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Category Archives: iDevices

A plan for applying the SAMR model to a Middle School ICT task

28 Nov

Page from my current Dreamweaver handoutI teach Middle School (Years 7-10) ICT and Senior School (Years 11-13) Computer Science at a New Zealand secondary school. On the back of some PD I’ve been doing with colleagues regarding eBooks, I’ve been reflecting on what I can do in my subject area if all students had an iPad in class.

I sat down yesterday and starting looking at my Year 9 Website Design unit. My initial reflections considered what seems to be working well and what still causes issues (I’ve been teaching the unit in some form or another for several years). Currently, the basic task centres around students developing a 4 page website on a topic that they have studied during the year (any subject). Software used is Dreamweaver CS5.5 and Fireworks / Photoshop CS5.5

Oh yes, and all this in one 40min lesson a week! :)

What currently works well

  • A lot of students respond well to my Dreamweaver handout (see image), which provides a step-by-step guide, including lots of images, regarding how to use Dreamweaver.
  • Video tutorials aligned with the handout are available for students in Blackboard as well.
  • It’s a great task to differentiate learning needs for students at the upper end of the spectrum. For example, I get extension students to write their code by hand, use HTML5 and Javascript, get them using external stylesheets etc.

What currently doesn’t work well

  • A lot of students still don’t get the importance of a website’s root folder, no matter how many times (and in different ways) I’ve tried to get this through to them. Spatial awareness or just plain poor file management??
  • A surprising ignorance regarding file types and file management by students.
  • Still a fair amount of misunderstanding by students regarding what actually goes into the creation of a website.
  • Still too much copying and pasting from Wikipedia etc, especially from less able students.

With these thoughts in mind, I placed the unit alongside the SAMR model of technology integration and came up with several conclusions:

  1. Creating an eBook in iBooks Author will allow students to have both text/images AND videos in one place – an improvement (for some students) on my current setup.
  2. I can get students working on an iPad up to the modification level. At the redefinition level, the iPad is replaced with other technology (see below).
  3. This may take me longer than I thought…

So, here’s what I’m thinking – updating my current website design unit by placing it within the context of the SAMR model.

REDEFINITION
  • Use a free online host and get students to upload their web pages and images here
  • The website is therefore ‘live’ and students submit their URL rather than (or in addition to??) a zipped root folder
  • Yes – need to test multiple logins at once onto one host from the school network though
MODIFICATION
  • Students use a wireframe iPad app to plan their page design. A way of increasing the emphasis on the planning process involved in web design, not just technical skills in Dreamweaver etc
  • Yes – could be a starter
AUGMENTATION
  • Convert the current Dreamweaver handout into an eBook
  • ePub – can incorporate video tutorials with text / images
  • iBook – can include video tutorials AND reviews AND create an HTML5 widget of a project checklist
  • Yes – thinking iBooks Author at this stage
SUBSTITUTION
  • Current Dreamweaver handout (printed) is provided to students in PDF form
  • No, I can do better than this. May as well stick to the status quo of a hardcopy workbook if this is all I can come up with!

I still want the focus on students creating web pages from scratch rather than using a content management system. I want them to gain an understanding of what goes into creating websites, both from a technical standpoint and in terms of content (we also go over how to write content for the web – use of shorter sentences / paragraphs, sub-headings, lists etc to chunk content). I want to encourage creation over consumption and extend all students in the process.

If I take my current unit / resources I can try and create a more effective learning experience for students by:

  • Packaging how-to guides AND video tutorials in one place (i.e. an eBook) instead of having them as separate entities as they are now
  • Using the iPad as a consumption device – eBook
  • Using the iPad also as a creation device – wireframe app
  • Providing a real-world context for students in more than just content (i.e. they currently base the website on a topic they’ve studied in another class) by getting them to upload live sites. This will hopefully get more students understanding that images exist independently from web pages and the online host will likely have limits to file size – another important consideration I’d like students to recognise.

So there it is. My plan to improve an existing unit by incorporating two elements on the iPad (augmentation and modification – eBook notes and wireframe exercise) and use desktops in the computer lab to also tap into the redefinition level of the SAMR model.

I’ll let you know how it goes later on!

