iPad apps for schools, to mark Shakespeare's 400th Anniversary and Shakespeare Week

If you don’t know already, the 23rd April 2016 is being marked as 'celebrating 400 years of Shakespeare's legacy' and also, 14th - 20th March 2016 is National Shakespeare Week. There are some great resources on the official website, and we have made our apps half-price in celebration too.

They are called Digital Mysteries and are for iPads. We have them for A Midsummer Night’s Dream (11-16), Romeo & Juliet (11-16) and Macbeth (14-16). Each consists of one open question on the play, e.g. ‘Which of the characters in 'A Midsummer Night’s Dream' possess the most power?’ and 15-30 slips of information to help them answer it. There are additional sub-questions provided which you can ask too! They come with built in differentiation (easy/medium/hard), so you can easily more suit them to each group.

What’s different about using mysteries to explore Shakespeare?

• Truly collaborative – more than one student can interact with the tech at once plus working in groups ensures lively discussion on these important English topics and the themes within them
• Engaging – students learn about Shakespeare plays in an interactive way rather than passively reading a chunk of text; topics are split up into snippets with pictures so they’re easier to digest
• Retention – users are asked to create groups and think of names for them then lay them out in a sequence… these two different perspectives of looking at the same information mean they remember more
• Deep learning – multiple discussion points and the open-ended nature of questions help students get fully immersed in the task

Three ways to try it now:

• iPad – Search 'Digital Mysteries Shakespeare' on the App Store now.
  
  Individual: The apps have been reduced to 79p/99¢/AU $1.49 FROM £1.49/US $1.99/AU $2.99.
  
  A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Romeo and Juliet or Macbeth.
  
  Bundle: The app bundle works out at 3 for LESS than the price of 2! So £1.49/US $1.99/AU $2.99.
  
  Digital Mysteries: Shakespeare Bundle  
  
  
• Windows PCs and laptops
  
  Click here to download a 28 day free trial (or send this to your ICT team) – this includes all three Shakespeare mysteries plus more such as Of Mice and Men and Lord of the Flies
  
  
• Paper task of Romeo and Juliet
  
  We can provide a PDF of the slips for this task for you to print off , just click here and put in the comments box 'RomeoandJuliet-paper'

Want to create your own iPad activities? Click here for new tool, the Thinking Kit.

Would your students love to see their own ideas made into an iPad app?

The fusion of our experience in collaborative learning research, developing iPad apps and an interest in Project Based Learning in the last couple of years, led to our creative competition, Our Mystery.

As a very quick summary, it offers UK years five, six, seven and eight the chance to come up with their own ‘Digital Mystery’. There can be as little or as much ICT as they like involved, as we provide a template form in PDF or Word and ask for hand-drawn or photographed images to accompany it.

We wanted to help slot the opportunity in with existing school plans rather than require extra time, so the mystery can be on a topic students have covered or are soon to cover.

For an entry pack for your students, just go to www.reflectivethinking.com/ourmystery. The deadline for entries is in a few weeks so giving the task to students after their half-term holiday slots in perfectly.

Inspiring media/English students with Cannes film festival

'Festival de Cannes 2015' runs from 13th-24th May this year - what an engaging way to immerse students in various topics, one being 'target audience'.

There will be lots of coverage about the festival and it provides a great spotlight for lesser-known, upcoming films.

Our free task, Chugley Film Club, has been created specifically for 11-16 year olds. It helps students apply their knowledge of the concept of target audience and demographics. They do this through the scenario of Mr. Spine, who lives in a village called Chugley, running the local film club. Students are asked to help him decide on a suitable film for the other residents.

The resource recommends setting a homework or pre-session activity for students to gather a list of films. They will then carry out the task and in doing so, select which of their films is most suitable for the people of Chugley. One idea is rather than have the list they must gather general, you could say to narrow it down to former Cannes film festival winners, this year's nominees or films by previous winners' starring actors.

You can use this task completely free, in one of three ways:

•  iPad app: read more and download here
• Windows PC/laptop: download a free one-month trial here
• PDF: email info@reflectivethinking.com for a PDF copy which you can print out

UK election resource for 11-14s

Where should Grace put her X on May 7th?
Free PSHE/Citizenship resource for KS3

It is election time. Wherever you look there are politicians aiming to win you over. Debates, Q and As, sensationalist headlines, tweets and Facebook posts are all around us. But while young people in our schools may be aware of something important going on, how engaged are they?

Academics at Newcastle University wanted to involve 11-14 year olds in the election – it is an ideal way to introduce them to politics and parliament. It is also something they can then easily discuss with their parents when they get home too. They approached us to create a free iPad app, which is now ready to download – just click here or search ‘election mystery’ on the App Store. Email info@reflectivethinking.com for a PDF version or click here for a Windows PC/laptop free trial.

You may think ‘oh, another attempt to interest young people’, but this time, it’s different. The app tells the story of the election through an 18 year old called Grace Feng. Bright, illustrated slips of information fill the screen which explain her background and interests plus some of her aims in life and the opinions of her family and friends. Students must use these to develop an understanding of her as a person then with this, decide who she should vote for.

A teacher at Greenfield Community College is using the app - he said “It is more essential than ever to get young people engaged in the political process and the future of our country. As a school we are running a topical scheme of work through our 'time for success' on politics and the election. When we were told about the app, it seemed the ideal task to support this. Students can engage in their own time - as a homework task - or work through the mystery in lessons.”


Three options to use this free resource:

• iPad app: Click here or search ‘election mystery’ on the App Store
• PDF version: Email info@reflectivethinking.com with subject 'election mystery'
• Windows PC/laptop: Click here for a 28 day free trial