Going back to university as an iPad only user

[mk313]

OP, a couple of thoughts that may or may not hel you with the ipad.

If reflectivity is an issue & the angle of the screen when using a keyboard is an issue, you may benefit from using something like the TwelveSouth Compass. I’ve never used it myself, but I did look into it at one time. It’s a portable ipad stand that allows you to change the angle of the ipad. I’m sure there are other brands as well, but this is the only one I’m personally familiar with.

Also, with regards to the PIP video. I know that on newer iPads (the first time I noticed it was when I moved to my current iPad Mini 4) you can offload video playback (in at least some apps) to an external monitor and still use the ipad screen for other things. I believe I did this with AirPlay through an Apple TV, but it might have been while using the HDMI connector. It may only work with some video apps as well, but it was pretty helpful for me at the times I used it. Obviously not idea for mobile environments, but if you’re working at your apartment and have access to a TV/ external monitor, it may help a bit with watching your videos while taking notes.

 

[kipwheeler]

I just started school with the intention of using my iPad Pro, and my teachers told me off about using it. So annoyed.

I'm sorry to hear that. I'm a teacher who uses an iPad in the classroom, and I'm sure as they catch on more among academics outmoded attitudes toward students using the device will fade away in a few years.

 

[sparksd]

I'm sorry to hear that. I'm a teacher who uses an iPad in the classroom, and I'm sure as they catch on more among academics outmoded attitudes toward students using the device will fade away in a few years.

I'm curious as to why the teachers did that - did they provide a reason? Did they discourage the use of any electronics, e.g. laptops? It seems odd on the face of it. (When I was in college - many decades ago - teachers disallowed the use of calculators of any kind because even simple models were so expensive then that only well-to-do students could afford them, providing an unfair advantage.)

 

[kipwheeler]

There are majors that it’ll work for as your only device. This is actually my first semester of using iPad Pro only (I usually use my MacBook in conjunction with my iPad) for my major (crim) it works great because we don’t use any intensive programs. For people like engineering it is possible, but you’d need to have a computer you can remote into for using larger programs.
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Couldn’t disagree more, I have struggled with writing most my life. With the iPad I don’t have to worry about how it looks, or how it’s organized because I can go back later and rewrite/organize my notes in a way that works for me.

At least in literature and linguistic classes, I've found that my students who take handwritten notes (or who do some combination of handwritten notes transferred later to typed notes) fairly consistently outperform students who do something else--i.e., those who audio-tape the lecture, who type notes on the computer without handwriting anything, or who over-rely on downloading my PDF handouts and PowerPoints without writing their own notes to save themselves time.

I'd strongly encourage students who can afford an iPad with Apple Pencil or some sort of stylus system try it for a semester. The reason I think those students who handwrite their notes do better is threefold:

(1) As the Romans put it, "Repetitio mater memoriae"--repetition is the mother of memory. Handwriting it down once, then typing up or recopying a neater version of the notes later after class will tend to make it stick in your head more--in the same way verbal repetition helps students memorize material.

(2) Learning isn't just mental--it's also kinaesthetic. The more senses that are involved in learning something, the more likely it will stick. So, tactile contact with the iPad combined with hearing the material said during class combined with visually reading it later evokes three of your senses.

(3) Handwriting can force writers to slow down so their brains have time to process the material they are writing, opening a window for students to actually *think* about the material. When students are typing notes, good typists can usually type quickly enough that they speed along the sentences rather than actually processing or evaluating the content. They end up taking *more* notes, but not mentally making the connections to see the most important ideas. In contrast, students who are handwriting usually end up taking *fewer* notes because of the limit in how fast they can handwrite, but those notes are usually *better* in terms of summarizing and encapsulating the main ideas.

If you are using a program like Goodnotes to take down your lecture materials, it's also very easy to select text at the end of class to lasso and move around the page to better organize the materials, or select text you've written and change it to red, blue, green, etc. for color coding. That's an excellent tool for visual learners and for folks who tend to connect ideas spatially together.

Just two cents from an old college professor here--trust the greybeard.

