The document discusses using iPad and iPhone apps to foster literacy learning, outlining various apps that can be used for activities like accessing and analyzing information, reading and writing digitally, discussing and collaborating, and playing games and simulations to support learning. It provides examples of apps for social reading and writing, concept mapping, blogging, tweeting, essay writing, discussing online, screencasting, and texting that teachers can utilize to engage students in literacy skills.

1. Technologies: Using
iPad/iPhone Apps to Foster
Literacy Learning
Richard Beach, University of Minnesota,
rbeach@umn.edu
Google Docs Version of handout:
http://tinyurl.com/778odqp
Using iPad and iPhone Apps for
Learning with Literacy Across the
Curriculum
http://usingipads.pbworks.com

2. QR code: Google Docs
handout

3. Backchannel comments:
Writing to learn:
http://todaysmeet.com/Wisco
nsinReading

4. Backchannel comments:
Writing to learn:
http://todaysmeet.com/Wisco
nsinReading

5. Affordances of iPads/iPhones
 Touch:
◦ Intuitive navigation of texts and virtual
worlds
 Portability/storage/ownership
◦ Personal learning device
 Social reading/writing
 Multimodality
 Collaboration/communication

6. App Activity

7. Activity App

8. App Affordances
 Affordances: Those literacy practices
fostered/mediated by uses of apps
within authentic, engaging activity

9. App affordances: Six literacies to
learn (app examples on handout)
 Accessing/Analyzing Information to
Learn
 Reading Digitally to Learn
 Writing to Learn
 Discussing to Learn
 Games, Simulations, and Drama to
Learn
 Reflection to Learn

10. Underlying app affordance:
Images/video/audio to learn
 Multimodal processing and production of
texts
 Images/videos  oral/written language
 iPad: touch/drawing/video/audio
affordances
 Draw Something app (match
word/image)
◦ http://tinyurl.com/6wewqco
 Let’s Sing! Free app (identify song from
one player humming the song)
◦ http://tinyurl.com/ck2ue8w

11. The Dot Project: Multimodal
response to literature
 Students construct dots in response
to The Dot by Peter Reynolds
◦ http://www.thedotproject.org

12. Google Images/Earth/Lit Trips

13. Accessing/Analyzing
Information to Learn:
Wikipedia
 Qwiki
◦ includes videos, images, graphs, and
entries for millions of topics
 Articles for iPad
 Wikipedia Mobile
 Wikipanion Plus
 Simplepedia
 iWiki

15. Social, collaborative
reading/writing to learn
 Social reading/writing:
◦ Study: two 7th graders reading each
other’s annotations (Coiro, Castek, &
Guzniczak, 2011, 61st LRA Yearbook)
◦ Exposed to alternative response practices
that may differ from their own
◦ Acquiring new ways of interpreting texts

16. Collaborative Task
What caused the downfall of the Mayan civilization?

20. What will happen when Abby and Starfish
work collaboratively?
In what ways might their patterns of
strategy use remain the same or change?

22. Findings: Shifts in Abby and Starfish’s
Individual and Collaborative Stances
Thoughtful Gather
Purposeful Summarizer
Aesthetic Summarizer
Reflective Analyzer

23. Social reading/writing approach:
Context: Romeo & Juliet
(Enciso): six lines of the prologue to Romeo &
 Look at the first
Juliet. How would you teach this given everything we
know now about strategies, text structures, children's
interests, and the fact that a whole lot of kids are in the
room? Now imagine how an actor would approach this
text—say, a single actor on stage who has to make these
lines meaningful? And then imagine what the director
would do to make the meaning come to life. That's the
difference in teaching the text... and it's quite a leap in
pedagogical skill, dependent in large part on the
teacher's ability to form an ensemble of readers
(community of readers or the reading club as F. Smith
described it)…The point about complexity isn't just the
text—it's in the experience of and motivation to read the
text. We're approaching the text in the way that actors
in the Royal Shakespeare Company learn language and

24. App affordances: Social
reading/writing shared responses
toKobo Pulse

texts
◦ http://tinyurl.com/6v7oy9w
 Readmill
◦ http://tinyurl.com/6tldeng
◦ Video demo http://readmill.com
 Subtext
◦ http://tinyurl.com/6v6fgxg
◦ Video demo:
http://www.subtext.com/education
 Students share annotations, chat with
other readers, and view what peers are
reading

25. Using Diigo social bookmarking
for sharing annotations
1. Add Diigo to your toolbar
2. Find an online text
3. Highlight sections of the text
4. Click on the icon to add a Sticky Note
response
5. Have other students add their responses

26. Diigo annotations: Pro-con
readings: benefits of energy from
wind power
th
 7 grade students iMelanie
Swandby’s
◦ Lighthouse School Community Charter
School, Oakland, California
 Students posed questions for each
other
◦ “What does that mean, virtually free?”
◦ What are some things that use energy or
power?”