 
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Posted by on November 28, 2012 in BYOD, eBooks, iBooks Author, iPad

 

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Interactive eBooks and websites share common traits

20 Nov

Apple's iBooks Author for interactive ebooksWhat I’ve been up to…

Well, a long time has past since my last post, but over the past few weeks I’ve been spending quite a bit of time on iBooks Author, both in learning the nuances of the software and with an aim to help support colleagues create their own eBooks for Middle School.

Up until this week the only examples of interactive textbooks of which I’m thinking were the ‘Life on Earth’ and ‘The Beatles Yellow Submarine’ samples, both of which came out when iBooks Authors was first released in January this year. However, the newly supported iBookstore in New Zealand has a ‘Made with iBooks Author’ section, found in the non-fiction category, which I’ve found really useful. It’s a great thing to be able to view what others have done with this technology and internalise what we could do with it in our own contexts. Especially since the textbook category is still not supported by the NZ iBookstore.

Similarities between interactive eBooks and websites

Coming from experience in web design, I’ve noticed that a lot of the workflow and methodologies used when working with iBooks Author is very similar to that used when designing and building websites. A summary is below:

Templates

Websites use stylesheets and interactive ebooks use the layout panel.

Whatever it’s called, the result’s the same. Different page layouts, background designs and house style (for want of a better term) can be customised AND deployed from a central point. This greatly saves time in the construction of your document and any modifications to the design can be updated everywhere instantaneously. If your staff are familiar with the slide master in PowerPoint, it’s the same thing here too.

Asset Optimisation

File size is an issue for web page download times and eBooks. If a school went down the route of having all digital textbooks, consideration needs to be given to the management of these documents. If students have 6 classes, each of which has it’s own ebooks distributed, and only a 16GB iPad we could have a problem.

I’ve had it said to me that we’d just teach students to manage their documents; essentially get them to transfer files to and from iTunes when needed in order to save space on their iPad. I see two immediate problems with this:

  1. That’s just too much for some students (you know the ones I mean…11 years old and totally disorganised whether analogue or digital…)
  2. It’s actually a barrier when it comes to study. Students want need access to all available resources when studying for a term test or exam. Why should huge file sizes of eBooks prevent them from doing this effectively?

So where am I going with this? With the inclusion of video, audio and large images in interactive ebooks, it’s no wonder that the full version of ‘Life on Earth’ is over 1GB! Imagine if the majority of texts available to your students were that huge.

What can we do about it?

A lot, actually, especially if you’re compiling interactive ebooks in-house.

  • VIDEO – embed clips from external sources instead of including within the book itself. Sure, this means that students need to be online to view the material, but you may not require all students to do this separately whilst in class anyway. Use the YouTube widget from www.bookry.com or head over to http://ibooksgenerator.com for YouTube and Vimeo options (I’ve also asked them for something similar with Educreations videos I’ve created – here’s hoping!)
  • IMAGES – regardless of your source, make sure you’ve optimised them before placing in the book. Resize the image in a program like Adobe Photoshop or Adobe Fireworks first. Also, like web design, you don’t need to use the best quality images for books produced in iBooks Author. Viewing images on a screen means you can remove pixels and decrease the image’s file size (without becoming pixelated) and still produce a very good result. Remember, images for print need to be the best possible, but there’s a lot more leeway for the screen…

Chunking of Content

Content is king, but the way we present that content is equally important. I’ve noticed that some of my student handouts are not as suitable for an eBook as I had originally thought they would be.

Why?

They were written for print, not the screen. Like websites therefore, the use of sub-headings, bulleted lists and short sentences are often more effective in imparting content via a screen. You can still have your explanation, but in an interactive eBook this can come in the form of an audio or video file. Same content, just different modalities of learning being used – and that can only be a good thing, right?

What I’ve found is that I’ve rewritten some sections and culled others in favour of video. I’m still largely using resources I’ve built up over the years, but I’ve realised that a straight import from Word to iBooks Author is not necessarily the best thing to do at times.

Fonts

Serif style fonts, such as Times New Roman, have been around since the earliest days of printing. The little feet (‘serifs’) that flick out at the ends of letters help to create an illusion of a line. This is useful when printing on paper, but it’s not really needed when reading from the screen; hence the proliferation of sans-serif fonts such as Arial or Verdana.

