TECH Performance Record - Disciplines in Education

ESOL
Spellboard - This app was very interesting to me. Not only will the student see the word, but they will hear it (and hear it used in a sentence), practice writing it and can practice saying back. I like the use of the quizzes to see how each child is doing and what words they may need help with and the option of emailing the results to parents keeps them involved in their child's learning.

Mathematics
MathBoard - I liked that the app provided a quiz like game that not only included simple equations like addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division but also included square roots and squares, and lets you intermix all of them together. I also like the timed feature. Students could be challenged to take their time (f they rush through) or beat their time as needed. You could even do a challenge to see who can answer the most amount of questions correctly in a certain amount of time. Again it gives teachers a way to see what their students are struggling with.

Sketchpad Explorer - I didn't get to interact with this app as much as I had liked. However, the video showed a lot of good uses of the app. The ability to plot graphs and slopes right before you instead of on a whiteboard or in a text book is a great way to keep students interacting with the lesson. The ability to see the 3D images plotted on the graph is definitely great as that can be extremely confusing on a 2D piece of paper. Also there is a definite plus in that students would not have to purchase a graphing calculator.

Music
Beatwave - This app does a good job of having students interact with music. Students could interact with this and come up with their own beats and songs very easily. It teaches about timing, beats, instruments, tempo and pitch in a fun and interactive way. I could definitely see this being a great teaching tool.

Piano Free - I have a similar app to this on my phone and I love it. I had never considered using it in a classroom but I could definitely see the benefits. Students could simply interact with a standard piano (like many other piano apps) and get to know the keyboard, or they could play some of their favorite songs with the other side of the app. This app does a great job of teaching students timing and getting a general feel for a piano with a fun game that I, myself enjoy playing. The only downside is that there are limited amounts of free songs and other, more popular songs would have to be purchased.