iPads in Classrooms - Teacher Management Apps and (Maybe) OneDrive?

[JRA]

Good morning everyone.

Started off at a new place and there's a lot of iPads here. I know so so little about these things and have had to piece together enough to get by at the last place with Mosyle and what have you, but it looks like we're getting more in now, and it's time to bite the bullet and actually try and understand a few things.

Firstly, before I get onto the "real" issue, I still to this day don't understand why I as IT manager need an Apple ID. Or the school does. We have Mosyle to distribute apps etc, what function does the Apple ID of the IT manager/school actually solve, or do, sort of thing?

Secondly, which is inevitably the bigger question, we're looking at getting something in that can allow teachers to both broadcast their own iPad to students, lock student iPads if needs be, and also have some sort on OneDrive integration. I think the ideal was students get shown worksheets for example on an iPad and then work from them. Might also be an advantage if the classroom PC can do that/some of that "control" aspect too but not a biggie if it can't. I do rather think hundreds of iPads were acquired before a use case was thought up for them, and now they're being shoehorned into classrooms where some justification is reached for long after the fact, but whatever their origins I'm determined to make this work as well as it can.

 

Apple Classroom has been pitched, but it has some BAD reviews on it and a VERY poor rating. Keen to avoid that if there is better out there.

Currently have no AD logons for individual students at all but we do have 365 logins for most pupils. I'd use those if I could but I guess I can make up AD accounts if we need.

 

If anyone can make any sense out of the above in any respect and help me out with advice or opinions on it I'd be immensely grateful!

[RLR]

You (or the school) will need some sort of apple ID to setup your MDM. This is because your MDM will likely need certifcates installing which you get from Apple School Manager. You sign into Apple School Manager with an Apple ID. If you're not signed up to Apple School Manager and your still using the old method (Volume Purchase Program (VPP) and Device Enrolment Program (DEP), then I would look into this first as it merges everything into one place.

The first certificate you need is an Apple Push Notification Certificate (APNS). The second certificate you need is your app License certificate (referred to as token). This can be downloaded from your Apple School Manager (or VPP if you're still using that). These expire every year and need renewing. If you don't update your APNS certificate and it expires you may have to re-enrol all your iPads again. You need to make sure you're renewing the same APNS certificate and not creating a new one or you will have to re-enrol all your devices again. There's quite a lot to it if you've never had to use apple devices before. I recommend getting some outside help to go through it all.

 

As for Classroom management, you'll slowly learn that Apple keep their iPads very locked down which doesn't let developers have much freedom on creating the things they want. Your main answer for classroom management is Apple Classroom. We use it here and it works fairly well.

 

There's a lot that can go into the setup. For example, you can setup your iPads as shared iPads which allows students to sign into the iPad using their managed apple id. If you're not using shared iPads but are sharing iPads, then you run the risk of students/staff leaving themselves logged into services that other users can access.

[JATSO]

I went through all this just for 24 iPads but its worth it in the end.

 

The school needs an Apple ID to use Apple School Manager and get it set up.

You have to get all your iPads that you want to manage centrally into Apple School Manager platform.

Once you have your Apple School Manager platform and with the iPad's are setup you can assign them to be managed by something like Mosyle Manager but the purchasing of Apps is still done in Apple School Manager, once the apps are purchased you can then bring them into Mosyle Manager and distribute them along with managing the iPads, its pretty simple system once you get it all in place.

 

Start off with getting Apple School Manager set up, make sure you create a couple of Administrator accounts under the school domain.

Use a telephone number that is active for TFA so that you can always get back into Apple School Manager as its a pain to chase apple to get things changed.

[JRA]

Goodness that was swift! Thank you both much indeed. Daresay I think I even follow now what the Apple ID does!

 

As for Classroom management, you'll slowly learn that Apple keep their iPads very locked down which doesn't let developers have much freedom on creating the things they want. Your main answer for classroom management is Apple Classroom. We use it here and it works fairly well.

There's a lot that can go into the setup. For example, you can setup your iPads as shared iPads which allows students to sign into the iPad using their managed apple id. If you're not using shared iPads but are sharing iPads, then you run the risk of students/staff leaving themselves logged into services that other users can access.

That's grand, thanks for this also. How have you set up Apple Classroom for authentication etc? We'll have shared iPads for the students but staff keep their own.

