Siri, Apple's personal assistant, allows seniors to use their voice to set reminders, send messages, read email, search for information and much, much, more.  The following useful Siri Commands can be used on the iPhone 4s, iPhone 5, iPad (IOS 5 and higher), iPad mini, and the iPod Touch. Use this list as a starting point to help seniors develop their own personalized list of commands to which Siri can respond. 


Please submit any additional Siri commands that would be helpful to senior citizens in the comments section below.



HOW TO USE SIRI

Press and hold the HOME button on the iPad until the "What can I help you with?" prompt appears. Then use a normal, clear speaking voice to state your command. Wait for Siri to respond to your request. Press the microphone icon that appears on the screen to speak or reply to Siri again.

ALARM, REMINDER, CALENDAR, and TIME COMMANDS

• "Set the timer for 15 minutes"
• "Stop the timer"
• "Reset the timer"
• "Pause the timer"
• "What time is it?"
• "What is today's date?"
• "Wake me in an hour"
• "Set an alarm for 7:00 a.m. tomorrow morning"
• "Turn off all alarms"
• "Remind me to take my medication at 8:00 p.m."
• "Remind me to send a birthday card to Suzie next Wednesday"
• "Set up a dental appointment for next Tuesday at 10:00 a.m."
• "Add iPad training at the Senior Center to my calendar for next Tuesday at 1:00 p.m."
• "Remove the iPad training at the Senior Center from my calendar"

EMAIL AND TEXT MESSAGE COMMANDS   

• "Read my emails"   (Will only read aloud the time the email was sent, sender's name, and subject)
• "Send an email to Tammee" (substitute name of person in your email contacts)
• "Email Joe and say that I appreciate his help this weekend"  (substitute name of person in your email contacts)
• "Send a message to Pat on his mobile and tell him I will be there soon" (substitute name of person in your email contacts)
• "Read my most recent email message"
• "Read my new text messages"
• "Reply to Pat's text message" (substitute name of person from your contacts)

CREATE AND FIND NOTES COMMANDS

• "Note: the car is parked in Row 5, Level 3 at the airport"
• "Create a grocery list note"  (substitute the desired name of your note)
• "Add bananas, milk, and bread to the grocery list note"
• "Find the grocery list note"

MUSIC, RADIO, and APP COMMANDS

• "Play Amazing Grace"  (substitute the name of song that is located on your iPad)
• "Play the radio"
• "Play some John Denver"  (substitute the name of an artist whose songs are located on your iPad)
• "Shuffle my favorites playlist"  (substitute the name of a playlist located on your iPad)
• "Pause" or  "Skip" while song is playing  
• "Play Solitaire"  (substitute the name of an app on your iPad)
• "Open Magnifying Glass"  (substitute the name of an app on your iPad)
• "Launch App Store"

OTHER SIRI QUESTIONS OR COMMANDS

• "What is the temperature outside?"
• "How hot will it be in Phoenix this weekend?"
• "What is the forecast for this evening?"
• "Search for diabetic pasta recipes"
• "Google what's happening in Washington D.C."
• "Search for images of dogs"
• "What movies are playing near me?"
• "Who starred in the movie, Casablanca?"
• "Show me football scores from Sunday"
• "How many days until Christmas?"
• "What Mexican restaurants are near me?"
• "How many cups are in a pint?"

I had so much fun helping primary grade students create QR-coded audio letters to Santa that I thought I would share the steps here. This project is especially appropriate to use with primary age students because few keyboard skills are required. Recording their letter is much easier than having young students try to write/type their Santa letter. 

Begin the project by having the students create a picture of Santa using a drawing tool (Kid Pix Deluxe 3D is my favorite software and ABCya Paint is my favorite web-based tool). Save the picture and print it.

The next step is to brainstorm what students might say if they could talk to Santa.  Students will practice reciting their letter to a buddy until they are fluent and ready to record. Students will then use the online tool called Vocaroo to record their audio letter to Santa. 

