Simple Machines Inquiry - My Initial Planning

Affordable computers have great potential to stimulate creativity and develop excellent problem-solving skills.

Thinking about my next Unit of Inquiry. This one is all about Machines.

I want to tap into the current craze amongst my Grade 5 students which is Minecraft. I am thinking that I will get the students to create a roller coaster in Minecraft that doesn't use any power rails and the challenge will be to see how many hills the mine cart can travel over with only the using the motion from down the initial inclined plane.

We can measure the height of the slope by counting how many blocks high it is. I would then like to translate this into a real live activity by getting the students to create a marble run in the shared area between the classrooms using a flexible hose and marbles of different weights. We could try to compare the two by making a decision based on a scale that one Minecraft block equals so many centimeters. This is based on the height of our roof which would allow a maximum height of 3.5 M. I'm going to try creating a roller coaster tonight in Minecraft that is 35 blocks high to see how far it gets me.

Given that Minecraft uses a mine cart and the marble run uses a marble we need to scale it down. Perhaps we could compare the height of a mine cart with a marble to get a better break down? I'll leave those decisions for the students.

Here is a great example of what I hope to re-create.



For my second hands-on I would like to start by using Angry Birds online to explore a catapult and then get the students to make their own catapults. We will start by throwing soccer balls of different weights to see how far it will go. This we can then compare to using a catapult.

Here is a You Tube video of what we hope to create.

Actually I am still planning this but I do like to leave certain things open to happen in the moment. I'll certainly post about it when we get started.

AirPlay Mirror iPad to Macbook with Reflection App

I use iPads a lot in classes but it can be quite difficult for students to project their screen as the VGA connection for iPad sometimes takes a little while to kick in.

On the weekend I downloaded a new app for Mac called Reflection. This app is very easy to setup and use. I was easily able to download the trial version which worked straight away on my own home connection.

My school uses a Proxy server so I wasn't able to just connect to the system like I can at home.

What I did was the following:

In System Preferences I opened the Internet Sharing option.



In the Sharing options check the box for Internet Sharing and choose WiFi.
Make sure that this is OK with your school ICT Manager first :)



Then in my WiFi tab on my Mac I created a network called jane_ross
This was so I would know which WiFi to join from each iPad.

On each iPad I joined the new jane_ross network. After that I was able to double tap my home button on the iPad and swipe to the left to see the AirPlay button. You need to make sure that the Reflection App is active first - or you will not see any AirPlay button.



This morning at school I tried it out with 6 iPads at once. Here is the result. It is quite easy to change the size of each iPad by dragging a corner.

New Life for iPod Touch Generation 2

Technology is continually updating and gadgets that were once the latest thing - are soon replaced by newer ones with more options. So was the fate of the 15 iPod Touch Generation 2 at my school. These iPods are only a couple of years old - but cannot be updated anymore.

So new apps won't work :( And the books that were made with my favourite iPad creation app Book Creator - WON'T WORK! These iPods can only be updated to iOS 4.2.1
This is a problem. I can't use the iBooks 2.0 app with iOS 4.2.1. I need the iBooks app to read the books that the students are creating. I am in the middle of a publishing project. As an ICT Coach, I have been working with several classes to create talking books.

What's the solution?

I went on Twitter - I tweeted about my problem. This is what Twitter is for me. It's my help line for Tech. I think that if I can share as much as I receive then I will have restored the cosmic balance. So I sent out a tweet - an SOS for help.

The app creator of Book Creator, Dan Amos @redjumperdan answered my tweet. He suggested that I try using iBooks v 1.2 but it's not easy to get a hold of an earlier version of an iPod app. Most links on the web direct you to the iTunes Store and the most recent version is the one that is available.

Where do you find past versions of iPod apps? oldipodapps.com?

Dan kindly sent me a copy of the version 1.3.2 but it didn't work with my iPod. What next? I even managed to get a copy of the iBooks .ipa file 1.2.2 but it still didn't work.

So why do I need these 'old' iPods to work ...

I love the talking books that my students are making with Dan's awesome Book Creator app but I needed a solution to create more access in the school community for viewing these books.
We are creating these books using the school iPads. We have a set of 20 iPad 2 and these iPads can be borrowed by teachers to use with students. In the beginning the iPads were very popular but as time went on they were being borrowed less and less.

As an ICT Coach, this is a concern of mine.
How can I get the iPads used more? How can I get the class teachers more interested to use iPads in their teaching and learning program?

I have taken on this challenge by making a publishing project. I use the Book Creator app to create the book and the Drawing Pad app to create the pictures and as well as this I use photos taken by using the iPad camera.


Book Creator App


Drawing Pad app

This works really well. We have been creating books in all Grades from 1-5. I have been working very closely with the Chinese teachers in the school as by using the Pinyin setting in the keyboard, the students are able to type in Chinese characters. In Indonesian language classes in Grade 1 we have also made several books. Soon Kindergarten will start to create books too.

Here are my students working in Chinese classes using the Book Creator app.



The Book Creator app is so user friendly and allows students to put words, pictures and voice recordings. It produces a book that can be read by the free app iBooks. iBooks works with the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch.

