Personal Technology Tips in Plain English
Posts tagged ipad
The M(oblie) Generation & The iPad Dad
Oct 19th
It used to be that you went to with your black and white marbled composition notebooks.
Then loose-leaf binders — those Trapper Keepers were the best!
These days it’s quite different, even for the littlest ones in our grade schools. . .
This month, I was interviewed as an iPad Dad for Forbes Magazine — they were looking to uncover what’s happening in our schoolhouses across the country. Originally, I thought I was at the forefront with my kids. But in reality, our kids aren’t as much of an outlier as I initially thought.
At this point, the iPad has taken the first steps for tablets in becoming the notebook killer in our schools.
According to Forbes, over 2,300 schools have brought in the iPad to the classroom. And in fact, over 600 schools have set-up a 1:1 ratio in classes.
The iPad is inspiring the sort of learning and creativity in Jahng’s kids that Heathkits, crystal radios and, let’s be frank, PCs, did for generations past.
Here’s the article that come out in Forbes:
Education no longer is just about the content, but also about the medium. That impacts creation, curation and consumption all together.
It’s refreshing to see our schools embracing the need to look at the curriculum from such a different approach. The final trajectory promises to certainly be quite different for this M(obile) Generation.
What do you think about all this tech in the classroom? Good for the kids? Bad? Share a comment below.
Blogging On My iPad with Blogsy App
Jun 12th
One of the biggest challenges in becoming a successful blog author and publisher is to figure out ways of integrating that actual sitting down and writing a blog post into your daily workflow.
And usually, producing posts take longer than your really think it will take, at least when you’re first starting out – mostly for the little things that add up like formatting, making sure you have appropriate graphics or photos accompanying each posts, etc.
This is why with my coaching clients, we spend a lot of time upfront trying to reduce the friction in getting things out of the blogger’s head and into the computer. If you can solve that ongoing battle for your time and attention’ you are in a for a great blogging experience. The question is just how can you do that?
So I was very happy to hear about the Blogsy app for iPad the other week. The developer was kind enough to let me take the app for a spin for this review and so far I’m impressed.
This just might do the trick for my writing praxis while I am out and about with my iPad.
Out of the gate, there are a couple of things I really appreciate about the Blogsy app. Here are 3 of them:
- You can easily search for video/images on Flickr, Picassa, YouTube, or even search on the web for images — all right from inside the app. This is a huge time saver since on the iPad, you would normally have to jump out of the app, launch a new one, find the image or video, copy paste the copy for it and then go back to the writing application. You don’t understand the convenience until you do it yourself with Blogsy.
I do wish Blogsy supports Vimeo soon. It seems like it is on the to-do list to add for new capabilities by the developer. But at least you can use the in-app browser to go to vimeo.com and grab the HTML embed code.
- You can manipulate any inline embeded image and video size via pinch and zoom. Again, one less hassle which actually takes advantage of the iPad platform touch screen controls.
- Multiple blogs support. Anyone that is a serious bloger is more likely to have multiple blogs. Having access to all of them from one app is a treat. . .especially when I am on a trip, I won’t have to consider bringing my laptop or not. This makes my iPad just that more productive while I am traveling or out of the office for extended periods of time.
Blogsy just got updated to version 2.0 this week, and I have seen a couple of crashes, but I assume these will be addressed in the coming weeks by the developer.
I have written a couple of drafts already in Blogsy, but this is my first live blog posting by the actual Blogsy app itself.
I will be blogging more about Blogsy 2.0 and beyond as I continue to use it, especially on an upcoming international trip where I will certainly ditch my laptop for the iPad (actually, with TeamViewer, I will be able to use my laptop on my iPad remotely just in case, but that is another blog post).
Are you a blogger with an iPad? How do you write and publish blog posts on your iPad? Please leave a comment below!
14 Educational iPhone Apps Parents Should Know About
Sep 17th
If you’re a parent like me, making the most out of any screen time is something you have to attack with relentless pursuit. Instead of letting our kids become TV or game device zombies, there’s an alternative in today’s tech-dominated world.
With hundreds of thousands of apps being sold in the iTunes app store, there’s got to be a handful of great educational app, right?
Well, I was relieved and excited when I found out that there are in fact a bunch of really good educational apps available to choose from.
Here’s a selection of educational apps that fellow parents, teachers and app developers themselves have tipped me off about so that you can go straight to the App Store and start download these apps for your kids. . . Read the rest of this entry »
I love tech, gadgets and the web. Hope you pick-up a useful tip or two here today that helps you use technology to your advantage! Better yet, why not share your own expertise in a comment on a post today to help the other readers that land here for answers!