 

[dogslobber]

I'm sorry to hear that. I'm a teacher who uses an iPad in the classroom, and I'm sure as they catch on more among academics outmoded attitudes toward students using the device will fade away in a few years.

If they’re playing with their toy then they’re not concentrating on you. I hope you give the iPad users a F grade.

 

[kipwheeler]

At least in literature and linguistic classes, I've found that my students who take handwritten notes (or who do some combination of handwritten notes transferred later to typed notes) fairly consistently outperform students who do something else--i.e., those who audio-tape the lecture, who type notes on the computer without handwriting anything, or who over-rely on downloading my PDF handouts and PowerPoints without writing their own notes to save themselves time.

I'd strongly encourage students who can afford an iPad with Apple Pencil or some sort of similar stylus system try it for a semester. The reason I think those students who handwrite their notes do better is threefold:

(1) As the Romans put it, "Repetitio mater memoriae"--repetition is the mother of memory. Handwriting it down once, then typing up or recopying a neater version of the notes later after class will tend to make it stick in your head more--in the same way verbal repetition helps students memorize material.

(2) Learning isn't just mental--it's also kinaesthetic. The more senses that are involved in learning something, the more likely it will stick. So, tactile contact with the iPad combined with hearing the material said during class combined with visually reading it later evokes three of your senses.

(3) Handwriting can force writers to slow down so their brains have time to process the material they are writing, opening a window for students to actually *think* about the material. When students are typing notes, good typists can usually type quickly enough that they speed along the sentences rather than actually processing or evaluating the content. They end up taking *more* notes, but not mentally making the connections to see the most important ideas. In contrast, students who are handwriting usually end up taking *fewer* notes because of the limit in how fast they can handwrite, but those notes are usually *better* in terms of summarizing and encapsulating the main ideas.

If you are using a program like Goodnotes to take down your lecture materials, it's also very easy to select text at the end of class to lasso and move around the page to better organize the materials, or select text you've written and change it to red, blue, green, etc. for color coding. That's an excellent tool for visual learners and for folks who tend to connect ideas spatially together.

Just be sure your Apple Pencil is charged before you come to class....

Just two cents from an old college professor here--trust the greybeard.

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If they’re playing with their toy then they’re not concentrating on you. I hope you give the iPad users a F grade.

If they're going not taking notes or not looking at the appropriate PDF files we're discussing in class, they will certainly lose participation points for the day (and fail on their own when it comes test time). However, if they are using it to take notes, it's hardly a "toy"--just a tool. Misusing an iPad in the classroom is no different than a student who misuses his old school pencil and notepad to doodle rather than participate in the class lecture, so I don't see any reason to punish an iPad user more severely than I would punish a student using pencil and paper as a distraction.

I also can't throw stones. I use my own iPad in class--it has my lecture notes on it and it's equipped to display what I write on the iPad on the smartboard. I store charts, graphs, and images to display there. It would be counterproductive for me to condemn students who are using the iPad appropriately.

 

[dogslobber]

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If they're going not taking notes or not looking at the appropriate PDF files we're discussing in class, they will certainly lose participation points for the day (and fail on their own when it comes test time). However, if they are using it to take notes, it's hardly a "toy"--just a tool. Misusing an iPad in the classroom is no different than a student who misuses his old school pencil and notepad to doodle rather than participate in the class lecture, so I don't see any reason to punish an iPad user more severely than I would punish a student using pencil and paper as a distraction.

I also can't throw stones. I use my own iPad in class--it has my lecture notes on it and it's equipped to display what I write on the iPad on the smartboard. I store charts, graphs, and images to display there. It would be counterproductive for me to condemn students who are using the iPad appropriately.

Children will inherently find something else to focus on in class. It’s the nature of the beast and the way you get them to focus is to restrict the things that will interrupt their concentration level. It’s doubtful you can catch all the bad kids fiddling with their iPads as you teach them. They’re just devious that way.

