# data[].attributes.body
Reviews and rates websites, games and apps

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Common Sense Education provides educators and students with the resources they need to harness the power of technology for learning and life. Find a free K-12 Digital Citizenship curriculum, reviews of popular EdTech apps, and resources for protecting student privacy.

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George Lucas Educational Foundation Celebrating

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.entities[].name
Introducing Social Media to Elementary Students Holland

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Digital Literacy and Citizenship Classroom Curriculum Edutopia

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Student Voice Through Digital Literacy For

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Resources for Educators Digital Citizenship Week

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Common Sense Education 's Resources for Digital Citizenship Week Editor

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Check out Edutopia's collection of articles, videos, and other resources on internet safety, cyberbullying, digital responsibility, and media and digital literacy.

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edshelf - A socially-curated discovery engine of websites, mobile apps, desktop programs, and electronic products for teaching and learning.

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A socially-curated discovery engine of websites, mobile apps, desktop programs, and electronic products for teaching and learning. First time here?

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Question: What is the mission behind the Quest2Learn school you founded?

Katie Salen: Quest2Learn is this new public school that we opened in New York City in the fall. It'll eventually be a sixth grade through 12th grade public school. Right now we just have sixth graders. And it's a school that has been designed from the ground up to try to pay attention to the notion that we have a whole generation of digital kids. And more specifically that... because my interest is in game design, and there's been increasing kind of research around the fact that kids playing games today are learning to see the world in some pretty interesting way, that we wanted to not only tap into the digital generation in the design of the school, but also to think about, well, how can the structures of games be used to design a school in a way that was really engaging for kids, really got at content expertise, but also began to work on some of these 21st century skills that people are talking about-collaboration, working in teams, complex problem-solving, systems thinking, being able to kind of design and find resources. And so the school has really been designed as a school that uses games as a pedagogical kind of structure.

So, it's not a school where kids are playing video games all day, which is a common misperception, but it's a school that uses game-like learning.
What's different about the teaching tools Quest2Learn uses?

Katie Salen: There's many different kinds of tools that we use. So, sometimes we do board game design with kids, sometimes we have been doing mobile game design with kids, so kids designing games with cell phones. And so they may be using Bluetooth technology, they may be using something called QR code or Semi code technology, which are visual bar codes that cameras take pictures of. And they design games in the environment that use these bar codes.
Question: Why are games effective for teaching?

If you tell a kid, "Well you need to learn about predator/prey, and we're going to like read about it in a textbook or we're going to watch it on a film," you know, then they may get interested in it, they may feel like they're "doing school." But if you tell them, "Listen, we're going to-your challenge is to design a game about a predator and prey." Those kids will spend hours and hours researching what's an interesting predator and prey they want to work with? What are the specific relationships that they know they need to develop? They start drawing the elements of the game so the characters, so that maybe they choose a rabbit and a wolf. They begin to really understand the landscape and they go deep, deep, deep into that content and really become experts at it. Because to design a game, you have to really know what you're talking about in order to create a system that models that idea.

So kids got deep in the content when they design the games about something. The second thing is that, because games require a player, from the outset the designer has to think about their user. And this is actually very different than a lot of other different areas of design.

With a game, you bring a player in right away, even when you just have a paper prototype of it. And that player starts playing with your game and they tell you what they think. And for kids, this is a profound moment where they suddenly begin to understand the notions of point of view, they really begin to understand ideas and empathy. So, "How do I step outside of myself and what I want and begin to listen about what the player is telling me about their experience in this game?" And that for me also was a very eye-opening situation to begin to think about kinds of civics curriculum, ways for teachers to begin to use game design as a way to get kids to think more broadly about opinions outside their own, ways of collaborating... And those are the two really big things that I find game design gives kids when they have the opportunity to do it.

Question: How does game-based education equip students for the future?

Katie Salen: One of the arguments that we make around game design and also just the way that play happens in games, is that you have to learn how to problem-solve and iterate and things are constantly changing. So, I mean you try something out and it doesn't quite work and so you try something new; you look for a certain kind of resource and it's there, and then it's gone, and so you have to find another kind of resource. And so that ability to resource intelligently; the ability to find stuff when you need it, knowing who to go to; the ability to understand that everything is in process, that nothing is really ever a final solution; that certain kinds of tools are effective in one moment and maybe less effective at another moment.

