If you like to use your iPhone, iPad or laptop in your classroom because it allows you to effortlessly navigate the learning space, one of the greatest frustrations can be having to constrain yourself to the vicinity of the projector cable every time you want to share your screen with the class.
I have seen this as a common practice even in open plan learning environments, which instantly does away with it’s greatest feature by forcing the teacher to move back to the front of the room.
Whilst you can get wireless projectors at great expense, have you ever thought of using Apple’s $99 Apple TV? I hadn’t until recently, but since using it I could never go back to a physical projector/tv connection for the following 4 reasons:
1. No Wires!
You can share your iPhone, iPod, iPad or Mac’s screen so long as both devices are on the same wi-fi network. Just click your AirPlay icon, select your Apple TV and you are free to roam your classroom without thinking twice. It really is amazing to see the shift in classroom dynamic this creates, especially with something as light as an iPad, as you can attend to individual students as you share with the whole class.
Once you click on the AirSharing icon on your iOS device, you’ll be able to select what you’d like to do next with your wireless stream. Check out the next image for an idea on what that will look like.
2. Don’t just share your own screen. Share your students!
If you teach a class in which students are creating content on their Mac or iPhone/iPad, they can share it with Apple TV just as easily as you can. This is great if you have a student producing something that you want the whole class to see, or maybe they want to share their work for feedback and class discussion. A great feature of this is that it empowers your students by giving them a platform to share their work with the class, rather than keeping it to themselves. Classroom Apple TV etiquette will need to be developed however to avoid students sharing their screen as a joke.
3. Youtube, Vimeo, Flickr, Podcasts & iTunes U
Apple TV has access to YouTube, iTunes podcasts as well as Flickr, Vimeo and iTunes U making it a great way to share educational content from any of these services with your class. You can even use your iPhone/iPad as a remote allowing you to quickly enter text, and with the latest Apple TV update you can finally use a bluetooth keyboard for fast text entry!
4. Photostreams
If you have an iPhone or iPad with an iCloud account you can select this as the Apple TV’s screensaver which can make a great classroom backdrop. Imagine you have students working in groups on a big project and you want to document it. You can roam the classroom with your iPhone or iPad camera taking photos as the projects develop. This is wirelessly uploaded to your iCloud account and then appears almost instantly on the Apple TV Photostream feed allowing the whole class to watch as each project develops.
These are just four of the ways I have used the Apple TV to transform not just the classroom experience, but also at our office space at Epic Tutorials. How are you using the Apple TV in the classroom?
I would love to use the Apple TV in the classroom! However at the University where I am employed our wireless network in incompatible with the wireless on the ATV.
That’s a shame that it’s not supported. What sort of wireless network does your university use if you don’t mind me asking?
Because all our projectors are old (no HDMI) we are using AppleTV with an inexpensive VGA to HDMI adapter. Many of our teachers use it with Educreations, to be able to “write” on the “board” without being tethered to the front of the room. I have also found that kids who are too self-conscious to go to the board to write will happily demonstrate something on the iPad.
We also are using Notability’s magnifying feature to focus on and highlight text while allowing the students to see the entire page and not get lost.
Thanks for sharing Jeff. Sounds like a great use of iPads in the classroom and I especially like the sound of what your doing with Notability – one of my favourite apps.
I am using the Apple TV and haven’t had any problems until last week. The Apple TV freezes and stops working with the iPad. What could be going wrong? I can’t get the two devices to talk again the rest of the day. Any suggestions?
Does the Apple TV freeze and has to be unplugged to reboot or does it simply loose it’s connection with the iPad?
I have used apple tv and ipads (with tremendous success) working with preschool age children. I recommend using it with lower school children at least. This is not even the newest of technologies. Schools must keep and can for relativity little money. When I started teaching tech over 10 years ago the cost of programs, peripherals, etc. were much more expensive. This technology has great success for team based learning, among other goals. An apple TV is $100.
I have donated a number of those to our local schools. It transforms the classroom to an interactive lab and makes school fun again! Teachers and students love it. Too bad there isn’t any good source to get them for free or cheap.
Good on you for donating!
I have apple tv in my 1:1 iPad classroom. I love it when it is working but for some annoying reason it cuts off after about 20 minutes. Since I am the only one in my division that has one in the classroom, it seems that none of our tech people know how to fix this problem. I’d love to hear if anyone has suggestions or solutions to this. My kids are 1st graders and they love when it’s on because they can share and see each others work. Currently we are making a book in the Book Creator app about Penguins and they are able to see each others work whole group and share their delight with each other.
Firstly it sounds like you are creating something really exciting with your kids. Book Creator is an awesome app isn’t it? Sorry to hear about your problems though… Are you able to instantly re-establish your connection once it drops out or does it involve restarting your wi-fi router or the Apple TV itself?
A work around, use MBP connected by VGA to projector, use air parrot from Mac App Store….same result.
$5 mac app turns MBP Into iPad / iPhone mirror..including apps!
Regards
Gary B in AU
Great workaround Gary
Also a great way to create iOS screen capture tutorials.
Regards from a fellow aussie.
Excuse my ignorance. MBP?
Oh. Macbook Pro???
It’s important to note for Item #2 that students and teachers need to be on the same wireless network for this to work. Many schools give teachers access to more websites and services by putting them on a different network so AirPlay does not work. Apple is supposedly working on this after a lot of pressure from colleges (more info here: http://arstechnica.com/apple/2012/11/apple-working-to-make-bonjour-compatible-with-enterprise-networks/)
I have my Apple TV set up in my classroom but when I click on the AirSharing icon the option for ‘mirrorring’ isn’t offered.
Hi Carolyn,
Airplay mirroring requires the following minimum requirements:
iPhone 4S or iPad 2 (and later) with iOS 5 and later
Apple TV (2nd or 3rd generation) with software version 5.0 or later
An 802.11a, -g or -n wireless network
If you have the above try a software update on both devices and see if that fixes the issue. Hope this is of some help.
Hi Carolyn,
Many wireless networks are segmented off from wired networks to reduce network traffic on each segment. This is the case in my school district. Before you sink a lot of time into other troubleshooting, there are a couple of things you can do. First, if you try the AppleTV and iPad at home (if this is allowed) and they work, you know it’s something with the network configuration at your site. The other option would be to just talk to your network administrator up front and ask if Bonjour packets can pass between the wired and wireless networks. The AppleTV and an iOS device use Bonjour to communicate.
I love the idea of Apple TV in classrooms. I think this is an easy and affordable way to augment instruction; make instruction multimodal. Apple TV gives teachers and easy way to provide visuals, activate students’ background knowledge, increase comprehension for diverse learners and increase engagement. Thanks for your post.