When you bring out math manipulatives you let the kids play with them a bit so that later they can focus on the work of learning with the tool. That was my intent with our new iPads and netbooks. I have lots of ideas I want my students to try out but first I thought I’d let them play. They did ask nicely, after all. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n
I was also curious as to the apps they would gravitate to on their own. At first I was a bit surprised to see kids going to YouTube and Safari. I mean, they could do that on my iMacs. Many were content with YouTube in all of my five classes. Most did try out some apps. Doodle Buddy<\/a> was a huge hit (Draw Free<\/a> was popular but I saw more kids use Doodle Buddy<\/a>). Rush Hour<\/a> as well. I even got hooked! The chess app<\/a> was quite popular. Meanderthal<\/a> made kids curious but the iPads can’t take pictures so they couldn’t try it out. A few kids checked out Animals HD<\/a> and the HD Marine Life App<\/a>. I even had a few kids write a blog! Two were blogs about the iPads and one was actually the current assignment<\/a>!<\/p>\n What an awesome play experience! Here are the results of a Google Form<\/a> asking kids which apps they liked the best.<\/p>\n Here’s a video of their first day of play:
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