Think about that when working in iBooks Author. You can always change the template in the Layouts panel…

  • Use serif fonts for headings or sub-headings, if you really can’t do without them
  • Use a sans-serif font for your body text
  • Limit the range of fonts used to no more than three as using too many fonts can just add clutter to a page

Use Columns

In a number of free books made in iBooks Author that I’ve downloaded from the NZ iBookstore, I’m frustrated at times by the large number of ‘authors’ who have not made use of columns in the landscape template. In some cases I’ve switched to portrait mode, but that’s not always available.

What’s my problem you may ask?

A common trait with dyslexics is that they lose their place by the time they get to the end of a long line of text. Speaking as someone who experiences this, it does a world of difference on the iPad screen if you just allow even two columns on a landscape page. It’s enough of an issue to prevent me from continuing to read the text…

A parting word

An interactive eBook constructed in Apple’s iBooks Author is a document that is first and foremost designed for reading from a screen. It would be a shame if we didn’t consider the implications of this (exciting as these are) and simply produce a substitute for what every teacher’s already got in a Word or Pages document sitting on their hard drive right now.

Harness the potential of mixing different modalities of learning very easily in iBooks Author and remember that existing documents may need to be viewed in a more critical light and/or modified before taking the plunge into the exciting realm generated through interactive eBooks and iBooks Author.

 
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Posted by on November 20, 2012 in BYOD, eBooks, iBooks Author, iPad

 

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Why Blackboard’s MobileLearn app is missing the point

10 Jun

Blackboard LMS MobileLearn appDear Blackboard,

Can you please design an app that actually utilises the platform of mobile devices? Don’t just get on the bandwagon by rushing out a piece of junk simply to say you have an iOS app.

The problem…do you remember the children’s tale of the emperor’s new clothes…??

Yes, the app’s user interface looks ‘pretty’, but that’s about it.

Sure, aesthetics are important, but not everything. An app (like any piece of hardware or software) has to be functional too otherwise it’s missing the point! ‘Digital floss’ is a phrase that springs to mind. Or how about marquee text on web pages from the 1990′s?

If I can organise my Blackboard courses to adhere to principles of good web design – e.g. a student should be able to find what they need in no more than 3 clicks – then it’s NOT acceptable to locate this same content in the MobileLearn app with 7 touches? And where does this student see the content in the end? In a browser!! So why don’t they just go straight to Safari…??

To be fair, Blackboard have made a few enhancements since the launch of their first app last year. They’ve made changes to how instructors see content, but you still have to look hard to distinguish hidden folders from available ones. In some lighting conditions or when people are in a hurry, it’d still be really easy to miss and think that students can access content when in actual fact they can’t!

The one thing I do really support is the push notification. When an announcement is made in a course, your phone or iPad that has the app gets a pop-up on screen alerting the user / student to the fact. This occurs even when the device is in sleep mode.

So Blackboard, could you perhaps have a rethink about the purpose of your app? Don’t make students jump through ridiculous hoops only to end up in the browser view of a course anyway!! Make an actual mobile app. Redesign things from scratch and tailor it to iPads. Websites can do it (my own blog has a mobile-friendly view and a standard desktop/laptop view), so it is possible…!!

I don’t mean to be rude – I am, in my own way, actually trying to be constructive. It’s just that I think that there’s so much more that Blackboard could achieve with the MobileLearn app (and iOS compatibility in general!) that it’s frustrating when I’m left feeling let down – again – with Blackboard Learn. Has potential – will travel? Not at the moment, but here’s hoping!! :)

 
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Posted by on June 10, 2012 in Blackboard LMS, BYOD, iDevices, iPad, mLearning

 

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The difference between 1:1 and BYOD programs

25 Feb

1:1 or BYOD. What's the difference?

After a great deal of reading and investigating about implementing a BYOD program at the Middle School level, I’ve come to realise the marked differences between 1:1 programs versus BYOD programs. The differences are great enough that it’s important for schools to know which option they’re implementing as it can have a major impact on how technology can be used to support learning. It’s important that 1:1 and BYOD do not become interchangeable terms.

