Canvas for your iPod Touch, iPhone, and iPad!

Instructure has released a free mobile app for Apple’s iOS that will facilitate communication among instructors and their students using Canvas, its Web-based learning management system. Canvas for iOS, which has been approved by Apple, will shortly appear in the App Store. It includes functions for activity streams, conversations, syllabus, and grades.

The activity stream was first introduced in the full edition of Canvas and appears to the student when they log in. From there, they can respond to a discussion post, be notified of a change in an assignment, or get a reminder of an upcoming exam for any of their courses. That capability is part of the new app.

The browser-based version of Canvas also features a Facebook-like messaging component, called Conversations. On the mobile app, the student can participate in Conversations and also view feedback on submissions and check grades.

This isn’t the first mobile offering by Instructure. Earlier in the year the company releasedSpeedGrader for iPad, an app that allows instructors to view student submissions to Canvas, assess rubrics, assign grades, and deliver comments to students via text, audio, and video.

Instructure announced plans to offer an Android edition as well as a Web edition of the Canvas app in 2012.

— About the Author: Dian Schaffhauser is a writer who covers technology and business for a number of publications. Contact her at dian@dischaffhauser.com.

Echo reading with the iPad

Since beginning his teaching career in 2006, Richard Colosi has worked hard to become a teacher who practices innovative ideas in the classroom. Having won two national video contests: The 2007 Interwrite Learning Classroom Makeover Contest and the 2008 SMART Technology Extraordinary Moments Contest, he specializes in video production, podcasts, and the use of iOS devices (iPod/iPad) in the classroom.

In this video, first grade students students demonstrate one way to improve their reading fluency — using the iPad to help them echo read! Echo reading is a great way to help develop reading fluency, a skill that is vital to comprehension.