“The Apps in the Classroom series was created to provide teachers with a few ideas on how to integrate content creation apps into daily classroom instruction. Each guide includes ​a collection of activities that span age ranges and subjects and can be modified to work ​in your own learning environment. Inspired by Apple Distinguished Educators, the activities are designed to encourage students to think in new ways and help them take a creative approach to applying and demonstrating learning.”

In iTunes U, in For Educators, there is a category called Using Apps in the Classroom. If you click or tap the see all link, you will find eighteen courses, that are free, for you to check out. A few that interest me are; Tag Jornal Lesson Ideas, Art Authority Lesson Ideas, and Explain Everything Lesson Ideas.

I took a look at Explain Everything Lesson Ideas. I have used the Explain Everything app for a class project. The cost of the app is $2.99. “It is a terrific interactive whiteboard and screen casting app, it is perfect for making instructional videos that clearly demonstrate concepts. Annotate, manipulate, and at narration to documents, photos, and videos, creating visual presentations that you can share. Instructors can use this app to explain everything from math equations to football plays, or they can task students with producing their own projects to show to the class.”

The Lesson Ideas iBook provided great ideas to use in the classroom. They covered Kindergarten through High School and they covered all subjects. I liked the idea of using this app for the Kindergartens to find things in the classroom that start with a certain letter. The students would use their iPads to take pictures of those items and create a presentation of what they found.

Excerpt From: Education, Apple. “Explain Everything Lesson Ideas.” v1.0. Apple Inc. – Education, 2014. iBooks.

“One Best Thing is a collection of books created by Apple Distinguished Educators (ADEs) that demonstrate the use of Apple technologies to transform teaching ​
and learning. Each One Best Thing book shares a unit, a lesson, or a best practice and is designed to help another educator implement a successful practice. It’s a professional learning idea championed by an educator—in word and action—that others can look to for ideas and tips on how to replicate.”

One Best thing is a great resource for teachers. This collection provides free iBooks that cover all subjects and extras, examples are physical education and technology. There are 104 books out there. I chose Active Every Minute: Ready, Set, Flip Physical Education.

“Only one in three children are physically active everyday, making inactivity a significant issues for students. This One Best Thing demonstrates way that Apple technologies help physical education and K-20 educators increase the amount of physical activity time provided by flipping the classroom and engaging the learners.”

I have not experienced or observed a flipped classroom. I always hear great things about this method and I only see examples of this method in math and science classes. This was really interesting to me how they flipped physical education classes. I like the idea of having the rules of the game and how to do an activity all online, so the class can have more time playing the game or performing the activity.

This ibook provided helpful video examples of what a teacher would post online for the students to see. Throughout the ibook there are links to more examples and information. I also liked that it was short, there were not a lot of pages to read. I suggest using One Best Thing to gather ideas and implement them in your classroom.