For the Sharing Photos Thing I chose to use Instagram. This is an app where you can share photos with people in your groups that you create. You can not only take photos but you can crop and filter them before sharing. There are a lot of places now that have photo contests that use Instagram as the way to share the photos. I have been curious about this because of some of those contests, but I haven't tried it until these 23 Things. I am an amateur photographer so anything that I can learn about photos, editing them, and how to share them with others is greatly appreciated.
Personally I would use this to share the photos I take on trips with my other photo "geek" friends and share photos with family and friends. It seems like a much easier way to do this because it doesn't take a lot of time to upload them to a site and you only have so much space to attach photos in email. This way you know that the person instantly got the photo and then they will be able to do whatever they like with the photo.
Professionally this would be great to do a project in your class about watching the butterfly life cycle, planting a seed and watching it grow, or watching eggs hatch. You would be able to have students take daily photos and share them with the group. You could also have the students do a scavenger hunt and have the students look for certain things, take a photo and then share them with the class. Also if you had preschoolers you could have them learn the ABCs by finding things that start with the letter of the week and take a photo and then share it and finally put together a group book of all the things they found that start with each letter of the alphabet.
This app will be helpful to educators if they can just see the many different ways that you can use this technology in their classroom. I hope that some educator are going through these 23 Mobile Things and seeing all these great apps that would work for them in both their personal and professional life.
Friday, May 16, 2014
Thing 9
For the Taking & Editing Photos thing I looked at 2 different apps. I originally wanted to use the Color Splurge app because I could think of many things to do with this app. However the app had way too many problems, it would turn the photo black and white, but in order to have just one color stand out you had to paint that color onto the picture. I have used other tools where you choose the color and it turns everything else black and white that are much easier to use. Also there were way too many ads that popped up way to often. Lastly the app kept crashing, I am kind of bummed that this app didn't work, I love being able to add or edit photos by making one color pop.
So I decided to choose a second app, the LINE Camera app. This app allows you to have fun and edit your photos by adding filters, text and make collages. This app did not crash and was fun to use, but it is very basic. If you had a class set of iPads you could have the students take photos and create collages of people or things. You could also take a photo of each child and they could use the "beauty" setting to manipulate their photograph. They could see the different ways that you can alter a photograph to make it look "better", but this also is a perfect option because you can manipulate the photograph and it can look really creepy. Personally a person could use this to edit photos of their own or if they do amateur photography as a business they could use it to tweak those photos of a wedding or other event that they shot.
There are lots of different photography apps and photo manipulation apps out there, the point is you need to check them out and find out what will work best for your needs. There are a lot of ways to use this app both personally and professionally. These apps, while cheaper then buying PhotoShop or some other photo editing software are great but they also have their limits and should be practiced with a lot before just deciding that this will work and trying to use the app and finding that it doesn't.
So I decided to choose a second app, the LINE Camera app. This app allows you to have fun and edit your photos by adding filters, text and make collages. This app did not crash and was fun to use, but it is very basic. If you had a class set of iPads you could have the students take photos and create collages of people or things. You could also take a photo of each child and they could use the "beauty" setting to manipulate their photograph. They could see the different ways that you can alter a photograph to make it look "better", but this also is a perfect option because you can manipulate the photograph and it can look really creepy. Personally a person could use this to edit photos of their own or if they do amateur photography as a business they could use it to tweak those photos of a wedding or other event that they shot.
There are lots of different photography apps and photo manipulation apps out there, the point is you need to check them out and find out what will work best for your needs. There are a lot of ways to use this app both personally and professionally. These apps, while cheaper then buying PhotoShop or some other photo editing software are great but they also have their limits and should be practiced with a lot before just deciding that this will work and trying to use the app and finding that it doesn't.
Sunday, May 11, 2014
Thing 8
For thing 8, I chose to write about the Facebook app, which I already had prior to signing up for 23 Mobile Things. I have only just recently obtained a Twitter account and I am still getting used to my Google+ account. I like being able to have my Facebook account accessible where ever I had my iPad and could find a Wifi connection. It makes it very easy to change my status and see what everyone else is doing. However it also makes it much easier to get lost checking status updates instead of interacting with actual people.
Personally I use Facebook all the time to see what family and friends are doing, play games, and enjoy photos of my niece who I get to see maybe once a year. It is also a place where I can post cool things and photos. It is a great tool to keep in touch with people instantly and all over the world.
Professionally I could see posting library events or book trailers for people to check out, but a lot of schools have the internet blocking any social media so it would only work where you worked did not have it blocked. I see this more as a personal tool, but I know that it is used professionally at times. Event though I love it, I also see that it leads people to interact virtually instead of face to face more often.
Personally I use Facebook all the time to see what family and friends are doing, play games, and enjoy photos of my niece who I get to see maybe once a year. It is also a place where I can post cool things and photos. It is a great tool to keep in touch with people instantly and all over the world.
Professionally I could see posting library events or book trailers for people to check out, but a lot of schools have the internet blocking any social media so it would only work where you worked did not have it blocked. I see this more as a personal tool, but I know that it is used professionally at times. Event though I love it, I also see that it leads people to interact virtually instead of face to face more often.
