Crayons and school work all now in new iPad- Best for students and teachers

The new iPad is more friendly with students and schools. Focussing on education this new iPad has new hardware and software features for education users. With various school and teacher student friendly apps Apple has proved that tablet is a helpful tool in education. Let us see which apps are powering the latest iPad that would help the learners as well as the educators.

The Classkit framework

The ClassKit framework, coming in iOS 11.4, works with a powerful new iPad app called Schoolwork that helps teachers and students keep track of assignments and progress. With ClassKit, you can help teachers easily discover specific learning activities in your app, take students directly to the right activity with a single tap, and securely and privately share progress data to help teachers personalize instruction.

In addition to ClassKit and Schoolwork, Apple also introduced major new versions of its iWork applications. With this update, Pages, Numbers, and Keynote now support rich Apple Pencil integration. Pages offers a new Smart Annotation feature that allows users to mark up their documents, with the annotations not just sitting free-form on the page, but rather being attached to the words around them.

Pages also adds a new book creation feature, serving as sort of a replacement for iBooks Author, which requires a Mac. Apple hopes adding this book creation capability to iPad will attract more users since it no longer requires a Mac.

Apple also announced updates to Clips and GarageBand on iOS. The former brings a host of new content options, including new Pixar Selfie scenes. The latter includes TrueDepth support on iPhone X and more.

The school work app

With school work application Apple hopes to create a one-stop solution for teachers in terms of handing out assignments, giving students features, and much more. Apple also touts the privacy of Schoolwork, saying it protects all student data, with only teachers being able to see information.

As said above integrating with Schoolwork is a new ClassKit framework. Apple says this framework will allow developers to link and expand on different parts of their apps, doling out assignments via Schoolwork. A handful of apps will support ClassKit, including Apple’s own apps such as GarageBand and Swift, and a handful of third-party apps.

Essentially, Schoolwork is Apple’s take on a classroom management app, allowing teachers to assign tasks to students and for students view those assignments and submit their work.

• You can share your work: Submit work directly from Pages, Keynote, and Numbers, or share from any app.
• Check your progress: Use your student page to find work you’ve created ands see your progress in apps.

The interface itself is relatively simple. The homepage of the app shows students a broad overview of the tasks due within the next 7 days, then below that are assignments due further down the line. Furthermore, on a standard class page, students see a list of tasks assigned to them and the due date for each assignment. Once an assignment is complete, it will be checked off.

From a teacher perspective, there’s a bit more going on. Here’s the message Apple displays to teachers:

• Create handouts: Share announcements, homework, or a quick reminder.
• Guide students in apps: Direct students to an activity in an app, or collaborate with students in just a few taps.
• Personalize learning: Send a handout to a single student or the entire class, based on student needs.
• Review student progress: See student work and progress in apps all in one place.
• Provide instant feedback: Review work in any file, and give students feedback while they work.
• Focus on teaching: Let schoolwork help you focus on students.

Teachers can see detailed information about the progress of each student, viewing what assignments they’ve completed and what assignments they have not completed. Furthermore, they can see how many students in their class in total are done and how many are not.

In terms of creating a handout, teachers have the ability to choose which class or students to which they make the assignment available and can set a due date. From there, teachers can add activities in any third-party app, or upload files, add links, add bookmarks, and add photos and videos. Instructors can also request items from students, such as a file upload.

In terms of app integration, one can use apps like as an example Pixelmator for a geometry class. “Learn the basics of geometry by drawing and measuring different shapes in Pixelmator.” Interestingly, Schoolwork supports applications that do not have ClassKit integration, though it is the student’s responsibility to do the work as progress is not tracked.

Use Crayon Stylus

With the new 9.7-inch iPad there will be a new stylus from Logitech known as the new Crayon stylus as an accessory for the device. Logitech also announced a new $99 rugged keyboard case for the new iPad.

The accessory is part of Apple’s push to regain ground in school classrooms while also giving its iPad business some much-needed momentum. Apple hopes that its new iPad will help push Google’s lower-priced Chromebooks out of schools, which have become popular with teachers and students.

The Logitech Crayon digital pencil works with apps such as Apple Pages, Numbers and Keynote, as well as Microsoft Office. You can take handwritten notes and doodle on illustrations and PDFs to your heart’s content. The crayon will cost $49 and isn’t pressure sensitive, but you can use it on iPads that support Apple Pencil, not just the new 9.7-inch iPad with Pencil support that Apple launched with youngsters in mind. The Crayon charges through Apple’s proprietary Lightning cable, not through USB-C.

You can use this asn alternative to Apple’s $99 Pencil, which lets you write and draw as you would with a pencil and paper. The digital pencil promises not to roll off the desk, and claims 8 hours of battery life — basically a school day — before it needs to power up again.

With all this and more the new iPad is serving best of features for educators and students with the A10 Fusion chip, which Apple says makes for a 40 percent faster CPU and 50 percent faster graphics performance and good stereo speakers.

Also Apple pencil will come as a discount for educationist for only $89 rather than usual price of $99. Educators also now get a discount when buying AppleCare+ for their new iPads, with prices starting at $59 for two years of coverage.

Also Apple has announced that students will now receive 200GB of iCloud storage for free. This is up from the previous 5GB limit, though the limit remains the same for general consumers.