 

Of course if there's a technical document out there I could read do point me at it.

 

Again cheers both.

[JATSO]

https://help.apple.com/classroom/ipad/1.0/#/cad6d39b9338

 

https://appleid.apple.com/faq

 

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/classroom/welcome/ipados

 

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/deployment-education/edu42181fe4b/web

[JRA]

Ok, starting to get to grips with things a bit. Mosyle sure is a learning curve when you really get into it.

 

Next up is the classroom itself. Which, oddly enough, nobody thought about really they just bought more and more and more iPads...

 

So, looks like we need:

 

- OneDrive integration. This is a biggie. So teachers can stick work into and look at student work in particular student OneDrives for particular classes. Or indeed if all teachers could potentially get to all student OneDrives then that'd be fine.

 

- Classroom control. Some sort of broadcasting to all the screens in a particular classroom would probably be it, plus ability to lock down iPads of any children gone totally rogue.

 

- Some sort of way students would sign in and therefore not be able to mess with the OneDrive contents of the previous user. Staff have 1:1 iPads so no major need of this for them.

 

- Some nice neat way classes and teachers and students can be updated, preferably from spreadsheets. Can already foresee direct exports from SIMS not being the way as there's always one more teacher needing to be bolted on to one more class for reasons or students moved around classes or included in multiple for other reasons. Don't mind managing this myself but some sort of spreadsheet import seems to be the thing.

 

Sorry if this is so basic it's unreal but I'm literally scrabbling around in the dark here, and days and days of cartoon-ey sales pitches trying to research on my own have left me even more baffled than when I started.

 

If anyone either uses or knows of anything that sounds vaguely like the above or if this is just not achievable with iPads please do let me know! And thanks for reading I do feel fairly lost at sea here.

[RLR]

Ok, starting to get to grips with things a bit. Mosyle sure is a learning curve when you really get into it.

 

Next up is the classroom itself. Which, oddly enough, nobody thought about really they just bought more and more and more iPads...

 

So, looks like we need:

 

- OneDrive integration. This is a biggie. So teachers can stick work into and look at student work in particular student OneDrives for particular classes. Or indeed if all teachers could potentially get to all student OneDrives then that'd be fine.

 

 

This would become a mess if you are to use it this way. You're best off getting setup with Google Classroom or the Microsoft equivalent which I think is Microsoft Teams?

 

- Classroom control. Some sort of broadcasting to all the screens in a particular classroom would probably be it, plus ability to lock down iPads of any children gone totally rogue.

 

I'm not sure if there is a way to broadcast to all screens but another solution would be to just broadcast the one screen to the projector/tv in the room. This will require apple TV boxes or some sort of broadcast software installed on the classroom computer such as AirServer.

 

- Some sort of way students would sign in and therefore not be able to mess with the OneDrive contents of the previous user. Staff have 1:1 iPads so no major need of this for them.

You can setup shared iPad mode which allows students to sign in via managed apple IDs. There's quite a bit of setup involved if you're starting from scratch but worth it. We use it for our younger years.

- Some nice neat way classes and teachers and students can be updated, preferably from spreadsheets. Can already foresee direct exports from SIMS not being the way as there's always one more teacher needing to be bolted on to one more class for reasons or students moved around classes or included in multiple for other reasons. Don't mind managing this myself but some sort of spreadsheet import seems to be the thing.

Not quite sure what's being asked here. If you setup Google Classroom or Microsoft teams you can update these yourself.

 

 

EDIT: If you plan on going down the Shared iPad Mode route, then check that your devices are eligible before investigating as you may waste a lot of time trying to set something up that isn't possible with your devices. There's certain criteria the iPads have to meet to be able to use Shared iPad Mode.

Edited September 21, 2022 by RLR

[Alex0x7F]

- Classroom control. Some sort of broadcasting to all the screens in a particular classroom would probably be it, plus ability to lock down iPads of any children gone totally rogue.

 

 

We've used VNC Viewer flawlessly here for 6+ years. Using it in classrooms to broadcast whatever is on the teacher's desktop over to the iPads, with keyboard/mouse control disabled on the server (teacher's dekstop) side.

 

Inside our iPad MDM - Lightspeed - You can use the Lock iPad feature and write a message on the home screen, 'return to IT office' etc.

