Ahhh today was a good day! It’s one of those times when things just work, so I had to share!

Helen and I have talked about Futaba in our podcasts. It’s a great way to gamify student skill mastery. A few days ago, two of my tech club kids and my lab aide created sets for PreK games in the app. Right now there aren’t many ready sets in the app for preschoolers. Creating sets and games was pretty easy. This morning, I backed up the sets to Dropbox, then restored the backup to two iPad 2′s. My two tech club students came back and each took a Belkin Rockstar and five sets of Califone headsets to two of our PreK classes. They had four students come at a time during center rotations to work on the PreK games that were created for them. I tried not to mother-hen them all as my tech club kids were quite confident (“We’ve got this, Mrs. Adam!”) and would have been annoyed had I hovered too much. I did sneak in and snap a few pictures. I feel safe sharing this one as you can’t see faces.

So my favorite app of the day is Futaba. It was simple to set up, simple to share out and the kids had a BLAST! The teachers were happy, the kids were happy, my minions were happy!

My favorite gadgets of the day are the iPad (duh!), the Rockstar and the headsets! The iPad goes without saying, but I’ll include a link just in case you’ve been living under a rock and didn’t realize how awesome it is! The Belkin Rockstar let four of the kids listen at the same time with my tech club student listening to help. FIVE kids on the same device! YES! And the Califone headsets kept everything at the center nice and quiet so the kids at other centers weren’t looking over at all the hubaloo and get distracted. The mic portion of the headsets weren’t needed today, but trust me when I say it’s worth making sure, even if you have to pay extra, to get headsets instead of headphones. Our devices do have great built-in mics, but when my fourth graders were doing their ShowMes the other day, having a mic right at their mouths was important. You could hear the quality difference with the kids that didn’t use a mic. We’re never recording in ideal locations so anything we can do to eliminate background noise is a good thing.

So what gadgets and/or apps made your day easier today?

Disclaimer: I received no compensation for singing these praises. Well, not exactly. Futaba gave me one promo code to go with the one I’d purchased personally so I could use on two devices until our campus purchase was complete. I have since removed that code and am only using the ones purchased by the campus. So far that’s 20 copies but the teachers love it so I’ll be buying more. And Califone loaned Helen and I the headsets to use at our TCEA presentations and I’ve just never made arrangements to send them back. *cough* I’m hoping they’ve forgotten about them. 

What are you doing on October 6? How does breaking a world reading record while raising awareness about America’s achievement gap sound?

Join in Jumpstart’s Read for the Record® presented in partnership with Pearson Foundation. It’s a national campaign that mobilizes adults and children to close the early education achievement gap by setting a reading world record.

This annual campaign allows Americans to demand that all children receive the quality early education they deserve. On October 6, 2011, more than 2 million voices will call for an end to America’s early education achievement gap by reading Llama Llama Red Pajama by Anna Dewdney – setting a world record in the process!

Get involved at www.readfortherecord.org to help Jumpstart close the early education achievement gap:

1. Pledge to Read: Submit your official pledge and help us reach more than 2.1 MILLION children.
2. Spread the Word: Use our simple tools to educate your friends and family about America’s early education achievement gap and invite them to read.

For more information visit www.readfortherecord.org

Oh–don’t have the book? You can read it online! Perfect for projecting and sharing with the class!!