1:1 programs

The devices in a 1:1 program are owned by the school. Thus, not only is there are large financial outlay by the school before a program has even begun, but there’s the ongoing issue of maintenance and long-term IT support. Devices may need to be reimaged every so often (e.g. in a 1:1 laptop program) and the purchase of software is determined by the school as well. This could mean that in a 1:1 iPad program, for example, that apps are locked down and a highly personal device is not as flexible as it could be. Schools invest a lot of time and money in a 1:1 program, but is it worth it in today’s world of personalised and mobile environments? For me, a 1:1 program is a bit old-fashioned. It may still have a place in some situations such as schools where families do not have the money to purchase technology (whether this tech goes to school or not), but the writing’s on the wall. As technology becomes cheaper, accessibility of devices like iPads and laptops reaches out to ever-widening audiences.

BYOD programs

In contrast, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) requires that students own the technology. Schools have the opportunity to stipulate the hardware and / or software requirements, or they could embrace any piece of technology into the classroom. Arguments against BYOD inevitably refer to the financial investment needed by families and that this could restrict participation in BYOD programs. Arguments in favour of BYOD however often highlight that students take greater responsibility for their own technology rather than that owned by someone else (i.e. the school). Whatever the case, I think BYOD is the future. I don’t know about you, but the first thing I do when I get a new piece of tech is to personalise it. It may be to change the desktop background or set the touch pad buttons to left-handed on a laptop, or to set the home and lock screen on an iPhone or iPad. It doesn’t really matter the level of personalisation being added, just that it’s a natural part of what people do with their devices nowadays.

My earlier error in thinking…

Until recently I was thinking that I was looking at a 1:1 iPad program, but what I now realise is that I had combined too different concepts. It’s important to try and avoid this mistake. If the school owns everything, the school (and IT) ends up controlling everything. If the students own the hardware and software, there’s often a lot more flexibility in what can be done. The distinction between 1:1 and BYOD options is critical when thinking about the use of iPads in particular. The thought of schools stopping staff or students from downloading apps that can really make a positive difference to learning is something that scares me. It goes against the reasons people look towards iPads in the first place. For older students in particular (i.e. Middle and High School ages) their engagement in learning is often demonstrated by their interaction with technology. If they’re prevented from exploring the potential of new apps when they’re released and / or the benefits of iOS upgrades, then we really need to consider why…

 
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Posted by on February 25, 2012 in BYOD, iPad

 

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BYOD can enhance student writing

08 Feb

Writer's block

A common misconception from people in my generation or older is that BYOD is a threat to student learning; that student access to a digital device in the classroom somehow undermines the learning process. What a load of codswallop!!

If approached with common sense, creativity, patience and a willingness to learn from (technological) failures, BYOD could be the vehicle for transforming underachieving students. There’s no reason why high performing students and all those in between wouldn’t reap the benefits either.

I’m encouraged that I’m not the only teacher out there that thinks like this. I came across Bill Ferriter’s blog today – The Tempered Radical. His post, My Beef with Paper, is brilliant! It made me think about a conversation I’ve had recently regarding the use of iPads in classrooms. Whilst some people think iPads are only useful in terms of Internet access and subject-specific apps, I think they offer so much more to students. Think note-taking, for example. Why force students to take notes by hand for them only to lose individual pieces of paper 5 minutes after they’ve left the classroom? (Yes, I was one of ‘those’ students…) Taking notes in class has no correlation to a student’s ability to write essays in exams. They’re different skills. If your lesson is focused on developing an exam-specific skill, get students to use pen and paper. But if not, digital options provided by BYOD could actually benefit many students. Since when did BYOD mean the absence of any other tool? You wouldn’t use a chisel to hammer a nail because it’s the wrong tool for the job, so why do people expect an iPad for example to do everything? It’s. a. tool.

