Thanks to the generosity of our college’s Instructional Planning Council I have a grant that enables me to purchase a limited number of iPads for faculty members.  (Don’t call, I’ve spent it all for this year).  Faculty members who receive iPads are thrilled, of course, but often ask ‘So what apps should I put on first?’  I say, ‘Free or paid?’  And they always say, ‘Free.’  Therefore, as a long-time iPad users (relatively speaking, for a device that has experienced four generations over 2 years) here is my list of free apps that I actually use and...

The most creative publisher of apps for iPad today is Touch Press, responsible for such works as The Waste Land, X is for X-Ray, Barefoot World Atlas, Leonardo da Vinci: Anatomy, and Theodore Gray’s remarkable The Elements.  Their latest triumph is The Orchestra, a rich, expansive exposition on symphonic classical music featuring the principal conductor of London’s Philharmonia Orchestra Esa-Pekka Salonen and the musicians of the orchestra.  The work features the performance by the orchestra of 8 great works of symphonic music, not entire compositions, which would make it expansive indeed,...

If you are the organized type, and you use your iPad a lot, you will want to own Scanner Pro by Readdle.  It turns your iPad’s camera into a document/object scanner with built-in algorithms to remove shadows, sharpen images, correct perspective and improve, as much as possible readability.  That’s what makes it better than just taking a photo of a document or object with your iPad.  What really makes it useful is its ability to convert the picture to PDF (a document image, not a searchable PDF with a text layer) and upload it to Dropbox, Evernote, Google Drive, or any WebDAV service, like...

As many faculty are already aware, there is a Blackboard Mobile Learn app available for iOS and Android devices. That isn’t news, as the app has existed for a couple years now. What is news relates to a change in the way that app is licensed. Previously the app was usable only by certain devices using certain connections, in a fashion that was confusing to explain. Unless, of course, the institution you were attending actually purchased a license, in which case everything just plain worked. That last is still true, that the institution can purchase a license to use the Mobile Learn app…...

On plenary day I had the opportunity to present to full-time faculty on some of the apps for iPad that do an exceptionally good job at delivering educational content across various disciplines.  Naturally, my ambition far exceeded the limited time we had, and the conversation got sidetracked on using the iPad with a projector, so I didn’t have a chance to make it through the list I wanted to demo.  Afterwards I was asked by a couple of faculty members about the list, so here it is. iPad screen display and capture Here’s the scenario: you have connected the iPad to your classroom projector,...