Useful Apps For the iPad

iBooks is the first app I looked at and I definitely think it'll be useful for English class. If we do have iPads next year, we won't have to worry about carrying books around. The books we need will be right on the iBooks app. This is good because countless people forget their books and have to run and get one during class or share with someone else. The second app I think was useful were the graphing calculator apps. The lite versions were awful but the pro versions could actually be used in class. They do what most new calculators do and, me being an ap calculus student, think it could come in handy even though we do need the actual ti 84 for the ap exam. Other than this there wasn't anything that seemed useful for the classroom. All of the apps seemed like they were there for entertainment. If you get bored, these apps are definitely your way into entertainment. Other than that, they're pretty useless to be honest. The iPad can be used as a good note taker and a good resource for information but other than that it seems like it will mainly be used for it's fun and exciting apps.

-Akash Patel

Ipad

This is actually my first blog post from an iPad. It's not that bad. It looks like a giant iPod touch but it's a lot better in some ways. I myself have never been a big fan of apple. I don't like having to download a bunch of apple products in order to sync things to your device. This keyboard though is very well made. The keys are all spaced out well and they respond very well. This browser has been running exceptionally fast. I haven't encountered many problems with this thing so far. I've used iPod touches and iPhones so I'm pretty familiar with the way apple products work. I have to say I would definitely pick this iPad over the computer for this class. The computers tend to freeze a lot and it takes A while to get things done but this iPad has been working fine. I'm actually looking forward to experimenting with this as we move forward.

-Akash Patel

LiveBinder

LiveBinders are basically online binders. You can pretty much find any binder you are looking for and they can be useful if you need information on a certain topic. The topics are that great though. It would be easier to just google your topic because you'll take a lot of time just searching through binders that might give you useless informations. These binders are a great way to keep stuff organized but they aren't useful in finding information and resources. If you need a place to organize a bunch of files and data, this would be useful. If you need information for papers, projects, or any other assignment, google or wikipedia would be the better option.

-Akash Patel

A New Year

2010 was definitely a good year for myself. I got my driver's license that year and I also got my braces off after three years. I turned seventeen in August, I went down to Georgia and South Carolina in the summer to visit my girlfriend for the first time. Before this, she would always come up here to visit me. 2010 was just a good year overall and I can't wait to see what 2011 holds. I already know I can't wait until graduation. I'm definitely ready to start my college life and begin pursuing my passions and dreams. I feel like this year everything will just get better. Nothing can get worse. As time goes on, everything just becomes a better experience. This summer is something I can't wait for. It will be an amazing summer and it's going to start a little early for us seniors. This year is going to be absolutely amazing.

-Akash Patel

Foreign Language App

This article shows an app for the smartphone that instantly translates a language for you. All you have to do is aim the camera at a word or phrase and the phone will automatically translate it for you. There is a video demonstration of the app in the article. There are some people who think that we are becoming too dependent on smartphones and a lot of people won't bother taking a foreign language anymore because there is an app that translates for you. I disagree with this. There are a lot of people who are dependent onsmartphones but this app won't stop people from taking foreign language. This app can come in handy when translating words or phrases, but how is it going to help when you have to talk to another person. It can't translate what everyone else is saying. So even though there is an app that can translate stuff for you, there will still be a bunch of people who want to take a foreign language because they want to be able to speak to a native fluently without having to rely on another source for help. Other than this, I think the app is extremely useful!

-Akash Patel

Open Zine

I haven't blogged at all this past week and this is due to the fact that we have been working on a magazine this week. I can just say right now that my magazine is short and horrible. I feel like I have spent most of this week being frustrated and wasting time. The first day went alright. I got my cover page done and I got some information for my first page. The next day is where everything went downhill. I couldn't log in for 30 mins! I only have 45 mins to work on my magazine and I spent more than half of it just trying to log in. After I logged in, it said I didn't have any magazines. I know I didn't publish it, but why wasn't it showing up on my works in progress section. So I started to work on another magazine and when class ended I saved it and hit save later. After I saved this one, my old one came back up in my works in progress. At this point I was ready to flip a table over, but I let it go and I was ready to work on it the next day. After I finished a page, I realized that you can only have a cover and ONE page. What kind of magazine has one page!? After all of my frustration I decided to give up because now my weeks worth of work is just a waste. I published my first one just so everyone can see what I have been working on, but I think I'm done with that site because I can't take the frustration. Back to blogging for me.

Magazine: http://www.openzine.com/aspx/Zine.aspx?IssueID=15544

-Akash Patel

Passion

Our assignment for this week is to find a passion and promote it. I found this to be extremely difficult. I picked video games for a topic because it's my way to have fun ans stay connected with my friends even when we're physically far apart. The best thing about video games is that it's a way you can meet new people and communicate with people all around the world. After thinking of this topic, it took me a while to figure out how to promote this. I came across Game Battles, which a site dedicated to competitive gaming. This is a great way to challenge players that you have never met before. There are thousands of people on this site and there are also thousands of teams that you can challenge. You can join a team of people that is a thousand miles away. This is how I'm going to promote my passion because I really don't know what else I could do for a passion. It isn't easy to find ONE passion and it definitely isn't easy promoting it, but this assignment sounds interesting and I can't wait to see where it goes.

-Akash Patel