BTW, when I think ‘note-taking’ I’m not talking about ‘word processing’ or ‘desktop publishing’ as these are quite different skills. If you’re interested in some excellent note-taking apps for the iPad (and some have Android options too), try Evernote, inClass or Microsoft OneNote (PC or app (iOS or Android)). They’ll help ‘those’ students, trust me…

:)

 
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Posted by on February 8, 2012 in BYOD, iDevices, iPad, mLearning

 

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How Apple changed the face of education

21 Jan

iBooks Author - changing the face of textbooks!January 19, 2012, will go down in the history books as one of the greatest days for education. Big call, I know, but Apple’s launch of iBooks 2 and iBooks Author heralds a new era in not only textbook production, but, more importantly, in how students embrace learning. In November last year I wrote a post about why publishers of eTextbooks were getting it all wrong. This paragraph summarises the crux of my disappointment:

Where were the embedded videos? Audio narration? Progress check quizzes with immediate feedback to a student? Animations? Animations students can modify to see different results? (obviously it does depend on what the subject matter is). Click and drag exercises? A dictionary? Or at least a glossary of the chapter’s key terminology? I could go on for a while…

In iBooks Author there is now a user-friendly yet sophisticated tool to create interactive and rich content; exactly what I envisaged above! Some of this content includes:

  • interactive images / diagrams
  • embedded movies
  • entire Keynote presentations
  • quizzes (called ‘reviews’)
  • 3D objects
  • glossary tool
  • image gallery
In addition, iBooks 2 adds a slicker way to highlight text (compared with regular ePub files) and automatically creates ‘study cards’ from this highlighted text and any notes a user (e.g. student) writes.
I’ve been playing around with iBooks Author for the past few hours and I’m absolutely amazed by how easy this software is to use. Apple have created a very slick program that can be used by people of all ages. Teachers, students and school management could all make use of this free software.

Choose a template for you iBooks Author project

The simplicity of the program is created via templates. The template chooser (shown above) opens when you first create a project. Each template is very similar in terms of offering different types of page layouts, including chapter overviews, one-two-three column spreads, dedication, forward, copyright pages and so on, but you can still change features like the font, fill color and overall layout. Placeholders are automatically included and inserting images is simply a drag and drop affair. The location of these placeholders can be changed in an instant. Likewise, special widgets are included and these also employ the drag and drop functionality. It’s the widgets that create the interactivity – additional notes on images, embedded movies and quizzes, image galleries, 3D objects that can be rotated and even whole Keynote presentations. It’s the widgets that no other ePub creation tool has managed to integrate successfully into the development environment (Creative Book Builder has come close, but is, unfortunately, left in the wake of iBooks Author). For techie people there’s even a feature whereby developers can create their own widgets using HTML 5 and Javascript. And you’re not going to believe how good the result is when importing text documents from Pages or Word (.docx included, not just .doc). Tables, bulleted and numbered lists, and paragraph styles are, for once, actually retained!

In fact, constructing an interactive book in iBooks Author is a walk stroll in the park! The only ‘hard’ aspect to the process is in planning and developing your content – this includes preparing your images, Keynote files and movies etc. The majority of this would be done outside of iBooks Author. It’s very similar to creating a website; 80% of your time is spent in developing content and resources and only 20% of the time is needed to combine said resources to construct the final product. Although I haven’t tried this yet, I’m fairly sure that iBooks Author doesn’t turn a 2D image into a 3D object – you’d have to have some other means of doing this and it’s an area in which I’m a bit vague at present. That is likely to be the topic of a future post…

This video demonstrates how to use iBooks Author. In fact, this was all I needed to get started with the program!

Now despite my excitement (I have the same feeling I experienced when I first got my iPad 18 months ago) some readers may think I’m being paid by Apple and/or hate Windows (or other platforms). I can assure you that I’m not (on all counts) and I do think that despite my enthusiasm for these new tools, especially iBooks Author, there are a number of concerns and limitations.

  1. You must have a Mac to run iBooks Author. Schools running Windows have no access to this software.
  2. Apple restrict your distribution of your iBook. Everything goes through an iTunes Connect account and for books where you charge (up to $14.99) Apple take their 30% cut. Even if you’re not worried about this, I’m not sure if it’s possible to create an in-house book in iBooks Author and then upload this to your school’s LMS for students and staff to download to their iPads. More investigation is needed to see if this is possible or not with interactive ePub files that you want to distribute for free.
  3. The new Textbooks category is not supported by the New Zealand iBookstore. In fact, we can’t purchase any books through iBookstore. We only have the option to download Gutenberg books from a very small selection. The interactive books created in iBooks Author are published to the Textbooks category (which also distinguishes them from plain ePub books). There’s a real worry here that students outside the USA won’t benefit from these tools!