Edited September 21, 2022 by essential_alex

[RLR]

I forgot to mention in my reply that if you setup classes and go down the Shared iPad route then you can use Apple Classroom to lock student devices into specific apps. You can also use it to have a brief over view of what the students are currently seeing on their screen.

[Brimstone]

If you are looking for a solution to allow teachers to assign worksheets or other work to an iPad then I would strongly recommend either Seesaw or Showbie to do this, students would need to sign into the app on the iPads and can get to their One Drive, iCloud or Google Drive from within the app. Showbie works with very single file format you can think of, even Augmentted Reality or Garageband files can be assigned by the teacher to student iPads. If you have quite a bit of staff changes then this would really help as once Showbie is set up you can assign who can see which classes and easily move students between classes. All cloud and web based so can be access from any platform. Showbie used by all the schools that are part of the Glasgow City Council's iPad rollout currently at about 50,000.

 

Seesaw

https://web.seesaw.me/

 

Showbie

https://www.showbie.com/

[JRA]

Just getting back to things. Half term was spent knocking up the 365 accts for Ys3-6 so they now have individual logons and OneDrives and emails and all the educational thrills that an A1 license can bring a person.

 

Still iPads on the horizon, still loads to do, still even more to understand before I know what things I even need to do.

 

Looks like we're going with Jamf. And Jamf classroom along with it. We will have shared student iPads so they'll have to sign in and out lots but hey, shiny shiny iPad.

 

If you are looking for a solution to allow teachers to assign worksheets or other work to an iPad then I would strongly recommend either Seesaw or Showbie to do this, students would need to sign into the app on the iPads and can get to their One Drive, iCloud or Google Drive from within the app. Showbie works with very single file format you can think of, even Augmentted Reality or Garageband files can be assigned by the teacher to student iPads. If you have quite a bit of staff changes then this would really help as once Showbie is set up you can assign who can see which classes and easily move students between classes. All cloud and web based so can be access from any platform. Showbie used by all the schools that are part of the Glasgow City Council's iPad rollout currently at about 50,000.

 

Seesaw

https://web.seesaw.me/

 

Showbie

https://www.showbie.com/

Belated thanks for this, Showbie looks really quite good! I'm going to give it a solid look over today.

[JRA]

Morning all.

 

Resuming my painful learning curve and struggle with the iPads here. Have decided (pretty much) to go with Jamf. This is based largely on my hatred for Mosyle (cannot get on with it at all) and the potential integration with Apple Classroom. I know very very little, and to be honest this whole Apple thing has an uneasy feeling of minefileds and sales pitches designed to catch you out once you commit, and that one little thing you were promised or wanted to do you can't do at all, which you discover once you're stuck.

 

Anyways, rant over (for now.)

 

Good things about Jamf from my hazy memories of very very light use are that it was somewhat more intuitive. Also there's a phone number for support (something Mosyle don't provide) which will be invaluable as I'm sole IT staff here for a big primary. Further to that, we're definitely not the only school in the world using Jamf so I won't be as "at sea" with it all. Webinars and conferences etc abound proclaiming it's virtues, so there's at least that.

 

On to the things I need. I think. Laying them out just so any passing Apple experts can wade in and help me if I've gone mad/got the wrong end of something! Which will be:

 

1- Get the iPads in for Christmas break to Jamf-ify them. Mug of coffee, Netflix on, Mosyle goes off (or factory reset them) and then Jamf goes on. 1:1 iPads for staff, shared iPads for the students.

1a- Mac server here is dead, get a new one. This I'll need for Apple Configurator to stick some sort of profile on them with (primarily) a WiFi payload. Also need this because the visit-Jamf-url-method to configure these with settings is a method users can remove. No good. I don't understand what I'm doing and I'm out of time to test, the Jamf setup folks will be assisting me patiently with this. It also caches apps somehow, and does some WSUS-esque thing that way which is better than them updating from Apple HQ. So I'm thinking anyways.

 

2- Apple IDs. There is some way that Azure AD accts (or maybe even local AD) accts can be used to make Apple IDs for the students and teachers. These I believe are essential to the Apple Classroom element of Jamf. I think Jamf relies heavily on Apple Classroom somehow for something. Currently don't know how I'll get the classrooms set up, much of what happens there, or even how it all differentiates between students and teachers. I'll have to find this out. But I know I need it.