Thing 7
For thing 7, I looked at the Pinterest app, I already had a Pinterest account but I had only used it on a computer. I have enjoyed using Pinterest and I found the app great because I could be searching and not be sitting at my desktop computer. I love being able to have the freedom to check out things and post them to my Pinterest account from anywhere. The one drawback was that it seemed to take up a lot of space on my iPad so I had to delete the app and only use the web version.
Personally I use Pinterest to locate different crafts and other things that I am interested in and be able to keep them all together. I have been able to try a few things and I love having them all in one place instead of having to do a Google search.
Professionally we have created a Library Pinterest page which has links to helpful library and research tools, fun library ideas and crafts, and library celebrations. It is a great and fun way to get people connected to the library and see the different things that you have to offer them. We are creating a middle school makerspace next year and I have a ton of ideas that I have put on our Pinterest page that will give the students ideas and let them know of the fun things we are going to do in the library.
Personally I use Pinterest to locate different crafts and other things that I am interested in and be able to keep them all together. I have been able to try a few things and I love having them all in one place instead of having to do a Google search.
Professionally we have created a Library Pinterest page which has links to helpful library and research tools, fun library ideas and crafts, and library celebrations. It is a great and fun way to get people connected to the library and see the different things that you have to offer them. We are creating a middle school makerspace next year and I have a ton of ideas that I have put on our Pinterest page that will give the students ideas and let them know of the fun things we are going to do in the library.
Thing 6
For thing 6, I chose to use Quickoffice and I must say I am a total fan!!! At the school where I work we have Google Drive along with 2 carts of 30 iPads each, but it it not easy to edit documents on mobile devices. Once I got this app and tried working on documents on my own iPad it made editing and creating documents on a mobile device so much easier. It is a really easy app to work with and will make editing documents on mobile devices much easier. The best part is that it works on both Apple and Android devices, so it doesn't limit who can use it.
Personally it is helpful to me while creating documents for my own personal use and for grad school, because I don't have to always be sitting at my desktop computer to edit these with ease. Professionally this is great for being able to access and edit all documents that I would need for my work. I would be able to do some work or edit something on my iPad if my computer wasn't working or I was in a meeting and only had my iPad with me.
We have added this app to the iPad carts so that students at the school where I work can easily work on their documents for their classes. Next year the middle school will mostly have access to only iPads as the high school goes one-to-one and they are getting rid of the computer lab and adding another cart of 30 iPads. The middle schoolers will need to be working on documents and be using our version of Google Apps, and now having this app will make this process so much easier.
Personally it is helpful to me while creating documents for my own personal use and for grad school, because I don't have to always be sitting at my desktop computer to edit these with ease. Professionally this is great for being able to access and edit all documents that I would need for my work. I would be able to do some work or edit something on my iPad if my computer wasn't working or I was in a meeting and only had my iPad with me.
We have added this app to the iPad carts so that students at the school where I work can easily work on their documents for their classes. Next year the middle school will mostly have access to only iPads as the high school goes one-to-one and they are getting rid of the computer lab and adding another cart of 30 iPads. The middle schoolers will need to be working on documents and be using our version of Google Apps, and now having this app will make this process so much easier.
Thing 5
I used Dragon Dictation and before I used it I thought about this app. I think that it would be very helpful for when I wanted to make note of something but I didn't have a piece of paper at the time. It would also be helpful if I needed to have my notes for a class dictated, this would be an easy way to do so. It does state that it is not perfect and you may have to edit your notes to change the words that it cannot figure out, which is great that it has that option.
After trying the app it did pick up a lot of the words I said but it did have trouble translating a few of the words I said. I would use this personally to dictate things that I want to remember if I couldn't find a piece of paper (but providing that I had my iPad with me) and I would also use it for making lists of things to accomplish. Professionally I would use this to take notes while watching a webinar or reading an article, because it says that it is easy to share it through email.
I think that this app would be very helpful especially if you had a iPhone or smartphone because you would always have it with you, but you might not carry around an iPad everywhere. This app would be very beneficial to those who have it on their cellphone, but I could only see it useful on the iPad if you were using it for note taking after reading an article or watching a webinar.
After trying the app it did pick up a lot of the words I said but it did have trouble translating a few of the words I said. I would use this personally to dictate things that I want to remember if I couldn't find a piece of paper (but providing that I had my iPad with me) and I would also use it for making lists of things to accomplish. Professionally I would use this to take notes while watching a webinar or reading an article, because it says that it is easy to share it through email.
I think that this app would be very helpful especially if you had a iPhone or smartphone because you would always have it with you, but you might not carry around an iPad everywhere. This app would be very beneficial to those who have it on their cellphone, but I could only see it useful on the iPad if you were using it for note taking after reading an article or watching a webinar.
Thing 4
For this thing I looked at the Flipboard app and I thought it would be quite helpful personally as well as professionally. For personal and professional use I could see myself putting all of the different things I am interested in from different sites so that I have it all together and can easily find where they are located. I think this is a very helpful app because I can put together things that I want to look at but might not have the time to do so at this moment. This will be very helpful professionally because I can put journal articles, ideas and other important information that I want to look at or read and then look at them when I have time or be able to go back and reread them if needed. It is helpful because you won't have to try and remember where you found that information because you can put it in your Flipboard and have everything under one location. This would also be helpful for students because they would be able to keep track of information that they need for school.
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