My childhood fantasy of living on the Starship Enterprise can actually be a reality albeit with a slightly different look. In my case, the ship is ‘Titoki Street’, the technology is an iPad and the fascination, inspiration and love of learning is encapsulated in a interactive, rich-media book.

Bring it on, yet fingers crossed New Zealand students don’t miss out!!

I only have one question – why oh why didn’t this software come out at the start of the summer holidays?! ;)

 
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Posted by on January 21, 2012 in BYOD, Digital Learning Objects, iPad, mLearning, Software

 

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Xcode for beginners 02 – Hello World

16 Jan

As is traditional in programming courses, your first app will be a Hello World example. Specifically, the words “Hello World” will appear at the touch of a button on screen.

The screencast below walks you through what you need to do in Xcode, from creating a new project to running your app in the iOS simulator. The code itself is explained in more detail afterwards.

THE CODE…

(ViewController) Header file

  • .h file extension
  • Establishes the controls used in the app’s interface, in this example the label and the button controls. It kind of serves as the link between your user interface (i.e. what you created in the xib file) and the app’s main code (i.e. in the implementation file)
  • Sets the name of the controls used and their ‘event’ (to put it into Visual Basic terms), in this case: outlet and action
  • Outlet is tagged with the label. Think of outlet being another way of saying output - the control that we called ‘label’ is designed to display or ‘output’ text
  • Action is tagged with the button. This tells Objective-C that when a button is clicked something will occur – this is the ‘action’

Note that other than the setup of controls in this project, no other code goes into the header file. How these controls will be used is written in the implementation file.

Hello World - Header codeIBOutlet UILabel *label; creates an instance of a label object in the header file.

  • IBOutlet is short for Interface Builder Outlet - that is, what follows is related to an object that you clicked and dragged from the utilities panel (in Xcode) to the xib file (i.e. iPhone mockup screen).
  • UILabel states that the outlet object being linked from the xib (interface) file to the header file is a label
  • *label; is the name of the instance of a label object. In this example our label instance is also called label, but we could have called it anything we wanted to…
In short, IBOutlet UILabel *label; is making a connection between the iPhone interface created in the xib file and the project’s code setup in the header file. Thus…
Create an instance of a label object called (in this particular example), ‘label’

- (IBAction)button:(id)sender; creates an instance of a button object.

  • - (IBAction)button: indicates that the object created will perform some kind or behaviour or ‘action’. In this example, a button object (called ‘button’ in this case) is being instantiated.
  • (id)sender; tells Xcode that the button will send messages, when clicked, to the button’s method, which we’ll create next in the implementation file.

(View Controller) Implementation file

  • .m file extension
  • Contains the majority of the code in a project
  • Indicates what will happen, exactly, when the end-user touches the button

Hello World - getting the button object to do something!

  • So this code is within a method (that is, one or more statements that outline what will happen when the method is executed).
  • A method encloses it’s statements within curly braces { }
  • One or more statements can be written inside the curly braces
  • Each statement is like a one line instruction to the compiler
  • Each statement ends with a semi-colon ;

Finally, what we’re adding to the end of the implementation file in this project is the button’s method (i.e. the code that will run (yes, even if it is only one line!) when the button is clicked.

Objective-C says - (IBAction)button:(id)sender {

Visual Basic .Net says something like Private Sub myButton_Click… etc

Objective-C says label.text = @”Hello World”;

Visual Basic .Net says something like lblOutput.Text = “Hello World”

We’ll extend the Hello World example to include capturing user input in the next tutorial, Xcode for beginners 03 – Using a text box to input data

Don’t forget to subscribe to this blog, so that you can follow each tutorial as they’re posted! :)

 
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Posted by on January 16, 2012 in iDevices, iOS, Programming, Software, Xcode

 

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Xcode for beginners 01 – Getting Started

04 Jan

Develop apps for iPhone and iPad

Trying to develop apps for iOS devices is a HUGE learning curve. I wouldn’t like to attempt this unless I had some programming experience, that’s for sure! Over the past few weeks I’ve been teaching myself ANSI C in preparation for the move to Objective-C, but then I hit a snag. There’s so much to Xcode, Apple’s free IDE for developing iOS and Mac OSX apps, when you first open it that I was having difficulty finding appropriate resources for where I was at – right at the bottom – wanting to learn new coding skills, but also wanting to see my results in a visual interface. Most of the resources I found were focused entirely on code and/or were way beyond my present skill set with Xcode and Objective-C.