 

3- Also read somewhere the iPads can be used with guest sessions, so the students would just log in as guests and then that'd log them out of their OneDrives/outlook.com etc. Need to look into this more, but let me know if this is something anyone's used and has legs as an approach or won't work

 

 

4 - Apple-related results skyrocket because iPad.

 

 

If anyone out there survived reading that and has two minutes let me know if any of it's bonkers or if I'm slowly getting there.

 

Thanks for reading!

[Brimstone]

Morning all.

 

Resuming my painful learning curve and struggle with the iPads here. Have decided (pretty much) to go with Jamf. This is based largely on my hatred for Mosyle (cannot get on with it at all) and the potential integration with Apple Classroom. I know very very little, and to be honest this whole Apple thing has an uneasy feeling of minefileds and sales pitches designed to catch you out once you commit, and that one little thing you were promised or wanted to do you can't do at all, which you discover once you're stuck.

 

Anyways, rant over (for now.)

 

Good things about Jamf from my hazy memories of very very light use are that it was somewhat more intuitive. Also there's a phone number for support (something Mosyle don't provide) which will be invaluable as I'm sole IT staff here for a big primary. Further to that, we're definitely not the only school in the world using Jamf so I won't be as "at sea" with it all. Webinars and conferences etc abound proclaiming it's virtues, so there's at least that.

 

On to the things I need. I think. Laying them out just so any passing Apple experts can wade in and help me if I've gone mad/got the wrong end of something! Which will be:

 

1- Get the iPads in for Christmas break to Jamf-ify them. Mug of coffee, Netflix on, Mosyle goes off (or factory reset them) and then Jamf goes on. 1:1 iPads for staff, shared iPads for the students.

1a- Mac server here is dead, get a new one. This I'll need for Apple Configurator to stick some sort of profile on them with (primarily) a WiFi payload. Also need this because the visit-Jamf-url-method to configure these with settings is a method users can remove. No good. I don't understand what I'm doing and I'm out of time to test, the Jamf setup folks will be assisting me patiently with this. It also caches apps somehow, and does some WSUS-esque thing that way which is better than them updating from Apple HQ. So I'm thinking anyways.

 

2- Apple IDs. There is some way that Azure AD accts (or maybe even local AD) accts can be used to make Apple IDs for the students and teachers. These I believe are essential to the Apple Classroom element of Jamf. I think Jamf relies heavily on Apple Classroom somehow for something. Currently don't know how I'll get the classrooms set up, much of what happens there, or even how it all differentiates between students and teachers. I'll have to find this out. But I know I need it.

 

3- Also read somewhere the iPads can be used with guest sessions, so the students would just log in as guests and then that'd log them out of their OneDrives/outlook.com etc. Need to look into this more, but let me know if this is something anyone's used and has legs as an approach or won't work

 

 

4 - Apple-related results skyrocket because iPad.

 

 

If anyone out there survived reading that and has two minutes let me know if any of it's bonkers or if I'm slowly getting there.

 

Thanks for reading!

 

Can I make suggestion.....

 

Contact an AAES, there are 8 of them across the UK. Each AAES has years of expertise in doing all of this and should save you hours and even days of head scratching and grumbling with advice and help. If you bought your iPads from one of these (see link below) they should have been a big part to ensure the deployment goes smootly and quickly.

 

This is the advantage of using experts who are 90% always cheaper than some ICT company who has created a placeholder on their site for iPads but know very little, if anything at all about how to get them deployed quickly and easily.

 

https://www.apple.com/uk/education/how-to-buy/education-specialist/

[JRA]

Can I make suggestion.....

 

Contact an AAES, there are 8 of them across the UK. Each AAES has years of expertise in doing all of this and should save you hours and even days of head scratching and grumbling with advice and help. If you bought your iPads from one of these (see link below) they should have been a big part to ensure the deployment goes smootly and quickly.

 

This is the advantage of using experts who are 90% always cheaper than some ICT company who has created a placeholder on their site for iPads but know very little, if anything at all about how to get them deployed quickly and easily.

 

https://www.apple.com/uk/education/how-to-buy/education-specialist/

Good suggestion, yes we did in fact go this way back in December.