One of our second grade classes is on its third day using the iPads in their literacy centers, and another class just got started today. It was interesting to sit in on both our "veteran" (of three days) class and our beginning class and notice the difference a few days has made. In the more experienced class, students navigated smoothly to a new sight word video, reset the video upon finishing, and then started the Spell Blocks with Sight Words app. Without prompting, students began to explore the settings in Spell Blocks with Sight Words to adjust the challenge level to meet their needs.
In contrast, the beginning class was still in teacher-directed mode and struggled a bit just to get the movie to play and pause as they wished.
Navigation issues aside, I feel the veteran class is starting to think differently about the iPad and to look for ways they can customize it to their needs. This is something we anticipated
would happen, and I am
glad to see it happening so soon -- so our planning discussions will now turn to differentiation and how we can use the iPads to customize the learning experience for individual students.
Students are also taking increasing ownership of the management of the equipment. Each room has a team of three students who go to the cart, unplug the iPads, and carry them to the classroom. They take this job very seriously!
There has been so much progress over the last three days, and I can't wait to see what next week will bring.
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