A Macs place in a primary school

[HodgeHi]

iOS may be a simple interface to use but this does not mean that it is less powerful than its competitors. iOS was built from the ground up to support multi-touch and it shows.

 

With regards to purchasing more software, you would only need to upgrade the license to cover the VLE which IMO isn't a bad thing. The more content that you get on there and let kids have access to is surely a good thing.

[Robbocop]

Great thread guys, with lots of valid reasoning and so far relatively little Mac Bashing, which is nice. Just a couple of things I'd like to add, personal opinions rather than any professional view. The iPad does not have a keyboard, of course, and the on screen keyboard is OK for typing in URLs and emails, but is not a substitute for a mechanical keyboard for involved typing. This becomes worse when using VNC type solutions as some important keys are either missing or hidden away. That misses the point though really. The reason iPad is so interesting is that it's a very different device with different strengths and weaknesses. It's like criticising a microwave oven because it doesn't make good toast

 

If you can't see the benefit of a wholly tactile interface - the whole device is basically a controller - then it's not the right device. Early years pupils absolutely love the iPad because they prefer to use their fingers rather than a pen, mouse or keyboard. They're learning positional and causative skills just by playing with one. "If I do this, something happens" type activities. For SEN we're seeing empowerment on a new scale with these devices, where a traditional PC just can't be used. In Primary it's less clear cut, but as a true instant on device with a massive battery life, great display and very cheap apps it's gaining ground fast. It won't replace the laptop any time soon for typing an essay or running existing software, but in the home the tablet will be a device that people buy INSTEAD OF a computer if what they need is a fast, simply way to browse, view and communicate and very little else. People don't generally need to actually "compute" any more. When Mr Jobs called the iPad 2 a "Post PC device" I don't think he was kidding.

 

Feel free to disagree, because that opens up new ideas but that's how I feel about it.

[dhicks]

The iPad does not have a keyboard

 

Actually, it has a very nice one - I seem to remember a keyboard-with-stand device being touted at launch time, but everyone seems to have embraced the tablet concept better than maybe Apple were fearing.

[Robbocop]

Originally Posted by Robbocop

The iPad does not have a keyboard

You know what I mean David. If you had to carry a physical keyboard around with your iPad you might as well just have a laptop I do have an Apple wireless keyboard on my desk which I use when I'm in the office, but I don't carry it around. There's a hilarious case I spotted though with a keyboard in it iPad Keyboard Case Hey! Why not buy a gesture based low power device and turn it into an underpowered laptop! http://www.edugeek.net/images/smilies/tongue.png

[dhicks]

If you had to carry a physical keyboard around with your iPad you might as well just have a laptop

 

Ah, but that's where a school is different - you can have the keyboards kept in classrooms, the iPads could roam around with the pupils.

[Robbocop]

Ah, but that's where a school is different - you can have the keyboards kept in classrooms, the iPads could roam around with the pupils.

 

I'm liking that Nice one David!

[Robbocop]

Just as a further comment on the use of Apple wireless Keyboards with iPads: Some things are better - physical keys are great and having symbols like © and £ available without changing pages speeds things up. Some things you get used to on the iPad and they don't work on the keyboard - like hitting space twice to add a full stop. Not a problem though the keyboard functions exactly as you would expect. The bluetooth connection is very immediate and easy. I guess in a classroom or office you might need to number the keyboards which are paired with specific iPads.

 

Although you can't use a mouse with the iPad when you're typing, the arrow keys allow navigation through the document. CMD + Arrow goes to the start or end of the document or the line. ALT + Arrow goes to the start or end of the paragraph or one word at a time on the line. SHIFT + Arrow allows selection of text and you can copy and paste those selections using the standard CMD + C/X/V commands. CMD + A selects the entire document, again as you might expect. This helps minimise the number of times you need to touch the screen, which can be more irritating than you would think

[SYNACK]

It won't replace the laptop any time soon for typing an essay or running existing software, but in the home the tablet will be a device that people buy INSTEAD OF a computer if what they need is a fast, simply way to browse, view and communicate and very little else. People don't generally need to actually "compute" any more. When Mr Jobs called the iPad 2 a "Post PC device" I don't think he was kidding.

 

Feel free to disagree, because that opens up new ideas but that's how I feel about it.

 

You could be right, Apple is dragging the populace at large down to the level of SEN children. It is not that there is no longer a need or a benifit to be had from 'computing' it is that culture largely dictated by the media and large content producers like Apple are downplaying it. Their wet dream is a world where only a select few have the skills and devices to create their own content and that this must be distrubuted through their extortion engine (App Store).

 

I don't think that anyone is actually helping education or the future of free thought by supporting these Apple products in anything that they do not produce a true benifit in. By the sounds of it it can make a difference in SEN and maybe eairly childhood education but I know that our primary school kids can use a mouse without a hassle and we are slowly starting to get touchscreens in that give that aspect as well.

[ComputingData]

If anyone goes down the NetBook route then make sure you get one with a higher resolution screen - some netbooks have pretty low resolutions and you might have problems with some programs that just won't go that low anymore or might be very difficult to navigate.

[ComputingData]

How dare you malign the skills of some of greatest coders in the universe that produced such things as Report Assist - a ground breaking application that wasn't afraid to throw windows programming standards through the window in the quest to break new frontiers

 

lol.

 

Hey, I'm not a teacher - but I also didn't write ReportAssist. My code follows the guidelines, problem is that a lot of teachers just don't know how to use Windows properly. They should be forced to go on something like a ECDL or ICDL course every year or so!

[saihaynes]

To the OP some great points raised on this thread, if you'd like to talk through anything or visit then drop me a PM

 

We are a Primary with 430 students on roll, 34% on free school meals

 

The majority (soon to be all) of our frontline infrastructure runs iOS alongside OSX, Win XP/7/8, our backend is fully virtualized on VMware with Win2008/2012 servers

[LeMarchand]

What is it about the iPad that makes it work that the Tablet PC never managed to accomplish?

 

Magic Dust.

 

No, re-do it properly - don't copy any assets from the original, just re-do the whole thing, images, video, audio, the lot.

 

90% of the teachers I work with object to the slightest change in any software - let alone re-writing it!

 

The iPad thing in schools makes me physically ill, I was in a primary today using a tablet PC and in one class it practically stopped the lesson as the whole class in true primary school style 'quietly' proclaimed that I had an iPad. This went on for about 5 minutes while I was reconfigureing a bit of errant hardware. At one point I opened it up to use the keyboard for something and heard one child say, oh its just a laptop.

 

Laptop = no Magic Dust.

 

With regards to purchasing more software, you would only need to upgrade the license to cover the VLE which IMO isn't a bad thing. The more content that you get on there and let kids have access to is surely a good thing.

 

This is a great idea. I wish my schools had bothered to get a VLE sorted.

 

You could be right, Apple is dragging the populace at large down to the level of SEN children.

 

Could be good for us...