 

[sparksd]

Children will inherently find something else to focus on in class. It’s the nature of the beast and the way you get them to focus is to restrict the things that will interrupt their concentration level. It’s doubtful you can catch all the bad kids fiddling with their iPads as you teach them. They’re just devious that way.

"Children" - are you talking about use in elementary schools or in college? If college, then these children will be self-weeding.

 

[dogslobber]

"Children" - are you talking about use in elementary schools or in college? If college, then these children will be self-weeding.

You can’t control them in college class to be sure. They do distract others with their devices but chucking them out of the lecture and marking them absent works as attendance is mandatory. So, in effect, you have to use multiple strategies to combat those who would distract.

 

[sparksd]

You can’t control them in college class to be sure. They do distract others with their devices but chucking them out of the lecture and marking them absent works as attendance is mandatory. So, in effect, you have to use multiple strategies to combat those who would distract.

Attendance mandatory and monitored in college? At a military academy, yes, but not in a public institution. Chucking students causing distractions of any kind is one thing, chucking students properly using tools is something else altogether and does not represent good teaching.

 

[dogslobber]

Attendance mandatory and monitored in college? At a military academy, yes, but not in a public institution. Chucking students causing distractions of any kind is one thing, chucking students properly using tools is something else altogether and does not represent good teaching.

Of course attendance is mandatory. What sort of prof allows their students to slack and slide by otherwise? Maybe Psych 101 with 1000 students but smaller courses it’s mandatory for attendance for 95% of classes.

 

[sparksd]

Of course attendance is mandatory. What sort of prof allows their students to slack and slide by otherwise? Maybe Psych 101 with 1000 students but smaller courses it’s mandatory for attendance for 95% of classes.

Guess things have changed since I was in college 40+ years ago - I don't recall a single class that had mandatory attendance.

 

[CrystalQuest76]

Some university instructors require attendance for various reasons. Participation in discussions are sometimes part of the learning experience. Sometimes department rules require attendance. Some 'colleges' require attendance to ensure that students are interested in a class that otherwise will be canceled.

 

[maflynn]

Some university instructors require attendance for various reasons. Participation in discussions are sometimes part of the learning experience. Sometimes department rules require attendance. Some 'colleges' require attendance to ensure that students are interested in a class that otherwise will be canceled.

I predate the internet, so my college days had to be onsite. Yet, now it seems I've seen many if not most classes I could take at my university (Northeastern University) are online only without any attendance requirements. Seems odd to me, but I guess that's the changing face of education

 

[dogslobber]

I predate the internet, so my college days had to be onsite. Yet, now it seems I've seen many if not most classes I could take at my university (Northeastern University) are online only without any attendance requirements. Seems odd to me, but I guess that's the changing face of education

Having taken online classes myself, I can say that they are pretty scattergun. Some require active participation in a message board where prof posts questions and a discussion has to arise. The least contributing people get marked down so that's motivation. The lecture notes are pages of PDFs and the weekly tutorial is a online interactive discussion for an hour. There is often a final online exam which is very detailed and for a very short duration so you can't use your notes. I think nowadays the online software even records your answering the questions so it would catch copy/paste cheats.

I don't value online courses at all TBH. I have found employers don't either.
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Some university instructors require attendance for various reasons. Participation in discussions are sometimes part of the learning experience. Sometimes department rules require attendance. Some 'colleges' require attendance to ensure that students are interested in a class that otherwise will be canceled.

Even courses without mandatory attendance, I cannot fathom why people would skip class. Perhaps it's down to the prof being a droid but my college never had any optional attendance, even for Math 101 or Stats 101.

 

[Brammy]

I've seen many if not most classes I could take at my university (Northeastern University) are online only without any attendance requirements. Seems odd to me, but I guess that's the changing face of education

I got my undergrad degree from Northeastern's Professional Studies group in 2011. By then, yeah, most classes were online. I didn't have much of a problem with it.

I'm doing grad work at WPI, and those classes are in-person. It's kind of a wash for me. In person, you can ask a clarifying question better and sense what an instructor feels is important by how often they repeat something, or how they say it. Online I didn't have to sit there after work wiped out and could do it my own schedule.

