Unlock Literacy with iPads
in the spring of 2010, I placed an iPad on my desk, and my students immediately gathered around and
asked if they could play with it. The
district’s director of instructional
technology gave me the iPad to experiment with and consider how we
might integrate it into the English
curriculum at Euclid High School
in Euclid, Ohio, USA.
Because my students were so interested in the iPad that day, I decided
I’d show them how it worked. Mostly,
though, they showed me. That wasn’t
surprising. Most of my students were
familiar with the iPad, and many of
them either owned an iPod or used
one regularly. It was obvious my students were engaged; now all I had
to do was find content and teaching
methods that would work cohesively
with the iPad.
In October 2010, the district
provided me with a class set of 24
iPads on a cart, and I was charged
with tracking data over the school
year and sharing what I learned about
the iPads. While there had been a lot
of talk about how such a device might
shape education, few English language
arts teachers—let alone educators in
general—had conducted their own
research into the iPad’s impact on
student achievement.
Somehow I knew my students
would be engaged by the iPads, and
I suspected the devices could potentially transform learning and teaching
in my classroom. The majority of my
students receive free or reduced-price
lunches, and some of their families
have been disenfranchised from
school for several generations. Many
students come to my sophomore English class two grade levels below where
they should be in reading and writing.
No other pedagogical tool or technique in my experience
engages students in a way that makes learning fun and leaves
students feeling like they are in control of their own learning.
Choosing Apps
Finding the right apps was a process
of trial and error. Knowing that students would be the best judges of the
apps, I watched while they tried them
out. I noticed that students settled
quickly into using apps that engaged
them in ways that traditional classroom activities could not. With other
apps, it seemed that students would
rather surf the web. Some apps would
adjust to a student’s ability, and others
allowed users to select increasingly
difficult levels. It became clear that,
in many cases, the iPad apps allowed
for differentiated instruction. I made
careful note of this and adjusted the
app selection.
Here are some of the apps that
worked well with my students:
iBooks. With access to Apple’s eReader
app, students experienced reading
some of the classic works of literature in ways they’d never imagined,
by clicking on unfamiliar words to
determine meaning and context. Getting students to read outside of class
for homework is often a chore, and I
began to wonder what would happen
if my struggling readers could take the
iPads home. At this point, the devices
were to remain at school. One drawback of using a relatively new format
was that some classics, such as Harper
Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, were not
available in either EPUB or eReader
format. This was a source of frustration for me and my students.
Vocabulary-building apps. Students had
access to apps, such as WordFlick and
Words With Friends. WordFlick is a
solo game that provides the player with
a number of letter tiles, similar to those
found in Scrabble. The player must cre-
ate words using only the provided tiles,
with more points awarded for multisyl-
labic words and words that use unusual
letters, such as Q, X, and Z.
Storytelling apps. Struggling readers
often have trouble visualizing the
literature they’re reading, so I found
apps to help. Puppet Pals and Toon-Tastic appeal to the finger puppeteer,
whereas Storyrobe and Strip Design
engage students in digital storytelling.
As we read the August Wilson drama
The Piano Lesson, students would
work in groups to retell a critical
scene using one of these tools.
By Jim Harmon
