Literacy for Education

Grammar Express

This was the first app that I looked at.  I did not have access to the full version but did get to play around with three of the lessons available.  My initial thoughts were "Wow, wish I had this in elementary school.  I would have done much better in English class."  This app first teaches the lesson to you with notes.  The notes are written in a way as to not make you feel overwhelmed with information.  Then you have an easy to do quiz after you study up.  Over all I liked this app and can see me using it in class more for reinforcement of these skills, which can easily be lost.  

Merriam-Webster

I, of course, chose to use this app because this is the Dictionary I grew up with and have found it to always be reliable.  The same is true, if not truer, for the app.  I was only expecting to find, well a dictionary but was pleasantly surprised to see so many different features.  One of the ones that I just love is the word of the day.  It will give you a random word of the day which is a great way to build your vocabulary at a easy pace.  Not only does this feature give you the word along with the definition but it gives you some history behind it as well.  Such as examples of the word and where this word shows up in history.  So not only is this a great feature to help with grammar but it integrates a little bit of history in there as well.  Some other note worthy features are things like the app can say the word for you.  This would be perfect for students of all ages, even a student like me that is in Grad school that still has trouble pronouncing words.  The app also tells you what part of speech the word is, it's language of origin and the year it first appeared.  Over all I love this app and can find many ways this would be more than useful in the classroom.

Book Creator

Of course being a literature major I would choose to do a review on Book Creator.  I will admit I had some trouble with a similar app on the desk top but found the app on Ipad to be a lot easier to manipulate and use.  This would be a great tool in a creative writing lesson or a way to do projects in another subject besides just writing an essay.  And because this is a multimedia way of presenting you are not limited to just text.  You can add photos, either ones you found on the internet or ones you take with the camera. You can also add sound to spice up things for your presentation.  This app is really cool and I can see myself using it in my classroom.

Puppet Pals

This is such a fun app to use in class and can be applied to all subject areas.  With this app you create stories using the "puppets" that are provided.  You also record the story using the devices microphone.  It is very easy to use, even with the little bit of a learning curve. They have character's provided that cover a wide variety of genres, even political.  I can see students using this in a flipped class environment in order to teach the lessons they learn in history, science, math, literature and grammar.  This definitely would motivate students to do their final projects because it isn't just your standard essay or test.