More than a presentation tool, Keynote is an animation studio and digital canvas for creative learning.

🔍 What does it do?

Keynote is Apple’s flagship presentation app. On the iPad, it allows pupils to combine text, high-quality shapes, photos, videos, and live audio. Its standout feature is its powerful animation engine, which allows pupils to move objects across the screen to explain concepts, tell stories, or create their own mini-movies.

🎓 Why is it useful?

• Magic Move: This is the “secret sauce” of Keynote. By simply duplicating a slide and moving an object to a new position, Keynote automatically animates the movement between them. It’s the easiest way for pupils to create professional-looking animations.

• Infinite Shapes Library: Keynote contains thousands of professional shapes – from animals and nature to symbols and science equipment. Pupils can “break apart” these shapes to customise them or use them as building blocks for their own designs.

• Interactive Storytelling: Pupils can add “links” to shapes or text that jump to different slides. This allows them to create “Choose Your Own Adventure” stories or interactive museum exhibits.

• Live Video: You can drop a “Live Video” feed onto a slide. This shows the iPad’s camera view directly on the slide, allowing a pupil to be “part of the presentation” or demonstrate a physical object while their information is displayed alongside it.

⚙️ How does it work?

1. Launch: Open the Keynote app (Blue icon with a white lectern).

2. Start a Theme: Tap the ‘+’ to create a new presentation. For creative projects, the “Basic White” or “Basic Black” themes are often best.

3. Add Content: Use the icons at the top to add Shapes, Photos/Videos, Audio Recordings, or Tables.

4. Animate: Tap an object and select ‘Animate’. Use ‘Action’ to create a custom path with your finger, or ‘Transitions’ to add Magic Move between slides.

5. Export: Tap the ‘Share’ button (box with arrow) and select ‘Export’. You can save the project as a Movie or a GIF, making it easy to share on Teams or Google Classroom.

🚀 Beyond the Basics

• Animated Retellings: Pupils can use the Shapes library to find characters for a story. Using Magic Move, they can make the characters “walk” across the screen while they record a voiceover narration using the ‘Record Audio’ tool.

• Shape & Symmetry: Give pupils a set of basic shapes. They can use the Format (Paintbrush) tool to rotate, flip, and resize them to create symmetrical patterns or “shape pictures” (like a house made of a square and triangle).

• Animated Cycles: Use Keynote to explain the Water Cycle or Plant Growth. Pupils can animate water droplets rising (evaporation) or a seed growing into a flower using the ‘Draw Path’ animation tool with their finger.

• Interactive Maps: Find a map of a country. Pupils can place “invisible” shapes over cities. When someone taps the city during the presentation, it links to a slide with more information about that location.

• Green Screen Backgrounds: Pupils can design a beautiful, static background in Keynote, export it as an image, and then use it as their backdrop in iMovie for a green-screen news report.

🔗 Teacher Quick Links

Get Started with Keynote on iPad

Jacob’s Quick Tips – Keynote for iPad

GarageBand – your complete recording studio for music, podcasts, and digital storytelling.

🔍 What does it do?

GarageBand is a free, high-powered audio creation app. It allows pupils to play “Smart Instruments” (like piano or guitar that stay in key), record their own voices, and mix multiple tracks together. While it is excellent for music, it is equally useful for recording speech, creating soundscapes, or producing high-quality podcasts.

🎓 Why is it useful?

• Literacy & Voice: Pupils can record audiobooks or radio dramas. The process of editing their own speech helps them engage deeply with text, tone, and pacing.

• Smart Instruments: You don’t need to be a musician to create music. “Smart” features ensure that whatever a pupil plays sounds professional and harmonic, boosting their confidence in creative expression.

• Multi-Sensory Learning: Pupils can communicate mood and tone through sound – for example, creating a “suspenseful” backing track for a gothic story they have written.

• Portable Studio: Using the built-in iPad microphone, pupils can capture “found sounds” (like wind, footsteps, or rain) to use in their projects, or record on the go making learning truly mobile.

⚙️ How does it work?

