Article Review 4

Article Review 4

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2011/01/07/10-of-the-best-apps-for-education/ 

As I continue on my quest of determining what is the best type of app to create, I found this article to be very interesting in identifying the top ten educational apps. Here, I will provide my opinion on all ten of the apps reviewed. I downloaded the free apps, and read otherreviews on the pay apps (yes, im cheap). Here we go...

Word Lens - as a language teacher, I have already played around with this app before. The concept is fantastico, but the execution is horrid. I had played around some with the Spanish version, and found if you have a rock solid hand, it would seem to jumble the words into what appeared to be Spanish. If the font of the original text was not standard, it wouldn't work, or if your hand moved ever so slightly, it would kind of go haywire. Like the concept, just not the app for me.

Molecules - love love love this app. I can only imagine how useful this can be for science teachers. For student to be able to see up close, and manipulate difference structures - great! I didn't notice any glaring problems, but I am far from a science teacher (it possible had all incorrect info, but I can't speak on that. It seems legit to me).

Blackboard - great mobile interface for this service. Of course, one must be utilizing blackboard already to use this for courses. Working in the high school setting, and also finishing my MA, I see more and more people, who used Blackboard, now using Moodle or other sites to share their content (or manage online classes). It would be fun to have an online "blackboard like" app that teachers and students could use with already having a previous relationship (with one of ese sites). Hum...ideas are coming.

Today in History - fabulous. There are always neat things that have happened on virtually every day. This provides students the opportunity to stay on top of the info. Being a world traveler and global citizen, I wonder how one would request more info from other regions of the world (more German history for example). Over this is great.

Math Ref Free - shouldn't students have these formulas in the notes and/or textbooks? This seems like a nice resource, but almost redundant to me. The practicality of this app for a high school student just doesn't seem there to me. Perhaps a math major at university, but 600 formulas? Seems like a lot. Make sure you upgrade to get 700 more formulas!

PI83 Graphing Calculator - oh to be a math student in the 21st century! What I could have done with that $70 I spent on that massive TI83 thing...talking about good deal, buy this, use this, every high school student should love this. And their parents too! I'm sure there could be something wrong with this app, but the idea is great, and I can't see how anyone would be upset with this.

Star Walk - I've checked out similar apps and have always been unimpressed. This seems like a better situation (reminder, I have not purchased the pay apps - only actually trying the free ones - cheap...cheap graduate student). If someone really likes to star gaze and identify every constellation they see, I think this seems like a good app for that. Rather than lugging around a constellation guide book (which you can't read in the dark anyway), makes great sense to me to use a mobile device (backlit) to do this. Happy gazing!

Cram - ok, I must actually download this one and try it out. The idea of the teacher being able to create materials and then share them with students is brilliant! Particularly for a foreign language, I'm always worried that my students will misspell a word, or learn the wrong gender for a noun as they are studying, then they have a learned mistake in their collection of words...not good! This way, I can verify that their flashcards actually are 100% correct before they begin to use them. Yes please.

Essay Grader - really? Are we teachers that pressed for time? I don't like this idea at all. If A teacher wants to assign an essay, they need to be prepared to invest time in the essays themselves. Yes, it's true, grading essays is tough, but in reality, it it your personalized rfeedback that makes the student stronger. Why are we trying to give canned comments on students' individual work. How about the students just start giving us canned essays? If the teacher is using "essay grader" then I think the students need an app called essay writer. Not fair huh? (sorry essay grader creator, I just feel that this is taking the lazy approach for something that need more respect)

eClicker - yes yes and yes. I just inherited an actual clicker system to use in my classroom, but this is a fantastic use of technology. If every student has an iDevice - this can be great for sure. It gives a bit of pressure, and gives the teacher immediate feedback on the formative assessment (and can also be summative) so that the teacher can change their instruction as needed. Love it.