Technology is changing all the time. We have to constantly learn how to do new stuff every day. If we don't equip kids with an ability to understand that and know how to do it, they're not just going to, like, learn it on their own; schools actually have a pretty important role in helping kids do that.

Question: How did your own math and science education inspire you to become a game designer?

Katie Salen: I had some great math teachers in high school. And I was a kid that was interested in conceptual things and so I loved things like geometry and I loved things like trigonometry and calculus and doing proofs was something that I got incredible pleasure doing. And I think it was because it was about solving problems and it was about thinking through how you can sequence a set of ideas in such a way that you actually arrived at a pretty interesting conclusion.

I have a friend, a great game designer named Frank Lance, and he talks about game design as math sex. Because in essence, when you are designing a game, you are dealing with all kinds of issues of mathematics and programming. You're trying to discover what combinations of resources, when combined together will lead to certain kinds of results and that when you work in computer games that eventually comes down to doing math. Developing algorithms, trying to figure out procedurally what might happen in a game, dealing with lots of "if then" statements. So, that work in calculus was actually a pretty great practice space for the kind of thing you do when you design games, which is again, trying to figure out, well, if my game player does this and then they do this, what kind of event does that give rise too? And then what new opportunities might be there to continue to build on that argument.

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Creating a School That Teaches Through Games

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Question: What is the mission behind the Quest2Learn school you founded? Katie Salen: Quest2Learn is this new public school that we opened in New York City in the fall. It'll eventually be a sixth grade through 12th grade public school. Right now we just have sixth graders.

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You will need Google Chrome to install most apps, extensions and themes. free items

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If you know .... maybe you want to learn about....

# data[].attributes.body
ommunity-driven database of edtech products

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
"If you're writing poetry, write it. Don't type it in just because you can."

The classroom is changing, as new technologies dramatically alter the learning for both teachers and students. And at the heart of this change is the tablet.

You might not think of the classroom as a key market for big companies such as Apple and Google, but according to research conducted by the British Educational Suppliers Association (BESA), there will be nearly a million tablets in UK schools alone by 2016. That's indicative of a vast worldwide market. Manufacturers understandably want their share - and it comes with some significant benefits to education too.

According to BESA, the iPad has the lead at the moment, with 50% of secondary schools preferring the iOS platform compared with 29% for Android. Apple has confirmed it's sold over 15 million iPads into education alone.

That would explain the significant investment in dedicated education platforms: Apple has iTunes U to make virtual courses, iBook textbook creation, an education section in the App Store and the Apple Distinguished Educators program, where Google has only recently launched the Google Play for Education portal to help teachers find dedicated apps and books.

The iPad has such popularity in education that the city of Sneek, Holland, there's an institution called the Master Steve JobsSchool. Here, Apple's tablet is more than a convenience - it's the foundation of the whole educational philosophy. Everything is channelled through the digital hub, and teachers are referred to as "coaches".

This leads to a bigger question: is the iPad a tool for teachers to use, or could it actually replace them?

A tool to make good teachers better

Unsurprisingly, the answer from the schools I interviewed was emphatically "no". However, most are hugely enthusiastic about the possibilities offered by the iPad as a tool to allow good teachers to improve their educative skills.

"The iPad in itself will not impact results on its own," said a blog post from the de Ferrers Academy, a state school that's been trialling 1:1 iPads for its GSCE and A Level students for three years, talking about the positive impact of the tablet in the classroom.

"However, for staff [the benefits are] making effective use of it, the intense focus on leveraging its ability to transform/deliver rapid AFL, effective feedback, independent study/research... and 24/7 access to support and learning resources via iTunes U/Google Drive."

To find out how teachers are using the iPads on a daily basis to improve their teaching I met with teachers Daniel Edwards (Director of Innovation and Learning) and Simon Armitage (Director of Communication) at the Stephen Perse Foundation schools in Cambridge, UK, where each child from 11 years old is given their own iPad.

