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Today, we have a guest blog post written by Donna Roman, EdTech Specialist in the Department of Professional Learning. In the post, she provides a tip to remember—a familiar filter if you will—when the selection of apps in today's digital classroom becomes overwhelming! Donna writes... It’s easy to get overwhelmed with all of the apps available. Too many choices...too many capabilities….who has the time? Try considering why you want to use a tech tool. That narrows it down and makes it easier to manage the sea of possibilities. It also helps you differentiate in your classroom. Let’s go back to something we all know and love—Bloom’s Taxonomy. Below graphic is a great resource from Kathy Schrock centered around Bloom's Revised Taxonomy. Remember to always check the terms of service and CPS policy. 
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Written by Gerald Proctor, iOS Device Management Administrator Additional Guidance We all know that the iPad is a powerful internet connectivity device—allowing educators to leverage teaching and learning websites such as: Study Island, Achieve3000, and many more! In addition, the App Store has an extensive library of free and paid apps to assist students with their learning while helping to enhance a teacher's facilitation. For some, the idea of an using an App to enhance the learning experience is still very new and diving into the App Store can be daunting task:
Over the years many educators have become comfortable with teaching and learning websites—leveraging the content, features, activities, or games; some have even built up a go-to list of their favorite sites. It is this list of websites that often becomes top priority to add to the iPads as the website experience is very familiar. But, it is the user experience we must remember to take into consideration because a website was designed with traditional computer set up of a mouse and keyboard in mind, not a touch screen device such as the iPad. The learner (or user experience) can be vastly different with these sites when trying to touch and swipe though them verse using a keyboard and mouse. Many companies realized this limitation years ago and have since designed, developed, and deployed companion apps to recreate and re-think the website experience for the touch screen user, the iPad learner! Often, the companion app contains features and content not present on the website. Three very popular examples of companion apps are:
So, the next time you rush to use a teaching and learning website on the iPad with your students you might want to consider visiting the App Store to see if a companion app exists! You might be pleasantly surprised. To review how to deploy apps to the iPads via Apple Configurator: click here
To review how to deploy apps to the iPads via AirWatch: click here  If your school has iPads that were purchased on or after September 1, 2013, it is possible to request FREE content codes for the iApps: Keynote, Numbers, Pages, iMovie, and Garageband through the iOS fulfillment process! This should prove to be a huge WIN for your students, teachers, and school—while saving the school a significant amount of money. Visit our new Request Free iApps support page for information on the qualifying factors and steps you must take to acquire these apps. Written by Gerald Proctor, iOS Device Management Administrator
 Often when a major iOS upgrade is released we rush, filled with excitement, to install it on our devices—instantly our iPads feel new again! There is a thrill that comes with trying out the new features or app additions designed to improve and deepen our user experience. But, should we be so quick to upgrade? Is there any potential downside or issues that could arise with immediately upgrading to a new iOS? The answer is: it depends. An important question to consider is, will all of my mission critical apps—the ones I rely on and use on a daily basis—still function and perform as expected after this upgrade? iOS is the foundation that enables a iPad to manage and run all apps that reside on it. For an app, upgrading to a new iOS can be like relocating to a new office. We expect that necessary work items will still exist, but the location of these items and the layout of the building could be very different. A bit of reorienting might be necessary. After an iOS upgrade, an app could experience problems functioning in the new iOS environment— and might need to reorient. The developer of the app would need to release an update addressing these problems or "bugs" as they are commonly called. This is nothing new to developer community; often developers of very popular apps need to release an update within days of a new iOS upgrade being made available to "confirm compatibility" (ensure that they continue to functioning optimally). Not all apps are updated immediately following an iOS upgrade; and at times, some of these "un-updated" apps can experience unexpected behavior. If apps that you use regularly have yet to receive a developer update "confirming compatibility" with iOS 8, consider upgrading only one iPad to iOS 8 to and then verify if the "un-updated" apps still function as expected. The below PDF guide provides a quick "how-to" on verifying whether apps are "confirmed compatible" with iOS 8. Please consider taking a few moments to verify that your mission critical apps will continue to function as expected prior to upgrading the iPads. NOTE: Any websites that have been saved to the home screen as a "web clip" should not be affected by an iOS 8 upgrade. 
Written by Gerald Proctor, iOS Device Management Administrator
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