27. Adding sticky-note
annotations

28. One student’s annotation: Pro
wind turbine essay

29. One student’s annotation: con
essay

30. Students responding to each
other’s annotations

31. Dialogic interactions through
annotations
“There is a bad and good thing about
this. Bad is it kills birds passing by.
Good it makes energy cleaner.”
 “Tarnished with wind turbines? Aren't
wind turbines supposed to be a good
thing? Why are they complaining
about the turbines? it doesn't even
look bad.”

32. Use of annotations for summary
writing
 I am perplexed in choosing if wind energy
is a good courses or bad source. While,
wind energy is a good source because
it’s renewable and needs nothing more
but construction, it can also cause
irritation and attention of some people.
Wind turbines are loud, noisy, and risky.
Even though, it doesn’t cause any
greenhouse gases in the air, wind
turbines are harmful to wildlife and
space. More birds die by getting hit by
wind turbines which is very dangerous to
our wildlife.

33. Backchannel comments:
Writing to learn:
http://todaysmeet.com/Wisco
nsinReading
 What are some ways you could use
shared annotations in your
classroom?
 How might you conduct research on
students’ social, collaborative use of
annotations?

34. Accessing/Analyzing Information
to Learn: QR reader apps
 Create QR code images by entering
in a URL in a QR create site such as
Qrafter, QRstuff.com, Kaywa, Tec-IT,
QR-app
 You or your students insert QR codes
into texts
◦ provide other related texts or pose
questions

35. Digital concept mapping
 iPad apps: iBrainstorm, MindMeister
for Ipad,, Sundry Notes, Idea Sketch,
Total Recall, inShare, iMindMap
MindNode, iThoughtsHD, Popplet Lite
http://tinyurl.com/3o6a3wy
 Hierarchical/logical relationships between
key concepts

36. 5th Grade Students: Popplet
Lite for Concept Mapping
 5th grade students
in Laura
Kretschmar’s class
at Lighthouse
Community Charter
School, Oakland,
California
 Lesson on rare
earth metals to
address the
question, “What is
gold?”

37. Mateo’s initial map: What is
gold?

38. Mateo’s revised map

39. Blogging apps
 BlogPress or Blogsy to export their
blog posts to Blogger, Wordpress,
Posterous, Edmodo, Live Journal,
Private Journal, KidBlog

40. Twitter apps
 Twitter Apps such as Twitter,
TweetCaster Tweetbot, Tweetdeck,
Twitteriffic, HootSuite

41. Twitteriffic

42. HootSuite

43. Writing to learn: Essay/report
writing apps
 Pages, IA Writer, My Writing Spot for
iPad, PlainText, Manuscript for iPad,
Notebooks, Clean Writer, Storyist
iPad, DraftPad
 OnLive Desktop, DocumentsToGo
 CloudOn (Word, Excel, & PowerPoint
editing)

44. Collaborative writing/data
collection: Google Docs forms
 5th graders: Weaver Lake School,
Osseo, MN
 Data on parasite presence in
Monarch butterflies
 49% had parasites

45. Reading/Writing Digitally to
Learn: Interactive literary texts:
Younger students
 The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris
Lessmore (301 MG)
 The Dr. Seuss Beginner Book Collection #1
(The Cat in the Hat, One Fish Two Fish Red Fish
Blue Fish, The FOOT Book, Mr. Brown Can
Moo! Can You? and Fox In Socks)
 The Dr. Seuss Beginner Book Collection #2
(Enjoy Green Eggs and Ham, Dr. Seuss's ABC,
The Cat in the Hat Comes Back, There's a
Wocket in My Pocket! and Hop on Pop)
 And To Think That I Saw It On Mulberry Street
 The Monster at the End of This Book...starring
Grover!
 Sir Charlie Stinky Socks on his Really BIG
Adventure