One of the things that came up time and again from the teachers I spoke to is the fact that tablets have a camera and large screen, massively opening up the way children can interact with homework, document their work to refer back and improve and more easily share with parents and teachers alike.

For instance at the Stephen Perse Foundation schools, a class was set a task to identify 20 household objects, find out how they were made and use this information to explain how globalisation is present in every home.

Instead of doing a list or a static video, one pupil looked at the two options and mixed them together, creating an iMovie that showed an animated map to represent the objects, adding in stop motion.

"What was great was she clearly had fun and got the whole family involved," said Armitage.

"Getting the parents involved is something we've struggled with at schools, but proved to be one of the most impactful areas," added Edwards. "If a child is doing video all around the home, the parents must be asking what's going on, they would have talked about the project, and parents love to see engagement in learning."

Even for younger age groups, tablets are having a strong effect on learning, as a growing number of schools publish the children's work for parents to see. Even with strictly controlled use (and limited to one per three children) the children are more aware of what the projects they're doing mean.

"If you post [pupil's projects] to a blog regularly, five-year-olds will say 'hang on' before you take a picture and then correct their work," said Edwards. "Trying to get that review process is almost impossible to get into the brain of child that young, so I'm told."

The results are in

Like the Stephen Perse Foundation schools, the de Ferrers academy has been running an iPad trial for three years, and has conducted studies which show an improvement in A-Level grades through tablet use - including a record result in Maths and Phsyics for the first group of students equipped with their own iPads in 2012.

The same study showed a tremendous appetite for the new educational tool from the students, with 82% citing the tablet as having a "positive" or "very positive" effect on their learning experience.

This upturn in results and attitude towards the technology is also giving teachers more freedom to develop a closer educational relationship with the pupils. Instead of simply dictating lessons from the front of the class, it lets teachers see where students have learned and where there's need for further clarification.

This can come from a simple set of questions answered in an online test - giving instant answers and showing where the gaps in learning might be - to getting pupils to give audio recordings of their voice with projects.

This information, and the speed at which it's returned, can then be used to prepare more targeted lesson plans, saving time and helping children learn more effectively in the process.

Who's the teacher?

Some parents might worry that the iPad will become a crutch for teachers, a way of easily creating lessons that are showy and exciting but don't really teach a child in the same way as traditional methods.

But those using the technology believe it can enhance the established systems rather than replacing them.

"The curriculum will define the content you require and the skills you would use to teach, but you would always adapt that, however you're teaching. That's the point," says Edwards.

"For instance: a seven-year-old is given the water cycle to learn, and they've got to use a definition, an explanation, and a review. They can define it on paper, explain it and then review it by asking other people to comment.

"But what the teacher wants is their unique voice. I can get an audio recording of each module from every student and I can get what they understand and don't from their voice - and you get more from that than what they write."

Edwards also pointed out how this worked in the opposite direction, with the iPad allowing him to give more feedback without adding time to his working day.

"I had one class I marked with written work, and one that I annotated and recorded my voice. When I read out the written feedback, it was about 30 seconds long, where my video was 90 seconds. That's three times as much feedback in the same length of time for marking, because I had this device in front of me."

Putting U in the middle

At the core of this iPad learning is iTunes U. Apple's online portal allows teachers to create courses that are available to all those enrolled.

With over 1.3 billion course downloads already, it allows teachers to set up the lesson materials for each student level the night before and offers students access at any time to the resources used in lessons - meaning pupils of different abilities can be catered for in lesson plans by adding in different elements appropriate to their level.

The resources in the iTunes U program are vast: it can include anything the teacher wishes, from web pages to PDFs to videos and pictures. Apps play a big part too, with students being asked to use dedicated tools to help explain elements of lessons more simply.

Most of these courses are private, with a code needed from the teacher to get access. However, courses are increasingly being made public, allowing anyone to access to information on subjects ranging from evolution in the Galapagos to advanced geometry and calculus.

But open it up as a non-teacher and iTunes U is a confusing place. It looks like a load of subjects with some random documents assigned. So why does Apple's education portal exist? Why are teachers putting their courses online for others to see?

