Using Apple Pencil to grade student essays--best apps?

[JD2015]

Update.
PDF Expert 6 (previously PDF expert 5) huge upgrade this week makes it simply the best PDF editor now for IOS. Addressed many of its shortcomings, for example, you can now edit a PDF directly (except for ones that are just essentially images converted to PDF), or redact (limited though as cannot search and redact but have to do it manually).
Iannottate is my second favourite PDF annotation app. Goodnotes is the best app for importing documents, images, pdfs if doing research or taking notes.

 

[neutrino23]

The new PDF Expert 6 looks great.

To the original poster, you could go to an Apple Store and test this out for yourself. They will definitely let you use an iPad with a Pencil. They might let you download a free app to test it with. You could use the built in Notes app to test writing with the Pencil to see if it is comfortable for you.

If you do buy it there is a short period during which you could return it. I'm not up to date on the return policy. It used to be 30 days and no charge. Seems like I later heard of a 15% restocking fee. Ask before you buy.

 

[kipwheeler]

The new PDF Expert 6 looks great.

To the original poster, you could go to an Apple Store and test this out for yourself. They will definitely let you use an iPad with a Pencil. They might let you download a free app to test it with. You could use the built in Notes app to test writing with the Pencil to see if it is comfortable for you.

Yeah, I made a couple trips to the store to play with it, as suggested, and I've also played around a bit with my wife's 12.x incher iPad Pro. I do have a birthday coming up in June. If there's no new 10.5 mac that's apple pencil compatible announced in the first week of June, I will probably take the plunge and go for a new 9.7 inch pro and give it a go.

Thanks everyone for the various bits of feedback. It's much appreciated.

 

[xraydoc]

Yeah, I made a couple trips to the store to play with it, as suggested, and I've also played around a bit with my wife's 12.x incher iPad Pro. I do have a birthday coming up in June. If there's no new 10.5 mac that's apple pencil compatible announced in the first week of June, I will probably take the plunge and go for a new 9.7 inch pro and give it a go.

Thanks everyone for the various bits of feedback. It's much appreciated.

Don't forget that Word for iPad also has some basic Pencil support which can be viewed on any version of Word for Mac/PC that will open a .docx file.

 

[alecgold]

Don't forget that Word for iPad also has some basic Pencil support which can be viewed on any version of Word for Mac/PC that will open a .docx file.

That was an annoying function because you couldn't use it to navigate. Just as a pencil. But they improved that. Certainly in excel the pencil is replacing the mouse and it becomes more productive.

 

[mojo522]

That was an annoying function because you couldn't use it to navigate. Just as a pencil. But they improved that. Certainly in excel the pencil is replacing the mouse and it becomes more productive.

I think he was referring to the markup feature within office. The students can submit a word file, and you can write within the file and save it, no need to convert to PDF. I use it all the time in excel and word as an accountant.

 

[willmtaylor]

I’m teaching a Composition course this fall semester and am also interested in marking up students’ papers with as short and easy of a workflow as possible. Any updates or further suggestions?

 

[TinaBelcher]

I like your style! I just finished some classes this summer, and I always appreciated my English teacher marking my assignments with handwritten notes. It made me pay attention as it felt more personal. That way I could correct my assignment while looking on the physical comments, instead of overwriting a document she had been edited in. Just make sure it's very readable, lol! Some other teachers of mine were very sloppy!

 

[Montymitch]

I use Google Classroom almost exclusively now. On my iPad air, markup was so-so, but the AP and iPad Pro make it a lot easier.

 

[kipwheeler]

I’m teaching a Composition course this fall semester and am also interested in marking up students’ papers with as short and easy of a workflow as possible. Any updates or further suggestions?

Classes start next week. I'll let you know more after I do the first batch of papers.

 

[960design]

Academic here--one who marks up a lot of student essays.

I'm thinking about going physically paperless in my classes (again), but I've never liked inserting typed commentary using the comments function of Word. I've always preferred handwriting my comments directly on top of their text. Even when I've had the students submit their papers electronically, I tend to print them out so I can mark them up physically. However, I don't like carrying around 60-80 printed copies of essays--especially the 12-20 pagers, or wasting a lot of paper.

My query--do any of you MacRumors folks mark and grade your student essays or similar documents as PDF files using Apple Pencil and any particular apps? Do you recommend this, or something else? What tips or tricks do you suggest? What apps do you recommend?

I currently have a non-pro model of the iPad, so no apple-pencil support. However, if others have had good luck with this, I might upgrade to an iPad Pro 9.7-inch and give it a try.

While I do not follow your requested workflow exactly; there is something that may fit your needs better than originally imagined:

http://papergrader.org/

 

[willmtaylor]

I actually just discovered that Wors for iPad has pretty decent markup support for the Apple Pencil. Wouldn5 have to deal with PDF conversion this way.

 

[kipwheeler]

While I do not follow your requested workflow exactly; there is something that may fit your needs better than originally imagined:

http://papergrader.org/

It looks useful, though most of the features will be redundant for me. (My school already has a system in place that acts as dropbox, organizer, and so forth for papers submitted electronically, etc).