Then I found the book iPhone and iPad Apps for Absolute Beginners by Rory Lewis. His approach is to get non-engineering students into programming, so unlike other resources I’ve come across, Lewis doesn’t attempt to explain all the nitty gritty of what code is doing. Instead his aim is to tell you what you need to know only when you need to know it. The trick is to just accept this premise and have faith that things will become clearer in the long-term. I’ve ordered the print edition from Amazon and also have the ebook on my iPad as well. So far, so good! It’s the one resource that hasn’t completely lost my interest after chapter one at this stage! :)

In my series, Xcode for beginners, I’m going to use this blog as an outlet for putting things into my own words. I’m already thinking that I’ll make comparisons with Visual Basic .NET when necessary as that’s been my main programming focus of late. We’ll see how it goes…

What you need to get started

  1. An Intel-based Mac. Any Mac laptop or desktop 2006 or later
  2. To run the latest version of Xcode you need Lion OSX
  3. Signup as an Apple developer. You can either register as a developer (no $$ needed) or pay about $100 per year. The latter option is needed to be able to submit apps to the App Store, but when you’re first starting out it isn’t a requirement. Either way, this gives you access to Apple’s Developer Center
  4. Xcode – login to the Developer Center and download the latest version. This is the programming environment (IDE) that you’ll use to write code, develop a user interface and run simulations.
Once you’ve got all this setup you’re ready for your next tutorial, Xcode for beginners 02 – Hello World coming soon!


 
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Posted by on January 4, 2012 in iDevices, iOS, Programming, Software, Xcode

 

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Why eTextbooks get it all wrong

09 Nov

eTextbooks

I was hugely disappointed yesterday when I had the opportunity to have an eTextbook solution demonstrated from a well known publishing company. Foolishly, I thought beforehand that finally we were seeing a publisher lead the way not only in terms of developing eTextbooks, but also in being relevant to high school classes as well. How wrong was I?!

It turns out that the demonstration reinforced why eTextbooks and dare I say it, often eLearning courses, fail when people think it’s just about providing a resource and miss the point regarding what support students of different abilities and interests require.

So what went wrong?

The eTextbook demonstrated was just a series of (static) PDF files, as well as PowerPoint slideshows, a few standalone JPGs and GIFs, and SWF animations. Repaginating the (print) textbook to optimise an iPad screen size is simply not enough on its own! And yes, you did read it correctly just before – Flash files were included…

Presenting an ‘eTextbook’ as being iPad compatible is jumping on the bandwagon when some of the files included aren’t recognised by the aforementioned device! The publisher’s response to this? You can use the same eTextbook on a laptop as well. So….we’re left with a series of files that can mostly be accessed by different types of technology, but to what extent do they genuinely support learning?

Not far enough! Here we have an opportunity to not only release a digital version of what has traditionally been printed, but to make improvements on what has gone before. Regardless of the technology, the concept driving the effectiveness of eTextbooks, for me, is the same - technology naturally supports multiple modalities of learning!

So why do publishers just not get it? In the demonstration yesterday, the only interactivity (if you can call it that) was the end-user clicking hyperlinks in PDF documents. I’m sure I’m not the only one who yawns at the prospect of reading text and clicking links from one static page to another. That’s not interactivity to support learning! That’s just the quickest way to disengage anyone – teenager or adult!

Where were the embedded videos? Audio narration? Progress check quizzes with immediate feedback to a student? Animations? Animations students can modify to see different results? (obviously it does depend on what the subject matter is). Click and drag exercises? A dictionary? Or at least a glossary of the chapter’s key terminology? I could go on for a while…

So how can we harness these learning opportunities to benefit our students?