"They're not designed for remote learning," said Armitage. "[Teachers] on the outside say, 'Well, how am I supposed to teach using that?' Well, that's your bit."

"It's a resource, a different point of view," adds Edwards. "[A teacher] can look at Simon's course from another school and take 15 of those resources and use them in their course.

"There are loads of teachers posting content all over the place, telling people what they want to do, with which resources people can look at and use freely. It makes education in learning much easier."

Having the courses centralised also allows pupils to manage their own learning - if they miss lessons through illness, all the information is there, rather than leaving the teacher to photocopy courses, send exercise books through and make phone calls to explain what was missed.

The other element that attracts teachers to the Apple online portal is iBooks' textbook library. A vast number of volumes have already been created and can be instantly distributed to students, meaning no more back pain from lugging them to classes.

But the ebook distribution model also allows teachers to be even more tailored: iBooks Author lets educators create their own bespoke textbooks for their classes. In fact, 45,000 have been created already for that purpose, including some made by the students themselves.

These are then published through the Apple portal, making them available for other teachers to look at and include in their curriculum.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
An Apple for teacher: how tablets are changing education

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
"If you're writing poetry, write it. Don't type it in just because you can." The classroom is changing, as new technologies dramatically alter the learning for both teachers and students. And at the heart of this change is the tablet.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
"If you're writing poetry, write it. Don't type it in just because you can."

The classroom is changing, as new technologies dramatically alter the learning for both teachers and students. And at the heart of this change is the tablet.

You might not think of the classroom as a key market for big companies such as Apple and Google, but according to research conducted by the British Educational Suppliers Association (BESA), there will be nearly a million tablets in UK schools alone by 2016. That's indicative of a vast worldwide market. Manufacturers understandably want their share - and it comes with some significant benefits to education too.

According to BESA, the iPad has the lead at the moment, with 50% of secondary schools preferring the iOS platform compared with 29% for Android. Apple has confirmed it's sold over 15 million iPads into education alone.

That would explain the significant investment in dedicated education platforms: Apple has iTunes U to make virtual courses, iBook textbook creation, an education section in the App Store and the Apple Distinguished Educators program, where Google has only recently launched the Google Play for Education portal to help teachers find dedicated apps and books.

The iPad has such popularity in education that the city of Sneek, Holland, there's an institution called the Master Steve JobsSchool. Here, Apple's tablet is more than a convenience - it's the foundation of the whole educational philosophy. Everything is channelled through the digital hub, and teachers are referred to as "coaches".

This leads to a bigger question: is the iPad a tool for teachers to use, or could it actually replace them?

A tool to make good teachers better

Unsurprisingly, the answer from the schools I interviewed was emphatically "no". However, most are hugely enthusiastic about the possibilities offered by the iPad as a tool to allow good teachers to improve their educative skills.

"The iPad in itself will not impact results on its own," said a blog post from the de Ferrers Academy, a state school that's been trialling 1:1 iPads for its GSCE and A Level students for three years, talking about the positive impact of the tablet in the classroom.

"However, for staff [the benefits are] making effective use of it, the intense focus on leveraging its ability to transform/deliver rapid AFL, effective feedback, independent study/research... and 24/7 access to support and learning resources via iTunes U/Google Drive."

To find out how teachers are using the iPads on a daily basis to improve their teaching I met with teachers Daniel Edwards (Director of Innovation and Learning) and Simon Armitage (Director of Communication) at the Stephen Perse Foundation schools in Cambridge, UK, where each child from 11 years old is given their own iPad.

One of the things that came up time and again from the teachers I spoke to is the fact that tablets have a camera and large screen, massively opening up the way children can interact with homework, document their work to refer back and improve and more easily share with parents and teachers alike.

For instance at the Stephen Perse Foundation schools, a class was set a task to identify 20 household objects, find out how they were made and use this information to explain how globalisation is present in every home.

Instead of doing a list or a static video, one pupil looked at the two options and mixed them together, creating an iMovie that showed an animated map to represent the objects, adding in stop motion.

"What was great was she clearly had fun and got the whole family involved," said Armitage.

