Herald-Citizen "learning app columns"
Herald-Citizen: 10/30/11
Learning...There's an App for That?
As children begin to dream of the next cool gadget that Santa and his tech-savvy elves will bring soon, parents are wondering how many more hours of Angry Birds and Zombie games the children’s brains (and their parents’ patience) can handle. Do your kids try to operate everything with a swiping motion? Do they draw their house surrounded by Plants and Zombies when asked to illustrate their family during Art class? Maybe it’s time to consider some productive alternatives to these mindless (though very entertaining) games.
When you visit the iTunes App store or Android Market, you’ll find thousands of apps for every subject and concept related to education ranging in price from free to very expensive. On the upper end of the spectrum, if you find the need to pass the New York State Bar Exam, try BarMax NY: $999.00. There are apps for every age group, ability level and topic including ACT prep, language learning, physics, chess, Sudoku, writing, astronomy and every possible area you can imagine. As a parent, filtering this information can be difficult without a little assistance and decent advice. On the flip side, if your kids are only allowed to use the device between your rounds of Words with Friends, they should choose their app carefully!
Over time, I hope to steer you towards some of the more beneficial apps that I have tried out and would recommend for students and their families. Be careful, though, you may find that you or your kids are engaged and learning!
This week’s app is a powerful collaboration between the scientific community and the curious mobile user. Have you ever been at the park, on a trip, or simply in your backyard and wondered what kind of trees were around you? If you were as lucky as me, when you were young your grandfather would point out different types of trees on a hike and you can still recall some today. If you happen to have an Audubon Field Guide to North American Trees (What’s a field guide, Dad?), you may be able to pick out a few. Enter the mobile app Leafsnap. With Leafsnap, you place a leaf on a white background, snap a picture, and a helpful list of likely matches will appear. Normally, there are only a few similar leaves, and with a little discussion and comparison, you can choose the correct one. If that was the only thing the app accomplished, it would be really impressive. However, once you select the type of tree the info is automatically identified, geo-coded for your location, and added to the community of Leafsnap users and scientists. The sizeable project has connections to several universities and the Smithsonian Institution. Your nifty new leaf collection is now archived on your device. There are several leaf-identifying games built-in for extra practice. Your mobile device will need a built-in camera, or you’ll have to upload the pictures to your gadget of choice from your computer. The app is free and available on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, and Android. More information about the app can be found in the iTunes store or on the website: leafsnap.com
Dr. Jeremy Wendt