As more and more students in secondary and tertiary courses gain access to technology such as iPads, we face a bit of a Catch-22 situation. One of the reasons eTextbooks are not as prevalent as they should be yet is that the technology and concepts related to eTextbook development is so new – for everyone – students, teachers, parents and publishers alike. It also explains why a lot of eTextbooks currently available are no more than digital replicas of hard copy. However, we can take some lessons from what some eMags are trying to do and if you haven’t already done so, download Al Gore’s Our Choice app for the iPad or iPhone/iPod Touch. I think it’s one of the first real examples of where eTextbooks should be heading, if only the tools needed to achieve this were more readily available.

If you have an iDevice, why not try the Creative Book Builder (CBB) app? It’s a DIY ePub creator, which supports audio and video files with an iPad 2. It’s fairly basic and more suited to simple documents, but it’s a start.

Adobe’s InDesign CS5 and CS5.5 support more sophisticated ePub development. It’s the tool of choice for magazine publishers.

Whether an ePub document harnesses the future of eTextbooks or some other technology, it’s only a matter of time before BYOD means more than just Internet access…

 
4 Comments

Posted by on November 9, 2011 in BYOD, Digital Learning Objects, iPad

 

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How BYOD is impacting learning – initial thoughts

05 Nov

The iPad is to learning what the calculator was to mathematics

Are iPads the new calculator?

Bring your own device (BYOD) is the latest catchphrase to be bandied around schools and education conferences the world over. Coupled with the rise of portable devices like the iPad, we find ourselves in exciting times.

When thinking about BYOD for my own school, I constantly come back to the iPad over any other mobile device – smartphone, iPod touch, laptop, tablet pc, netbook, eReader.

Why?

  • Relatively speaking, the cost of an iPad is cheap, or at least on a par, with devices of similar performance (yes, netbooks are usually cheaper, but they don’t perform on the same level)
  • The variety of software (apps) available is astonishing (compare the number and range of apps available on the App Store with Android’s Market Place)
  • The minimal cost of apps is not going to be a barrier or induce a ‘have vs. have nots’ situation
  • The iPad’s battery life versus that of a laptop, for example
  • The screen size versus that of a phone or mp3 player
  • The fact that the iPad is incredibly easy to use and has yet to have a serious contender for the slate crown

Sure, the iPad does have it flaws (such as weaknesses in file management, limitations on printing, the availability of extension ports, and a sometimes less than adequate browsing experience especially with Flash and AJAX etc), but given that it takes up very little space in a students bag or desk yet can store a large amount of data, it’s hard not to consider the iPad for BYOD in secondary classrooms.

I’m sure the education sector would have had discussions about the introduction (and later mandatory student ownership) of scientific calculators in the 1970′s and 1980′s that had similar sentiments to the discussions in schools today about the benefits, or not, of implementing a BYOD programme. You can see the two camps can’t you; those teachers and senior management who are willing to sacrifice a large amount of their own time researching, thinking and experimenting with different learning opportunities that new technology may bring versus another group who simply want to do things the same way they have done for years. I remember not being able to use a calculator in Maths in Form 3 (Year 9) – mine was confiscated – yet in Form 4 (Year 10) we were expected to have one (an FX-82 I think).

When considering different approaches towards BYOD in schools, I always have that analogy of the scientific calculator tapping me on the shoulder. It’s not solely about the hardware or whether your slate or calculator is branded Apple, Casio, Samsung or Sony. It’s not solely about what software a device runs (regular calculator or graphing calculator anyone?). It’s about how the combination of hardware and software, mixed with infrastructure such as a wireless network, enhances learning.

A number of secondary schools in New Zealand are seriously considering mandatory BYOD implementation. Others are still in the early stages, but have an eye open to the possibilities, and hitches, that can and will surface. Schools in NZ that are at the forefront of this include:

Imagine what a typical high school classroom will look like 5 years from now. Will we see printed exercise books and text books, or will they be digital? Will we see any paper at all? Will students be engaged or disengaged? What kind of technology will teachers use on a daily basis? What technology will students have in their pockets and/or in their bags/on the desk – will it be a pocket calculator or will that just be one of many functions fulfilled by a device like the iPad? Will students be using technology all of the time and in every class, or will BYOD be a natural tool that is expected of and by students and teachers rather than being at the forefront of educational debate?

So much to process!

BYOD - so much to process!

 

 

 

 

Jenny

 
15 Comments

Posted by on November 5, 2011 in BYOD, iPad

 

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