Not only is Vocaroo simple for primary students to use (ONE button to click to record) but the sharing options are fabulous! There is a QR code link (see bottom, right corner in the image below) that easily converts the audio recording to a QR code.

Vocaroo has no limit as to the length of the recordings, but limiting your students to 1 minute of recording will help them to focus on the content of their letter. The Vocaroo site stores the audio files online for a short time (FAQ section states that audio files can be saved for a period up to a few months). There are, however, numerous download options available if there is a desire to keep an audio file permanently. 

The final step is to print the QR code and attach it to the student's drawing. These QR audio letters make a GREAT  interactive bulletin board display and then the projects can be sent home as a Christmas gift for parents to enjoy. (You may want to include the URL to the child's recording on Vocaroo if parents want to download the audio file to permanently save it).

Following is a sample QR audio letter to Santa created by a VERY imaginative 1st grade boy. Scan the QR code and listen for yourself!

Since I am truly thankful to have spent 30 years in the field of education, I thought I would share one of my favorite Thanksgiving projects by giving it a little technology update.  Enjoy and Happy Thanksgiving!

Turkey Boycott! Persuasive Writing/Speech

Students come up with turkey alternatives for Thanksgiving dinner and create a Tellagami project explaining from the turkey's point of view why Thanksgiving dinner would be better if turkey was NOT on the menu. 

Step-by-step directions:

• Begin by drawing a turkey using free iPad apps such as Hand Turkey or DoodleBuddy. Creative turkey drawings are then saved to the camera roll. 
• Students research the first Thanksgiving using books or websites (Scholastic has a GREAT thematic lesson with resources at Teaching About the First Thanksgiving) to determine what other types of foods could be selected as an alternative to turkey. 
• Students use a word processing program to write a short, persuasive paragraph describing the new food from the turkey's point of view. 
• Students tap CHARACTER within the Tellagami app to create a customized talking avatar (clothes, hair, shoes, eyes, gender, voice, and skin tone) who will attempt to persuade the audience about the new food choice. Students tap BACKGROUND to toggle to the camera roll to import their turkey drawing. Students may choose to record their own voices reading their persuasive paragraph or may copy/paste their paragraph from the word processing program. *Note:  Tellagami limits recording to 30 seconds or typed text to 440 characters.
  
• The completed project (Gami) can be emailed, posted to Facebook, or Tweeted, which also generates a link to share. You can also view your movie online and get the embed code. Consider embedding the finished products on a class wiki or blog. You can also save them to your iPad photos, which is what I like to do. From there, Gamis can be combined together in iMovie or incorporated into other apps like Educreations or Explain Everything. 
• 
  

The first week of school is nearly upon us and many elementary teachers are busy dusting off their "All About Me" projects. Why not try something a little different using these easy-to-use iPad apps that promote creativity?

Students use the visually appealing app, Haiku Deck, to choose four adjectives that truthfully describe themselves and include one "fantasy" characteristic (perhaps something they hope to do or achieve during the year). Students can use the Creative Commons photos within the app or import from the iPad camera roll. While sharing the presentations, students can try to guess the identity of each presentation's creator. The class can also discuss the meaning of the adjectives shared in the presentations and try to determine which adjective is the "fantasy" word. Share on the iPad or create a class account and save to the Haiku Deck website.

Students turn a list of their favorite things (up to 10 items) into a cool typographic work of art! Students use the iPad app, WordFoto, to take a picture of themselves or an object to represent themselves. They then create a word set that lists (up to 10 items) things such as their favorite color, food, school subject, sport, animal, etc. Share the unique creations via email, Facebook or save to the photo library on the iPad. 

Create a name acrostic collage that features photos of students' interests using the Pic Collage app. Students use the text, background, photos from the web and/or use camera features of the app to create a picture collage. Each picture represents something that the student likes that begins with a letter from his/her name. Students could also draw their own images, edit the photos or add stickers using this cool app. Final collages can be shared via Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, email or saved to the photo library on the iPad.

