continue using them with our fotobabble book sells and book reviews on our class blogs and websites to share more reviews with our school.  I'm really keen to keep utilising voice and video with the QR Codes to allow access for a range of students across the school.

If you have any other questions please leave a comment and I will get back to you.

You are also able to download the 100 characters template here.

Top 5 iPhone Travel Apps

It's been a fair while since posting here!

Over the last 5 weeks I've taken this small kiwi girl to the big wide world as I travelled around Europe.  I have had the most amazing adventures and feel like through all my experiences I've brought a lot to my life as well as into my classroom.

I downloaded a lot... many... heaps... of apps before I went away and there were a good range of them that were quickly deleted!  This post is a quick wrap up of the travel apps that I found to be the most beneficial and worthwhile.

Here are my top 5 (+1) iPhone travel app picks:

Tripit - Free - http://www.tripit.com/
http://itunes.apple.com/nz/app/tripit-travel-organizer-free/id311035142?mt=8

This handy little app was suggested to me by a well travelled friend.  Boy was it worth it's weight in gold! Tripit is simple in what it does and it does it well.
Once you create an account with Tripit and link it to your email it scans through and locates any trip information emails and automatically adds it to your itinerary for that trip.  So you don't need to enter in details and bits of information for your trip - it does it for you!  This was super handy with a trip that had around 11 flights within it! A few minutes after the confirmation email was sent through to my email I would receive an email from tripit letting me know it had been added to my itinerary.  I could flick open the app on my iPhone and there in my 'Europe Trip' would be the new flight added.  There was one flight that Tripit didn't pick up - this was extremely easy to add in my myself from within the app (it can also be done on the website).  The best thing about this is that via the app or website I had access to all my travel scedule, numbers, locations and more!  You can also pay for the full version which includes many features such as a flight checker - that checks to see if your flight is on time or delayed.  If you're a frequent flyer it would be a handy feature!

TripColor - Free http://www.tripcolor.com/
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/tripcolor-social-travel-sharing/id459934160?mt=8

Tripcolor was by far my most used app for the entire trip.  It's such an easy to use and effective app that allowed me to be able to share my trip with friends and family via online photo albums.
Once you set up your account you create a new trip - from here you can add photos to your trip, date/timestamp and information/notes about the photo.  The best feature of TripColor was the fact that it used the location information to keep a map of where each photo had been taken.  For example, on my trip to Berlin, I could see all the locations in Berlin I had taken photos.  When viewing it online via the trip photo map I could roll over on the location dot and it would show the photo that was taken in that location! Fantastic!  Check out the TripColor Demo albums here - you need to click on the individual trips to view the map and images.  I will continue to use this even though I'm home - it's a great way to record small trips as well as large ones!

Instagram - Free  http://instagr.am/
http://itunes.apple.com/nz/app/instagram/id389801252?mt=8

If you're a photo freak you'll know about instagram.  It's kinda hard not to after their 1 billion dollar sale to Facebook.  Anyway - Instagram is a photo sharing app that is a must have if you love to take photos.  Create a network of friends and new friends to share your photos with!  You can add hashtags (#) to your posts to link them to certain areas, places and countries along your travels.  It's a great way to link in and find some great places to visit while you are there too!

Guidepal Apps - Free - http://guidepal.com/
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/guidepal-city-guides/id507161832?mt=8

Guidepal offer apps for a huge range of cities!  The app provides you with a guidebook to the area you are visiting.  I found their range of apps to be one of the easiest to navigate.  Once open it gives you a chance to explore in areas such as history and information about the city, attractions, nightlife, food and more.  In each section it's clearly laid out and gives a range of information that is very worthwhile reading.  You can also have a look on the map to see what's close to you.  Augmented Reality is built in to the app - once you open the 'Nearby' section it will show you the name, distance and direction to local attractions and more.  A great range of features!

Timeout - Free -  http://www.timeout.com/london/feature/393/time-out-travel-apps-for-iphone

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/london-travel-guide-time-out/id406332146?mt=8

Timeout offers a range of guidebook apps for cities around Europe.  This was my other 'go to' guidebook that I located a range of interesting attractions and points of interest in the cities I visited.  Timeout is a magazine that is published for purchase around London.  It lists the what's what and main events that are great to attend at that time.  It's seasonal and up to date which I really liked.  The app had a great range of suggestions and led me to a pretty amazing Flamenco dancing show while I was in Barcelona! Worth having a look through when you're new to a city to get a range of ideas and information.

Happycow - $3  http://www.happycow.net/
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/happycow-vegan-vegetarian/id435871950?mt=8

Being vegan and travelling to different countries with a range of languages can be a bit daunting! Not with this app! Happycow is a website that lists vegetarian, vegan and health stores in your area.  The app does exactly this but with the added bonus of using your gps information to tell you how close or far away cafes and restaurants are from you.  This was a great app to locate yummy restaurants through the review feature, where previous customers can leave a review and star rating.

Fotobabble on the iPad

Two of the best Websites that have an iPod/iPad App are Fotobabble and Evernote (more on Evernote later). I first heard about Fotobabble through Fiona Grant. Fotobabble is a quick and easy way for students to share the work that they create on the iPad with audio and upload it to the net to embed anywhere.

Students can create work on the iPad using a range of Apps such as the Martians App or any other drawing/photo App available. Once the image is stored in the iPad's photos it is accessible to the Fotobabble App.

Students simply select their image and then press the record button. Recording is allowed for short bursts of 30 seconds - which is the only drawback for somethings. Once they have recorded they can play back and listen to their work before deciding to publish it or re-record.

Once they have completed their recording a simple button push to save the work uploads it to the Fotobabble site. The interesting thing is that the students can view their Fotobabble via the list in the Fotobabble App but as soon as it is posted to the blog it cannot be viewed via the iPad because of the lack of Flash. See an example of a completed Fotobabble here.

iPad - First Free Apps

Best Free Apps so far...

StoryKit
Students are able to read books that are already available within the App. The best part of this App lies in it's ability to be able to change or add to these stories. But also for the students to create their own stories that story on the shelf in the App for later reading. Inside the App the students are able to type, select images from their photo library and draw their own illustrations using the paint utility. Lots of great opportunities with this.

PopMath
A cool wee App where students match up basic fact sums by popping matching balloons as they move around the screen. Had me hooked after the first play - you need to pay for the full App to get more than addition problems.

NoteTakerLite & Use Your Handwriting (UYH)
Both of these Apps are easy to navigate and allow you to take notes and store them so that you can order them and bring them up when necessary.

Bump
A great wee tool shown to me by Belinda Johnston. Two iTouches/iPad's "bump" together to exchange files easily. A simple way to pass files around from student to student.

GS Lite - Green screening
A simple tool for green screening photos.

Other notable Apps..

FreddyFraction - Fraction game for kids
FilterStorm - Amazing image editing suite
iStudiez Lite
"2009 Best App Ever Award Winner in Education category!"
A way for students to timetable in their days
Whiteboard
A collaborative whiteboard that shows on each of the iPads.
Toy Story
A read along for kids with a range of other activities as well as a record story feature.

I'm looking forward to seeing what the kids think of these Apps also. I can see some good potential from a range of them. If you have any other great Apps that you are using across iTouch/iPad's feel free to leave a comment to share your great finds!