Getting There...

Today's lesson was better, generally, which was a great relief to me! It wasn't perfect and there is still a long way to go, but today I saw the first glimmers of how brilliant the iPad project will hopefully be by the end :)

Firstly, pupils finished recording their speaking assessments on Audioboo. Audioboo is a revelation to me! The app allows pupils to record themselves and then tag their 'boo', works in the same way as a Twitter hashtag, meaning that I then have all of their speaking assessments in one place. They then did their writing assessments on Evernote and emailed them to me. Even the most potentially boring assessment lesson was transformed with the iPads - never have I known a class to get so excited over doing an assessment!

The things that made this lesson a success were

• I was able to email the class the day before to remind them about their upcoming assessments
• Speaking assessments did not take a lesson and a half like they used to - instead they were all done in 15 minutes
• All of the writing and speaking assessments are in one place ready for marking and sending back to the pupils, and as they are on email, are not 'misplaceable' by me or the pupils!!
• The pupils had the most fun they have ever had doing an assessment!

There were definitely hiccups as well, but I am not so naive as to think that this project will be a success overnight!

The main problem is one that shouldn't really be a problem, and that is that pupils are still VERY excited. On the one hand this is obviously a good thing, however it does cause a bit of a nightmare when trying to settle them! They are also naturally testing the boundaries and seeing what they can get away with. The only way I have found to deal with this so far is to take their iPads away for a little while; but this probably won't work in the long run so I need to come up with a different sanction... any tips greatly appreciated!