Learned about another iPad "hidden gem" from Apple's Maria Henderson during the LoneStar TIA Conference keynote speech today...speak selection! This accessibility option when enabled will turn your iPad into a text reader in many common apps like Notes, Safari, and iBooks. This is the perfect tool for providing auditory support for students who struggle with reading. To enable this read aloud feature on your iPad, follow the steps below:

1.  Go to Settings>General>Accessibility
2.  Find Speak Selection and turn it ON

3. Find Highlight Words and turn it ON to provide a visual cue to accompany the spoken text.
4. Use the Speaking Rate slider to adjust your preferred speaking rate. Drag towards the turtle icon to speak slower or the rabbit to speed it up. (Hint: Most students will prefer a rate closer to the turtle end of the rate scale).
5. Choose a dialect if desired

6. Go to an app that supports text such as Notes.
7. Tap a word and then drag the blue grab handles to select the desired text.

8. Tap the word Speak that now appears next to the normal Cut, Copy, and Define options.
9. Enjoy listening to the spoken text!




Speak Selection works in native Apple apps.

While working with a group of 5th graders recently, I was asked by a parent to recommend some good resources that could be used by students who were interested in beginning programming. This is honestly an area that is outside my comfort zone. My personal programming experience is limited to having done a little with Logo (remember that one?) and some simple java scripts. Fortunately, I am married to an amazing software engineer who helped me review some  web resources and apps that I found. The following list of Beginning Programming Resources is what we liked the best when taking into account the content, ease of use, instruction/help features, and price. I hope to delve into this a little further in the future...

BEGINNING PROGRAMMING RESOURCES 

Please be sure to read carefully all of the requirements and obtain your parents’ permission before downloading or installing any of the programs or apps to your devices. These are recommended resources for upper elementary-middle school students who are interested in beginner computer programming.

Online Resources:

Scratch – Developed for students aged 8-16 years old by the MIT Media Lab, Scratch is one of the best ways to take the first leap into visual programming language. It allows students to build interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art. This visual approach to programming is the perfect way to teach students the beginning concepts behind programming and basic software development. Scratch is free to download and runs on Mac, Windows and Linux. (New 2.0 version available on May 9).

Alice - is a 3D programming environment that allows students to create animations, interactive games, or videos to share on the web. The program will help students understand key principles such as object-orientated programming and 3D modeling. Programs are created by drag and drop using graphic tiles. Each instruction corresponds to standard statements in a programming language, such as Java, C++, and C#. Alice is free to download and runs on Mac and Windows. *Watch the tutorials before beginning.

Apps:

Hopscotch HD is an iPad-only app that uses visual programming language, in which users drag "blocks" of code into a scripting area, to build programs. Aimed primarily at ages 8 and up, Hopscotch was designed for the touch-friendly tablet to eliminate the frustration common with code syntax. (FREE)

Daisy the Dinosaur is an app that teaches the basics of computer programming. It features a drag and drop interface that can be used to animate Daisy to dance across the screen. After playing Daisy, kids can choose to download a kit to program their own computer game. (FREE)

Cargo-Bot is an iPad game for children that focuses on solving puzzles to stack crates. It requires the crane machine that stacks the boxes to be programmed to carry out certain tasks. This app places the focus on developing  thinking skills instead of coding itself. (FREE)

Kodable is an app that teaches programming basics and logic lessons to kids. Children help the Fuzz family navigate Technomazes that they face after crash landing on Smeeborg. Use drag and drop commands to direct your fuzz through the colorful lighted maze. If you want to keep your fuzz happy, don't get lost! (FREE)

My Robot Friend is an app that uses STEM education in an engaging game that challenges students to use logical thinking and problem solving. The first few levels start out simply but quickly become more challenging after the initial movement tutorial segment is finished. The advanced levels include some complex tasks such as backtracking and blasting moving targets. The better the player performs, the more costume pieces they‟ll unlock along with the coins needed to purchase them. ($3.99)

Codea is a great starting point for students interested in making apps and lets students program directly on the iPad device. Students can create games, simulations and just about any visual idea they have. *Recommended for students with some programming experience. ($7.99)