46. Graphic novel app: Teacher
guide: http://www.freespirit.com

47. Tools4Students (25 graphic
organizers): Second graders:
Lorax Garden app

49. Story/children’s book writing
 StoryKit, Storyrobe, Book Creator,
Bookemon Mobile, Picture Books,
Writer's Studio, StoryPatch,
Demibooks® Composer, StoryBuddy,
My Story, MoglueBooks, myebook,
StoryJumper (for younger students),
Tikatok

51. Comics/graphic novels
 Comic Life, Strip Designer,
ComicStrip CS
Shttp://tinyurl.com/6or7bvz, Comics
Creator, PhotoComic, Comic Touch
Lite

53. Apps for Sharing/Publishing
Writing
 ePub: Mac Pages (soon to be on iPad
Pages)
 Apple Author (requires OS Lion): iBooks
 Dotepub or Inkling books
◦ Human Biology Inkling textbook
 MoGlue Books
http://tinyurl.com/88pbgau
 ebooks for reading on eReaders by
submitting properly formatted Word files
to Smashwords.com, Bluefire Reader
App, or Book Creator

54. Discussing to learn: CMS
platform options
 OpenClass (free; linked to Google
Apps)
◦ http://www.joinopenclass.com/open/view/t
1
 Edmodo (free; also an app)
◦ http://www.edmodo.com/
 Schoology
◦ https://www.schoology.com/home.php
 rcampus (cloud-based)
◦ http://www.rcampus.com/

55. Discussing to learn: Collaborize
Classroom
http://tinyurl.com/7xdcejl
 Free platform for classroom
discussions
 App/Web-based
 Extensive curriculum resources
 Focus on fostering students
collaboration
 Professional development on leading
discussions

58. VoiceThread: Multiple audiences
share responses to the same
images

59. 5th Graders: VoiceThread for
Studying Dinosaurs
 Extinction of the dinosaurs:
◦ supernova, volcanoes, or an asteroid.
◦ Volcanoes
http://voicethread.com/share/2454743/
◦ Supernova
http://voicethread.com/share/2544219/
◦ Asteriod
http://voicethread.com/share/2545658/

60. VoiceThread affordances:
Literacy practices
 Collaborative shared reading
◦ Mediated by focus on same images
◦ Learn from each other’s focus/practices
 Scientific thinking: claims/counter-
claims
◦ Exposure to competing arguments
 “The asteroid couldn’t have caused the
dinosaur extinction because the asteroid only
landed on one spot and there were dinosaurs
everywhere.”

61. Screencasting app: Doodles and
audio voice-over for collaborative
reading/writing/video
 ShowMe, Explain Everything,
VoiceThread, Screenchomp,
Educreations
 7th grade students at Lighthouse
Community Charter School
◦ Mendelian genetics
◦ Created ShowMe presentations

62. Students ShowMe’s: Genetics:
dominant vs. recessive traits
 “If a brown eyed and a blue eyed parent
had a baby, what color eyes would the baby
have?”
 http://www.showme.com/sh/?h=ibbycYS
 Mother and father birds and baby bird
 http://www.showme.com/sh/?h=RNKspgu
 Pea plant genetics
 http://www.showme.com/sh/?h=GC6q3nM

63. ShowMe affordances: Social
reading/writing/video synergy
 Unfolding doodling  voice-over
talk
 Use of ShowMe for prewriting/revision
◦ Testing our/erasing doodles
 Collaborative focus on same images
 Video: Rhetorical sense of audience
 Use science disciplinary literacy
◦ Images, charts, figures as data evidence

64. Screencasting: Students or you
create how-to tutorials for peers
 VoiceThread, ExplainEverything,
Screenchomp, ShowMe,
Educreastions
 Snapguide http://tinyurl.com/ctkslx8
◦ Students:

65. Screencasting: feedback
 VoiceThread, ExplainEverything,
Screenchomp, ShowMe,
Educreastions
 Video response to writing: Jing
◦ http://tinyurl.com/3kkw4am
 Speeches/drama: Formative
Feedback for Learning
http://formativefeedbackapp.blogspot.
com

66. Peer feedback: Reading/writing
connections
 Video: Better Reviewers are Better
Writers http://tinyurl.com/c36bv96
 ELI review: Web-based review
◦ 1. Select peer reviewers
◦ 2. Reviewers reader using criteria
◦ 3. Reviewers respond
◦ 4. Writer strategizes revisions
◦ 5. Teacher obtains student work/reviews

67. Backchannel comments:
http://todaysmeet.comWiscon
sinReading
 What are some ways you do/could
use these apps
(VoiceThread/ShowMe) in your
classroom?
 How might you conduct research on
use of these apps?