So what's the problem?

The iPads have become rather popular ... now it's quite difficult to borrow one. This has prompted me to look for other ways of how the students might be able to view each others stories.

So - solution?

Jailbreak the iPod Touch ...

I am very fortunate to have access to a school Genius Bar aka iQbar. The iQbar is available to anyone in our school community. The guys that work there know a lot about Tech. Today I learned from them about how to jailbreak an iPod 2 using Green Pois0n , load Cydia - then update it, add the AppSync for 4.0+ and sync the iBooks 1.2 that I found online. It's also possible to add a source such as Hackulo.us to download that version of iBooks.

So the ending to this story ...




Yes! Now all I have to do is get the other iPod Touch jailbroken and set. It means a new life for the iPod Touch Generation 2 in our school.

My iBook is Published!

Yesterday when I logged into my account in iTunes Connect, I discovered that my iBook had been released in 32 countries. This is my first iBook and I have written it in my second language, Indonesian, with the help of my two children Taruli and John.

You can download your copy of the book via iTunes. Here is the link to the Australian store http://itunes.apple.com/au/book/lomba-kapal/id497936331?mt=11

My iBook is called 'Lomba Kapal' which means Boat Race. It is a story about my children racing origami paper boats in the river near my house. I took the photos and videos with my iPhone on the morning that the iBooks Author app was released. I then spent the next two days working on the story and the layout. I was determined to keep the overall size as low as possible.

In Indonesia I have a very slow Internet connection at my house. I am well aware that accessibility is the most important factor in technology. I wanted to make my iBook easy to download so that others like me with a slow connection can still get it in a reasonable amount of time.

This iBook is just under 18MB and has 15 pages including interactive elements and multimedia.

Here is a screen shot inside the iTunes Store of my iBook and the preview pages.




I think that it is really sad that my book has been released to 32 countries such as US, UK, Australia, Ireland, Czech Repulic, Estonia and others but it is not available in the Indonesian iBookstore.

I asked some of my contacts on Twitter about this. I found out that the iBookstores in Asia do not have any locally produced content in them. I am wondering why this is the case? What has to happen for the iBookstore in each country to be open for locally produced content?

What can I do to open the Indonesian iBookstore for locally produced iBooks?
I have a group of national Indonesian teachers ready to create children's stories.
We need access to the Indonesian iBookstore.

In the meantime, my iBook is for free and I encourage you to download it. It includes interactive pictures, galleries and videos. I have been writing children's stories over the years but this is the first time that I have properly published one. I am hoping to write a whole series about the things that we do as a family.

Waiting ... for my iBook to be Approved

I have blogged about my first attempts to create a storybook using iBooks Author. I was able to create a book of 15 pages over a couple of days. The software is easy to use and feels like a combination between the Mac software Pages and Keynote.

My next task after I had completed the book and had it proof-read was to upload it to iTunes Connect. Itunes Connect requires you to download the software iTunes Producer which enables you to upload your iBook and fill out all the necessary information for publishing.



My first issue was that one of my interactive picture widgets in my book was not working properly. I didn't realize that the word tags in the picture must always stay within the frame. I was able to fix this fairly quickly but I then needed to wait for iTunes Connect to view my book again.

After a few days I sent a message to iTunes Connect to ask what was happening with my iBook. I got an answer within a day. I was told that my book was in the review process and needed to be cleared.

Just yesterday I noticed that my book in iTunes Connect was no longer labelled as 'pending' but was now needing a different review process. This review is for quality. I don't know why my book has been singled out for this review. I am wondering perhaps it is because it is in Indonesian and there might not be anyone in iTunes Connect that can check the language?

I wait patiently for my book to be cleared ....

Accessibility in iOS - Getting your iPad to Speak

I recently presented a mini workshop about Accessibility in iOS in Bangkok. This is new learning for me. I have had my current iPad 2 for several months and I can't believe that I only just learned that it can read the screen in 36 different built-in languages!

This feature works best with iBooks. This means that you can get your iPad to read your iBook to you. I have my own iBook that I wrote in Indonesian so I decided to test it.

To enable VoiceOver I prefer to use the Triple-click Home method in the Accessibility settings on the iPad. This gives the user greater control to turn the VoiceOver on or off as necessary.



To adjust the speaking rate in the VoiceOver section of the settings slide the setting towards to turtle to make the speech slower.



Before you try using the VoiceOver you will also need to select the languages you wish to make available in the Language Rotor. You can select any languages that you will use. You need to select VoiceOver and then inside that tab you select Language Rotor.



Next open iBooks and open a book that you would like to have read to you. Open the book to the page that you want read. Enable VoiceOver by tapping quickly three times on the home button.

To activate the rotor, tap and hold the screen with two fingers and rotate your fingers. It's a little like turning a dial with two fingers. You will see a dial pop up. You can select the 'language' setting on the dial.



To change between languages you tap the screen as if you are making a check mark. You will hear your iPad call out each language. When you get to the one that you want, tap on the text to hear your iPad read the text aloud.