"Getting the parents involved is something we've struggled with at schools, but proved to be one of the most impactful areas," added Edwards. "If a child is doing video all around the home, the parents must be asking what's going on, they would have talked about the project, and parents love to see engagement in learning."

Even for younger age groups, tablets are having a strong effect on learning, as a growing number of schools publish the children's work for parents to see. Even with strictly controlled use (and limited to one per three children) the children are more aware of what the projects they're doing mean.

"If you post [pupil's projects] to a blog regularly, five-year-olds will say 'hang on' before you take a picture and then correct their work," said Edwards. "Trying to get that review process is almost impossible to get into the brain of child that young, so I'm told."

The results are in

Like the Stephen Perse Foundation schools, the de Ferrers academy has been running an iPad trial for three years, and has conducted studies which show an improvement in A-Level grades through tablet use - including a record result in Maths and Phsyics for the first group of students equipped with their own iPads in 2012.

The same study showed a tremendous appetite for the new educational tool from the students, with 82% citing the tablet as having a "positive" or "very positive" effect on their learning experience.

This upturn in results and attitude towards the technology is also giving teachers more freedom to develop a closer educational relationship with the pupils. Instead of simply dictating lessons from the front of the class, it lets teachers see where students have learned and where there's need for further clarification.

This can come from a simple set of questions answered in an online test - giving instant answers and showing where the gaps in learning might be - to getting pupils to give audio recordings of their voice with projects.

This information, and the speed at which it's returned, can then be used to prepare more targeted lesson plans, saving time and helping children learn more effectively in the process.

Who's the teacher?

Some parents might worry that the iPad will become a crutch for teachers, a way of easily creating lessons that are showy and exciting but don't really teach a child in the same way as traditional methods.

But those using the technology believe it can enhance the established systems rather than replacing them.

"The curriculum will define the content you require and the skills you would use to teach, but you would always adapt that, however you're teaching. That's the point," says Edwards.

"For instance: a seven-year-old is given the water cycle to learn, and they've got to use a definition, an explanation, and a review. They can define it on paper, explain it and then review it by asking other people to comment.

"But what the teacher wants is their unique voice. I can get an audio recording of each module from every student and I can get what they understand and don't from their voice - and you get more from that than what they write."

Edwards also pointed out how this worked in the opposite direction, with the iPad allowing him to give more feedback without adding time to his working day.

"I had one class I marked with written work, and one that I annotated and recorded my voice. When I read out the written feedback, it was about 30 seconds long, where my video was 90 seconds. That's three times as much feedback in the same length of time for marking, because I had this device in front of me."

Putting U in the middle

At the core of this iPad learning is iTunes U. Apple's online portal allows teachers to create courses that are available to all those enrolled.

With over 1.3 billion course downloads already, it allows teachers to set up the lesson materials for each student level the night before and offers students access at any time to the resources used in lessons - meaning pupils of different abilities can be catered for in lesson plans by adding in different elements appropriate to their level.

The resources in the iTunes U program are vast: it can include anything the teacher wishes, from web pages to PDFs to videos and pictures. Apps play a big part too, with students being asked to use dedicated tools to help explain elements of lessons more simply.

Most of these courses are private, with a code needed from the teacher to get access. However, courses are increasingly being made public, allowing anyone to access to information on subjects ranging from evolution in the Galapagos to advanced geometry and calculus.

But open it up as a non-teacher and iTunes U is a confusing place. It looks like a load of subjects with some random documents assigned. So why does Apple's education portal exist? Why are teachers putting their courses online for others to see?

"They're not designed for remote learning," said Armitage. "[Teachers] on the outside say, 'Well, how am I supposed to teach using that?' Well, that's your bit."

"It's a resource, a different point of view," adds Edwards. "[A teacher] can look at Simon's course from another school and take 15 of those resources and use them in their course.

"There are loads of teachers posting content all over the place, telling people what they want to do, with which resources people can look at and use freely. It makes education in learning much easier."

Having the courses centralised also allows pupils to manage their own learning - if they miss lessons through illness, all the information is there, rather than leaving the teacher to photocopy courses, send exercise books through and make phone calls to explain what was missed.

