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Mackie Academy: iPad in the art and design classroom

Exploring the digital creation tools on the iPad

The iPad pilot at Mackie Academy in Aberdeenshire has been situated in the Expressive Arts faculty. The staff met to identify where the iPad and the apps they had access to would best suit their needs over the course of the academic year. This agreement led to the creation of a rota that would enable effective sharing of the devices across year groups.

We met with Miss Norrie (art and design teacher), who talked with us about her experience in using the iPads with her learners. She thought that having the devices available meant that her learners had greater to access to digital media in art and design classes and broadened their experience of using different media to create art. She also liked the fact that the iPad had  everything contained within one unit, which meant that learners could search the web for images by and information about artists such as David Hockney and then move straight to an app that would allow them to create work themselves.

MackieMissNorrieArt Miss Norrie interview

Miss Norrie also felt that by having the iPads mirror to a presentation screen via Apple TV was of great benefit, as was functionality which allowed lessons learned or techniques mastered to be shared wirelessly by any learner during the course of a lesson.  Although the pilot was in its early stages, she felt that she was seeing a more open and collaborative culture in her classroom.

One criticism that she had of the device was that the contact point of the stylus that can be used to draw or paint on the iPad was too thick, compromising the learners ability to create fine detail in their work.