1. Launch: Open the GarageBand app. Tap the ‘+’ to create a new song.

2. Choose a Tool: Select Audio Recorder (the microphone) to record speech, or Live Loops to create instant electronic music by tapping colored cells.

3. Record: Tap the red Record button at the top. Use the “Metronome” icon to keep a steady beat if needed.

4. Edit: Tap the Tracks View icon (looks like a brick wall) to see your recordings. You can trim, move, or loop clips by tapping on them.

5. Export: When finished, go to My Songs, long-press your project, and select Share > Song to save it as a high-quality audio file.

🚀 Beyond the Basics

• Podcasting: Have pupils record a 3-minute “Expert Interview” on a class topic. Use the “Telephone” or “Robot” voice effects to make it sound like a real radio broadcast.

• Ratio & Patterns: Music is built on patterns. Use the Beat Sequencer to build drum beats – pupils can see how different “ratios” of beats create different rhythms.

• Expressing Emotion: Pupils can use the “Strings” or “Keyboards” to create a short piece of music that represents a specific feeling (e.g., calm, angry, or excited).

• Language Practice: Record pupils speaking in a different language. They can use the Sampler to play their own voice back at different pitches, making pronunciation practice fun and engaging.

• Soundscapes: Create the “sound of a setting.” Pupils can layer tracks of wind, whispering, and door creaks to bring a setting from their creative writing to life.

🔗 Teacher Quick Links

Connected Falkirk GarageBand ‘How To’ Playlist

GarageBand Tips: How to Get Started with GarageBand

Apple GarageBand Page

iPad Camera is the window to your classroom. Capture evidence, scan documents, and support accessibility.

🔍 What does it do?

The Camera app is the primary way pupils capture their learning. It can take high-quality photos, record video, capture slow-motion clips, and even read text directly from a book or whiteboard. In a “1:1 iPad” classroom, it becomes a digital bridge between physical work in a jotter and digital work in the cloud.

🎓 Why is it useful?

• Evidence of Learning: Not all work is digital. Pupils can take a photo of their physical models, posters, or written work and upload them instantly to Teams or Google Classroom.

• Live Text: One of the most powerful features – if the camera sees text (on a whiteboard or in a book), a small icon appears that allows the pupil to copy and paste that text directly into a document or note or have it read aloud.

• Scan QR Codes: No more typing in long web addresses. Pupils simply point the camera at a QR code to be taken directly to a website, a Form, or a video.

• Magnifier: For pupils with visual impairments, the camera can act as a high-powered magnifying glass, allowing them to zoom in on small text or distant displays.

⚙️ How does it work?

1. Launch: Tap the Camera icon (Gray icon with a black lens) or swipe left on the Lock Screen.

2. Switch Modes: Swipe your finger up or down on the right side of the screen to switch between Photo, Video, Time-Lapse (great for long science experiments), and Slo-Mo.

3. Focus and Exposure: Tap a specific part of the screen to tell the camera where to focus. If the image is too dark, tap the screen and slide your finger up or down next to the “Sun” icon to adjust the brightness.

4. Zoom: Use two fingers to “pinch” or “spread” on the screen to zoom in or out.

5. Review: Tap the small thumbnail in the corner to view your most recent photo and use the ‘Edit’ button to crop or rotate it.

🚀 Beyond the Basics

• Time-Lapse & Slo-Mo: Use Time-Lapse to record a plant growing over a day or a chemical reaction. Use Slo-Mo to capture fast-moving events, like a ball being dropped, to analyse the physics of the movement.

• Shape Hunts: Send pupils on a “Shape Hunt” around the school. They can use the Markup tool in the Photos app to draw over their photos with their fingers, highlighting the 2D and 3D shapes they find in the real world.

• Visual Timetables: Use the camera to take photos of the equipment needed for a lesson. Display these on the board or in a shared Note or Keynote to provide a clear, visual checklist for pupils who struggle with multi-step instructions.

• POV Storytelling: Have pupils film “Point of View” videos where they act as a character in a story, speaking directly into the camera to explain their feelings or motives.

🔗 Teacher Quick Links

Take Photos with Your iPad Camera