The other element that attracts teachers to the Apple online portal is iBooks' textbook library. A vast number of volumes have already been created and can be instantly distributed to students, meaning no more back pain from lugging them to classes.

But the ebook distribution model also allows teachers to be even more tailored: iBooks Author lets educators create their own bespoke textbooks for their classes. In fact, 45,000 have been created already for that purpose, including some made by the students themselves.

These are then published through the Apple portal, making them available for other teachers to look at and include in their curriculum.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
An Apple for teacher: how tablets are changing education

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
"If you're writing poetry, write it. Don't type it in just because you can." The classroom is changing, as new technologies dramatically alter the learning for both teachers and students. And at the heart of this change is the tablet.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
"If you're writing poetry, write it. Don't type it in just because you can."

The classroom is changing, as new technologies dramatically alter the learning for both teachers and students. And at the heart of this change is the tablet.

You might not think of the classroom as a key market for big companies such as Apple and Google, but according to research conducted by the British Educational Suppliers Association (BESA), there will be nearly a million tablets in UK schools alone by 2016. That's indicative of a vast worldwide market. Manufacturers understandably want their share - and it comes with some significant benefits to education too.

According to BESA, the iPad has the lead at the moment, with 50% of secondary schools preferring the iOS platform compared with 29% for Android. Apple has confirmed it's sold over 15 million iPads into education alone.

That would explain the significant investment in dedicated education platforms: Apple has iTunes U to make virtual courses, iBook textbook creation, an education section in the App Store and the Apple Distinguished Educators program, where Google has only recently launched the Google Play for Education portal to help teachers find dedicated apps and books.

The iPad has such popularity in education that the city of Sneek, Holland, there's an institution called the Master Steve JobsSchool. Here, Apple's tablet is more than a convenience - it's the foundation of the whole educational philosophy. Everything is channelled through the digital hub, and teachers are referred to as "coaches".

This leads to a bigger question: is the iPad a tool for teachers to use, or could it actually replace them?

A tool to make good teachers better

Unsurprisingly, the answer from the schools I interviewed was emphatically "no". However, most are hugely enthusiastic about the possibilities offered by the iPad as a tool to allow good teachers to improve their educative skills.

"The iPad in itself will not impact results on its own," said a blog post from the de Ferrers Academy, a state school that's been trialling 1:1 iPads for its GSCE and A Level students for three years, talking about the positive impact of the tablet in the classroom.

"However, for staff [the benefits are] making effective use of it, the intense focus on leveraging its ability to transform/deliver rapid AFL, effective feedback, independent study/research... and 24/7 access to support and learning resources via iTunes U/Google Drive."

To find out how teachers are using the iPads on a daily basis to improve their teaching I met with teachers Daniel Edwards (Director of Innovation and Learning) and Simon Armitage (Director of Communication) at the Stephen Perse Foundation schools in Cambridge, UK, where each child from 11 years old is given their own iPad.

One of the things that came up time and again from the teachers I spoke to is the fact that tablets have a camera and large screen, massively opening up the way children can interact with homework, document their work to refer back and improve and more easily share with parents and teachers alike.

For instance at the Stephen Perse Foundation schools, a class was set a task to identify 20 household objects, find out how they were made and use this information to explain how globalisation is present in every home.

Instead of doing a list or a static video, one pupil looked at the two options and mixed them together, creating an iMovie that showed an animated map to represent the objects, adding in stop motion.

"What was great was she clearly had fun and got the whole family involved," said Armitage.

"Getting the parents involved is something we've struggled with at schools, but proved to be one of the most impactful areas," added Edwards. "If a child is doing video all around the home, the parents must be asking what's going on, they would have talked about the project, and parents love to see engagement in learning."

Even for younger age groups, tablets are having a strong effect on learning, as a growing number of schools publish the children's work for parents to see. Even with strictly controlled use (and limited to one per three children) the children are more aware of what the projects they're doing mean.

"If you post [pupil's projects] to a blog regularly, five-year-olds will say 'hang on' before you take a picture and then correct their work," said Edwards. "Trying to get that review process is almost impossible to get into the brain of child that young, so I'm told."

