On Friday night when my partners and I started leading out week long tablet computing seminar, we gave this challenge to our participants for those who wanted to (and had the technology to complete). Try going one week with completing all of your work for our seminar for the week on your tablet. We have our participants doing activities like exploring apps and rating them in Google+ and doing some readings and finally doing a blog post on one of three topics. Choice A just happens to be writing about your experience trying to use just a tablet for the week.
Here I am, a leader of the seminar and I am thinking, pff a week of readings and apps on my tablet is nothing, I am going to try and do everything on my tablet for the week. That did not last long.
Our seminar started with a Blackboard Collaborate meeting – also the first time I could not rely on my tablet – I did have the capabilities to use my iPad app for the session, the only problem was that we were using my Blackboard link and I could not give my co-presenters moderator privileges, let alone have access to the whiteboard so out came the laptop and I was a dual participant in the session.
Saturday morning came around and I thought that I was doing pretty good. I was reading posts and replying to some. I like to reply to a bunch of posts before going in to track my contributions – you know, stay in the state of flow. Well off I went to my activity tracker and out came my laptop. Turns out you cannot add comments to a google doc spreadsheet with an iPad (I was later informed by Sonny that it is possible but just a huge pain, which I was not about to suffer through – I had two little girls really wanting my attention).
Next was Sunday. I knew that I couldn’t track my contributions on my iPad and I was okay with that so I decided that I would do all that I could and leave it to the end and have a quick little bit of laptop time. Something else I cannot do with my iPad is access my personal email as I have my work one linked to my iPad so I still go on my laptop once a day. So here I am, commenting on posts, looking at articles and I come across something that I think will interest Jean. I post it in Google+ using my iPad then go to +Jean, and nothing. Turns out that you cannot ‘tag’ someone in your post using your iPad. Out came the laptop again as it was a time sensitive thing and I had to make sure she saw it.
Today I saw that a bunch of people had responded to a post I had put up in Google+. I wanted to make sure everyone got their individual responses from me so I had to turn on my laptop so I could tag each person. Next I went to my office to work on report cards as our school had the second quarter cut off on Friday. Again, I go on my iPad to work on reports and it is not compatible. Yet again, out comes my laptop and I am working on it instead. Man is this experiment ever failing!
It has not been all bad. Using my tablet (iPad) I have had to figure my way around things and it has actually been nice to use both at the same time. I was exploring some Google tools earlier today and although I couldn’t really access them properly on my iPad, I played with them on my laptop then wrote about them as I was exploring on my tablet. I have also found myself exploring a lot more of the free apps than I would have if my tablet were not as close to hand as it has been the last few days. I know that there are some failings of a tablet but hey – my laptop is heavier, bigger and cannot runs apps so there are pros and cons to each! I am glad to be exploring this though. I am such a hands on learner and I think that if I were reading about this experience instead of living it, I would think that they overlooked something or didn’t try hard enough (which is the case for me in some instances) but at least I am now more comfortable with my tablet and I know the limitations of it as well as my use of it.
Here I am, a leader of the seminar and I am thinking, pff a week of readings and apps on my tablet is nothing, I am going to try and do everything on my tablet for the week. That did not last long.
Our seminar started with a Blackboard Collaborate meeting – also the first time I could not rely on my tablet – I did have the capabilities to use my iPad app for the session, the only problem was that we were using my Blackboard link and I could not give my co-presenters moderator privileges, let alone have access to the whiteboard so out came the laptop and I was a dual participant in the session.
Saturday morning came around and I thought that I was doing pretty good. I was reading posts and replying to some. I like to reply to a bunch of posts before going in to track my contributions – you know, stay in the state of flow. Well off I went to my activity tracker and out came my laptop. Turns out you cannot add comments to a google doc spreadsheet with an iPad (I was later informed by Sonny that it is possible but just a huge pain, which I was not about to suffer through – I had two little girls really wanting my attention).
Next was Sunday. I knew that I couldn’t track my contributions on my iPad and I was okay with that so I decided that I would do all that I could and leave it to the end and have a quick little bit of laptop time. Something else I cannot do with my iPad is access my personal email as I have my work one linked to my iPad so I still go on my laptop once a day. So here I am, commenting on posts, looking at articles and I come across something that I think will interest Jean. I post it in Google+ using my iPad then go to +Jean, and nothing. Turns out that you cannot ‘tag’ someone in your post using your iPad. Out came the laptop again as it was a time sensitive thing and I had to make sure she saw it.
Today I saw that a bunch of people had responded to a post I had put up in Google+. I wanted to make sure everyone got their individual responses from me so I had to turn on my laptop so I could tag each person. Next I went to my office to work on report cards as our school had the second quarter cut off on Friday. Again, I go on my iPad to work on reports and it is not compatible. Yet again, out comes my laptop and I am working on it instead. Man is this experiment ever failing!
It has not been all bad. Using my tablet (iPad) I have had to figure my way around things and it has actually been nice to use both at the same time. I was exploring some Google tools earlier today and although I couldn’t really access them properly on my iPad, I played with them on my laptop then wrote about them as I was exploring on my tablet. I have also found myself exploring a lot more of the free apps than I would have if my tablet were not as close to hand as it has been the last few days. I know that there are some failings of a tablet but hey – my laptop is heavier, bigger and cannot runs apps so there are pros and cons to each! I am glad to be exploring this though. I am such a hands on learner and I think that if I were reading about this experience instead of living it, I would think that they overlooked something or didn’t try hard enough (which is the case for me in some instances) but at least I am now more comfortable with my tablet and I know the limitations of it as well as my use of it.