Accessibility on OSX - making your Macbook Spell

I recently presented a mini workshop about Accessibility on OSX. This is something that I previously didn't have much experience with and I am very grateful to Jane Harris for giving me the following suggestions.

Jane taught me about reverse spelling. A traditional spelling test is when the teacher reads out a list of words for the students to spell. Jane's idea is to reverse this, to get your Macbook to spell out each word. In Lion, the Macbook has a built in feature for speech.

To enable this in Pages you simply highlight the text you want spoken, right click it and select speak.

For spelling, just put a space in between each letter - s p e l l . Your macbook will spell the word.
You can teach your students to create personal spelling lists and then they can get the Macbook to spell out each word whilst they write it down.



You can adjust the speaking speed in the System Preferences settings in the Speech section.



To adjust the speed of the speech you can slide the speaking speed to 'slow'.



Another idea is to create slideshows of vocabulary words in iPhoto. In iPhoto make a folder of images (an Event) and rename each image with the word of the object. You can also add a description which is a sentence that includes the vocabulary word.



Hold down the shift button to select all images and create a new Slideshow.



In the settings make sure that you select 'Show Captions' with Title and Descriptions selected.



You could encourage your students by playing a couple of their visual spelling slideshows each day

My iBook Adventures

Today I went back to school very excited to show my iBook on my iPad. This book is in Indonesian my second language. My first job was to get my language proof-read by my Indonesian colleagues. I wanted to make sure that my Indonesian was not too formal and therefore suitable for children as my book is a children’s story.

Then I tried using iTunes Producer to create the .itmsp iBook package. I am still a little confused as Indonesian is not on the list of languages. Does that mean that there are no books in the iBookstore in Indonesian?

There are only 14 languages in the drop-down list. When I tried to type over the option to add Indonesian. It continued to fail when I uploaded the package to iTunes Connect. Consequently I have had to put my book language as English even though I have written it in Indonesian.

I hope that I can create a series of books for children written in Indonesian. I need Apple to add Indonesian language to their list of languages.

A word of advice ...

I neglected to read the fine print and had to resize both my cover art image and my screenshot images for my book.

For the Cover art:

Cover art should be at least 600 pixels along the larger axis and must be a TIFF, JPEG, or PNG file in RGB Color mode. For an average trade paperback, this could be 400 x 600 minimum size.

For the screenshots:

Screenshots should be a clear picture and be a 1024 x 768, 1024 x 748, 768 x 1024, or 768 x 1004 pixel
JPEG or PNG file with the appropriate file extensions (.jpg, .jpeg, and .png) in RGB Color mode.

Once I had done this I had only one other error - language. I tried to type in Indonesian but it is not one of the language options from the drop down list. In the end I put English.

Needless to say the upload was successful. Now I am wondering what happens next. I have gone into the settings and made it available to the world.

iBooks Author - First Impressions

I downloaded iBooks Author as soon as it was released. I have been writing books in the classroom for a number of years but I have never properly published them. My books are always about the current learning. Mostly they tell the story of the current inquiry.

You can read here about the Publishing Group that I am working on at my school.

Originally I wrote books with Microsoft Publisher. This worked well enough as these books were just for printing off on a colour photocopier. I was able to master the double sided printing (short edge binding as I prefer landscape not portrait). I was able to then take the printed pages and cover to a local binder and get them made up into hard cover books.

Then I moved to an Apple school so I used Pages, Keynote and Comic Life to make my books. I am an Elementary teacher so I prefer Keynote as I use large photos and very little text. The Keynote file can be easily exported as a PDF and then the book can be printed via Preview.

I was easily able to sync these PDF books to my iPad. I have also worked with creating ePubs in Pages. I must admit I got a little frustrated with this as I had little control over the layout. I believe that layout is the most important part in an Elementary school book. I tend to keep a certain layout in my books and with ePub the pictures need to be Inline which limits the overall look.

Now for iBooks Author ...
I am impressed - hands down! It's like Apple knew what I needed. iBooks Author is a combination of Keynote and Pages. You can also easily copy/paste from Comic Life as well.

Most importantly you get TOTAL control over the layout.

I love using the widgets. I have tried the Interactive picture widget and the 3D image widget with a lot of success! Here is a screen capture from my first book. This one is in Indonesian. My children are helping me to write it. I hope to finish soon and even try to send it to the iBookstore. Who knows - maybe I'll get to actually publish this one?

Going to ADE Global Institute in Cork, Ireland.

I must admit that I am thrilled to be chosen to attend the Apple Distinguished Educators Global Institute in Cork Ireland. I submitted my application not daring to dream that I would be selected.

I remember when I got the email last week - I was so nervous to click it open ....



It is quite a thrill to one of the 200 ADEs chosen from across the world that will join this institute. I can't wait to go and meet up with innovative teachers who love to use technology like I do. I am one of only 2 people to go from Indonesia.

I hope to learn more about:

Publishing books for iPad - a current project that I am chasing at my school
Running an Apple Training Centre - my school will launch it's training centre next month
Challenge-Based Learning - I do a lot of this and would love to hear about how others are running it in their classes. It will be a great trip!