Kids, of course, come in all varieties and their interests run the gamut, CNET reports. But when it comes to 10-year-old girls, I dare say, there are two ubiquitous desires: getting one’s ears pierced and getting a cell phone. And you may as well let go of that ol’ school stereotype of a preteen–phone glued to ear–gabbing on and on with friends about inanities. The phone is not really for talking. It’s for texting. Which is why my own 10-year-old daughter–too young in her stodgy mom’s eyes for piercings or a cell phone–was ecstatic to have found a workaround for the latter. Earlier this summer, a friend told her about an app for her iPod Touch called Textfree, which assigns her a real phone number and lets her send and receive texts for free…
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Students use iPods, iPhones to grade Obama’s address
It’s the stuff that makes political pollsters salivate: 30 Abilene Christian University students used iPhones and iPod Touches to respond to President Obama’s Jan. 27 State of the Union address in real time, and a campus technology official said the exercise offered insight into boosting student participation.
Abilene Christian was among the country’s first campuses to bring iPhones to students when the school gave the devices to incoming freshmen last school year. Freshmen and sophomores now have university-issued iPhones and iPod Touches, and professors from the political science and journalism programs assembled 30 students to gauge their reaction during Obama’s first State of the Union speech.
“It was a helpful exercise because … we were able to see if an interactive environment helped students engage in politics differently,” said Dennis Marquardt, Abilene Christian’s educational technology manager, who helped oversee the project.…Read More