68. Discussing to learn: Google+
Hangout: Up to 10 people

69. Discussing to learn: Teen
texting: Pew Research
 63% text daily versus 39% cell phones,
35% face-to-face socializing, 29% social-
networking messages, 22% IMing, and
6% emailing.
 The median number of texts sent daily
was 60 in 2011. The heaviest texters
(more than 100 texts a day) are also the
heaviest talkers; 69% of heavy texters
talk daily on their cell phones versus 46%
of medium texters (those exchanging 21-
100 texts a day)

70. Texting/message apps
 iMessage (iPad or iPhone), Messages
(Mac), AK Messenger!, textPlus Free
Texting + Group Text, Textie™
Messaging, Textfree, TextNow + Voice
- Free Texting and Calling, iPushIt,,
Text Me!, gText
 Classroom-based texting systems:
Class Parrot, Kikutext, WeTxt,
Remind101, Sendhub, Class Pager

71. Class Parrot: School texting

72. Tom’s Messenger
http://tinyurl.com/7v7klxw

76. My message on Tom’s
Messenger

77. Another message

78. Games/simulations/drama to
learn: Game/simulation/roleplay
apps
 Tiny Tower, CityVille Hometown, My
Town 2, Trade Nation, Farm Story,
Epic Citadel (medieval fantasy town
with a cathedral).
 Students creating characters and
stories based on the Epic Citadel
medieval setting
http://www.porchester.notts.sch.uk/citad
el

80. Interactive fiction
 Zenonia series
 Terra-Eternal Chaos, Vanquish: The
Oath of Brothers
 Rimelands series
 Fighting Fantasy series
 Gamebook Adventures series
 LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4
 Hunger Games: Girl on Fire
 Avatar

81. Critical literacy: Sexism in role-
play game (RPGs) app:
 Saturday Morning RPG
◦ a high school student must make
decisions to cope with the threat of an evil
villain to attempt to save the world, a
game that draws on Saturday morning
cartoons
 Surviving High School
◦ a new female high school student coping
with getting to know students in her school
or a male assuming the role as a member
of the high school football team

82. Apps for planning/organizing
instruction
 Nearpod http://tinyurl.com/6ts55kp
◦ http://new.nearpod.com
◦ videos, polls, sketching tools, or featured
presentations
 GoClass http://tinyurl.com/chbmeke
◦ http://tinyurl.com/blgogqs
◦ SHOW (online resources), EXPLAIN (add
notes), ASK (questions for students)

83. Reflection to learn: Self-
assessment forms
 Google Docs Forms
 iResponse

84. Open-ended feedback
 Essay Grader
 Easy Assessment
 Collaborize Classroom Pro
◦ student online discussion participation

85. Record keeping/grades
 The TeacherTool, Super Duper Data
Tracker, Teacher's Assistant Pro:
Track Student Behavior, Easy
Assessment, TeacherPal,
PowerTeacher Mobile, Gradekeeper,
iHomework
 Students’ reading performance:
Reading Log, Reading Record iPad
◦ recording changes in students reading
scores over time.

86. e-Portfolio apps
 Three Ring
 Teacher's Wire
 Use blogs, wikis, websites

88. ELA professional
development
 NCTE’s Connected Community
 English Companion Ning
 National Writing Project Connect/Digital
Is
 Classroom 2.0
 Curriki
 IRA’s Engage
 ReadWriteThink
 School 2.0
 Sophia
 #EngChat (Twitter feeds)

89. App uses/recommendations
 EdReadch channel (MobileReach,
MacReach)
 Appy Hours 4 U
◦ The TechChef4u app
 The iPad Show
 The Daily App Show
 TWIT channel
 Tech Chick Tips