The results are in

Like the Stephen Perse Foundation schools, the de Ferrers academy has been running an iPad trial for three years, and has conducted studies which show an improvement in A-Level grades through tablet use - including a record result in Maths and Phsyics for the first group of students equipped with their own iPads in 2012.

The same study showed a tremendous appetite for the new educational tool from the students, with 82% citing the tablet as having a "positive" or "very positive" effect on their learning experience.

This upturn in results and attitude towards the technology is also giving teachers more freedom to develop a closer educational relationship with the pupils. Instead of simply dictating lessons from the front of the class, it lets teachers see where students have learned and where there's need for further clarification.

This can come from a simple set of questions answered in an online test - giving instant answers and showing where the gaps in learning might be - to getting pupils to give audio recordings of their voice with projects.

This information, and the speed at which it's returned, can then be used to prepare more targeted lesson plans, saving time and helping children learn more effectively in the process.

Who's the teacher?

Some parents might worry that the iPad will become a crutch for teachers, a way of easily creating lessons that are showy and exciting but don't really teach a child in the same way as traditional methods.

But those using the technology believe it can enhance the established systems rather than replacing them.

"The curriculum will define the content you require and the skills you would use to teach, but you would always adapt that, however you're teaching. That's the point," says Edwards.

"For instance: a seven-year-old is given the water cycle to learn, and they've got to use a definition, an explanation, and a review. They can define it on paper, explain it and then review it by asking other people to comment.

"But what the teacher wants is their unique voice. I can get an audio recording of each module from every student and I can get what they understand and don't from their voice - and you get more from that than what they write."

Edwards also pointed out how this worked in the opposite direction, with the iPad allowing him to give more feedback without adding time to his working day.

"I had one class I marked with written work, and one that I annotated and recorded my voice. When I read out the written feedback, it was about 30 seconds long, where my video was 90 seconds. That's three times as much feedback in the same length of time for marking, because I had this device in front of me."

Putting U in the middle

At the core of this iPad learning is iTunes U. Apple's online portal allows teachers to create courses that are available to all those enrolled.

With over 1.3 billion course downloads already, it allows teachers to set up the lesson materials for each student level the night before and offers students access at any time to the resources used in lessons - meaning pupils of different abilities can be catered for in lesson plans by adding in different elements appropriate to their level.

The resources in the iTunes U program are vast: it can include anything the teacher wishes, from web pages to PDFs to videos and pictures. Apps play a big part too, with students being asked to use dedicated tools to help explain elements of lessons more simply.

Most of these courses are private, with a code needed from the teacher to get access. However, courses are increasingly being made public, allowing anyone to access to information on subjects ranging from evolution in the Galapagos to advanced geometry and calculus.

But open it up as a non-teacher and iTunes U is a confusing place. It looks like a load of subjects with some random documents assigned. So why does Apple's education portal exist? Why are teachers putting their courses online for others to see?

"They're not designed for remote learning," said Armitage. "[Teachers] on the outside say, 'Well, how am I supposed to teach using that?' Well, that's your bit."

"It's a resource, a different point of view," adds Edwards. "[A teacher] can look at Simon's course from another school and take 15 of those resources and use them in their course.

"There are loads of teachers posting content all over the place, telling people what they want to do, with which resources people can look at and use freely. It makes education in learning much easier."

Having the courses centralised also allows pupils to manage their own learning - if they miss lessons through illness, all the information is there, rather than leaving the teacher to photocopy courses, send exercise books through and make phone calls to explain what was missed.

The other element that attracts teachers to the Apple online portal is iBooks' textbook library. A vast number of volumes have already been created and can be instantly distributed to students, meaning no more back pain from lugging them to classes.

But the ebook distribution model also allows teachers to be even more tailored: iBooks Author lets educators create their own bespoke textbooks for their classes. In fact, 45,000 have been created already for that purpose, including some made by the students themselves.

These are then published through the Apple portal, making them available for other teachers to look at and include in their curriculum.

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An Apple for teacher: how tablets are changing education

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"If you're writing poetry, write it. Don't type it in just because you can." The classroom is changing, as new technologies dramatically alter the learning for both teachers and students. And at the heart of this change is the tablet.