Category Archives: Students

Anything relating to student devices

Faculty, Faculty/Staff, iPads, Student, Students

iPad OS 17: what’s new, and should you update?

09/20/2023 Tom Rule

Updating is OPTIONAL at this point. MDS Tech has not tested the new OS just yet, but we anticipate there will be only a few issues since we have been updating the iPad apps as they come out.

Note that students must update iPads AT HOME – the OS updates do not work on the student network.

Here’s a synopsis of the major changes in IOS 17, taken from a variety of sources:

Personalize your lock screen – there are new wallpaper options, interactive widgets, and Live Activities of various sorts. There are also more options for fonts, styles, and colors for your lock screen.
- Create a custom iPad Lock Screen
Interactive Widgets – you can tap a widget to check off a to-do list item, play a new podcast episode, and more
- See Add, edit, and remove widgets on iPad
iPadOS 17 helps protect your vision by reminding you to move your device farther away if you have been using it for an extended period of time.
- See Help protect your vision health with Screen Distance on iPad.
Autocorrected text are highlighted as you type so you know what has been changed – tap on the word to change it back. Predictive text, where the OS guesses the words you are about to type, can be approved by hitting the space bar.
- See Enter text using the onscreen keyboard and Use predictive text on iPad.
FreeForm app – this app is a great tool to use along with Natobility. There are new drawing tools [watercolor brush, calligraphy pen, highlighter, variable width pen] and a ruler. You can also collaborate with others live.
- See Draw or handwrite on a Freeform board on iPad and View others in a board.
Notes can easily view PDFS and scans, and you can add links.
- See Work with PDFs in Notes on iPad and Add links in Notes on iPad.
The Tips app has even more suggestions
- See Get tips.
The Health app is new to iPadOS, although it has been on the iPhone for some time. It can help you monitor your health and fitness.
- Get started with Health on iPad – Apple Support

Sources:

iPads, Student, Students

Make sure your iPad is ready

08/15/2023 Tom Rule

Make sure you got all of these tasks completed on your iPad – believe me, it will save you some hassles down the road!

ONE: Connected to the correct network [MDS-student or MDS-middle]. Look at Settings -> WiFi

TWO: Signed into Drive [use your MDS email address and password].

THREE: Notability backing up to Drive automagically. [Fire up notability, Click the Gear icon, then AutoBackup. Select “Google Drive” and get logged in. THEN select PDF+Recording as the format.]

FOUR: Email setup. [Fire up email, select Google as the account type, and log in using your MDS email address and password. Remember that your MDS email is mds#####@mountdesales.net.]

FIVE: AppleID setup – this is a bit more complicated because we are in a campuswide transition.

IF you have a regular AppleID [that you setup yourself – primarily Upper school students]:
- Then your AppleiD is your MDS email and MDS password – OR whatever you set it to. If you can’t remember, click the “I forgot”: or “Password Reset” link and follow the instructions.
- If you are getting a message saying your password has expired, please let Mr. Rule know at the ipad email address. [ipad@……]
IF you have a “managed AppleID” – middle school students:
- ….and yours is already setup, then you login with your MDS email address and PROBABLY your MDS password. Some students have a variant on your MDS password for the AppleID – your teacher has access to that information.
- ….and you have never setup your AppleID, then there is a “temp” password available.

Regular AppleID accounts allow you to sue Find My iPad to locate your ipad, and have 5gigs of online storage. Managed AppleID accounts allow you to login to the shared iPads in the middle school, AND have 200gig of online Cloud storage.

Both allow you to access your data and use apps like Keynote, Numbers, etc. at iCloud.com

Apps, More, Students, Websites

Canva – Create away!

02/01/2023 Tom Rule

Use Canva to create all sorts of Graphics, from presentations to flyers to…. well, the list is long. You can download PDF or graphics [like jpg or png], import them into a Notability project, print them out….. In other words, you have options.

canva.com – sign in with Google, and use your MDS account info.

But what if you don’t have time [or the inclination]

to learn how to use Canva?

–> CLICK HERE. <–

Notes, Tips, Hints, & Answers