That said, most classes use some sort of an online-component: Canvas/Blackboard is the one WPI uses. I can submit papers just fine on the iPad, but could not download the professor's marked-up copies on my iPad. There was some sort of scrolling/scaling issue. I haven't tried in a few months since my class is just getting underway.

I hope Office 365 is updated soon to take better advantage of iCloud files. I like keeping all my stuff in iCloud, but Office stuff seems to like being in OneDrive better on iOS.

 

[CrystalQuest76]

If they’re playing with their toy then they’re not concentrating on you. I hope you give the iPad users a F grade.

I recently returned to the classroom as a student (I was curious how things had changed). I used my iPad w/ a Bluetooth connected keyboard extensively during the lecture. I was the oldest individual in the classroom. Interestingly, i saw many of the students using laptops before the start of lecture but would put them away and use paper and pen for note taking (studies have shown writing notes increase knowledge retention over typing). My handwriting is so bad that i felt i needed to type rather than write. At times the lecturer would say something that was not in the reading and I was able to quickly look it up on the iPad. There were breakout discussions during class, and I would type my ideas quickly and neatly down on the iPad before presenting them to my fellow students. I also had a electronic version of the textbook and at times I would open it during class if the teacher was commenting or showing an image from it and I would screenshoot it and integrate it into the lecture notes i was typing. My point being that just since a person is using an iPad in class, does not mean it was being used as a toy.

 

[facemeat]

At least in literature and linguistic classes, I've found that my students who take handwritten notes (or who do some combination of handwritten notes transferred later to typed notes) fairly consistently outperform students who do something else--i.e., those who audio-tape the lecture, who type notes on the computer without handwriting anything, or who over-rely on downloading my PDF handouts and PowerPoints without writing their own notes to save themselves time.

I'd like to chime in that as a student I remember a lot more when I hand write my notes in contrast to when I use my laptop. As you say, scribbling notes down and later rewriting them in a document is a lot more beneficial than directly writing notes unto my computer in a lecture.

This is why I want to invest in an iPad Pro, to doodle in PDFs and Notes during lectures and later when I get home rewrite what I wrote into a proper documents. I'm just having a hard time justifying a $1000 purchase with only one year left.

 

[Brammy]

As you say, scribbling notes down and later rewriting them in a document is a lot more beneficial than directly writing notes unto my computer in a lecture.

For me, it's a duplication of effort. I would rather take notes directly into the final medium. For me, this is OneNote.

We have people at work evenly split on handwitten notes vs electronic. It's just more efficient for me to capture all the information as succinctly as possible in one pass.

 

[kipwheeler]

For me, it's a duplication of effort. I would rather take notes directly into the final medium. For me, this is OneNote . . . .It's just more efficient for me to capture all the information as succinctly as possible in one pass.

I understand your thinking, and if it works for you--great. I'm sure that my students who prefer using laptops only for notes are thinking along the same lines. For many students who might be reading this forum, however, I would reiterate my earlier point though that "efficiency" (i.e., speed and time saving) does not necessarily equate with greater learning (i.e., retention). Sometimes efficiency in speed and time saving defeats the purpose of actually retaining and understanding the information.
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My point being that just since a person is using an iPad in class, does not mean it was being used as a toy.

I agree. Students who use iPads as toys typically end up doing poorly in the class anyways, regardless of whether the teacher plays classroom cop and deliberately marks down their participation points. The students who are using them appropriately find them valuable tools. Pace to Dogslobber, but I don't want to deprive good students of a useful tool just for the sake of being punitive to foolish students who might misuse the tool as a toy.

 

[CrystalQuest76]

For me, it's a duplication of effort. I would rather take notes directly into the final medium.

I used to be in the field of education and learning. There have been a number of studies over the years that show hand-writing lecture notes increases knowledge retention. There was one just two years ago:
http://www.npr.org/2016/04/17/474525392/attention-students-put-your-laptops-away
When I was much younger and was an undergraduate student (no laptops back then for any student), I had horrible handwriting. I used to write the lecture notes and then go to the computer lab and type them up for myself. During the transcription process, I would often fill in things that had not been written down during the lecture. I think it helped lock the knowledge into longer term memory.
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I'm just having a hard time justifying a $1000 purchase with only one year left.

Save your money and don't go into deeper into debt than you already are as a student. Wait until you are making real money and then reward yourself to a new piece of technology. The apple executives are making massive amounts of money and don't need you going into debt for their lifestyles.
Saving money is not a crime.

 

[Brammy]

During the transcription process, I would often fill in things that had not been written down during the lecture. I think it helped lock the knowledge into longer term memory.

The fear I have with this is I will "remember" incorrect data and put it in. I type fast and accurately. Its easier for me to just capture the information up front.

It has been a while, though, since accurate retention of lecture notes was important. Maybe a science class like biology or chemistry. Most of my classes now are around discussion of the assigned reading more than anything. The class I finished in the spring my notes were more around what the instructor wanted for the next assignment than any great concept.

Science classes with the diagrams and the like were the worst for using a laptop anyway.

 

[CrystalQuest76]

The fear I have with this is I will "remember" incorrect data and put it in. I type fast and accurately. Its easier for me to just capture the information up front.

The concern of inaccurate data is very legitimate. However, I do recommend that you read the NPR story about the recent study about handwriting vs typing lectures. There is also a link to the actual study and its worth reading.
There is a cool middle ground of handwriting the notes and converting them into typing. It does require an iPad Pro with an Apple Pencil. Its called Nebo by MyScript. There are a number of video demos of it in action and its rather amazing. You hand-write in the application with the Pencil, double-finger-tap on the notes and they convert to typed text. You can also draw diagrams that will be smoothed out when double-finger-tapped. And you can even draw out advanced mathematical formulas that will convert to typed text.
I wish it existed when I was an undergrad and was taking physics. I had a very difficult time transcribing my handwritten formulas using MS Word's Equation Editor.

 

[Brammy]

The concern of inaccurate data is very legitimate. However, I do recommend that you read the NPR story about the recent study about handwriting vs typing lectures. There is also a link to the actual study and its worth reading.

Thanks. That was interesting. I just looked through my lecture notes from last semester. My OneNote notes were pretty much what they recommended: a lot of bullet points and not much word-for-word transcription.

 

[0989383]

OP Update: The End

A disappointing update for avid iPad only users. I've taken the opportunity to buy a new MacBook Pro from Apple. A 13" Space Grey base model. Why? Well, the money was there now. Which was why that was never an option before.

The iPad does a phenomenal job at my workload. All of the positive and great stuff I've said and done on it of course do not change just because I've moved to a different device. Though a bit more real estate and the full features of macOS never go amiss when it's possible to have them.

I went from MacBook Pro > HP Notebook 14 > iPad mini > iPad Air 2 > ThinkPad E470 > iPad 2017 > MacBook Pro
A full circle now. I didn't get a great price for any of the devices sold this year.. If I'd have bought this Mac back in February I'd have spent the same amount and possibly been happier. Who knows. It's been expensive and confusing.

One of my personal favourite aspects of the iPad was the low to buy price. Especially with Macs now being a very real ripoff compared to yesteryears prices. I vowed never to buy one again in case it broke like my last one with the high repair costs. Well I've solved that hopefully by getting Apple Care to prevent technical failures for up to 3 years.

My iPad is for sale as I won't need two devices. I'm looking for £360 for the iPad, K380 keyboard and unofficial smart case. They're all immaculate. There's an eBay ad which if anyone in the UK is interested I'll PM you, but other than that I know this is not the place for sales etc. Remove this if it's not allowed Moderators?

I'd still be happy for anyone to ask my opinion on the iPad only life. It's still got it's merits and I'm by no way against it all of a sudden. As far as I'm concerned, it still beats cheap Windows laptops... and when it comes to more premium Windows laptops, well, get a Mac lol.

I'll be interested to see if iOS 12 continues the independence of the iPad as a main device. And in the mean time, wish well to everyone who has taken interest in the project.