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Apple Announces 'Classroom' Coming to Mac, Reveals New 'Schoolwork' App for Educators

nutriousmitten said:
Beta in June, just in time for most schools in North America to be let out. I guess ready for the fall, assuming you have beta testers in teachers willing to work over the summer.

But with the iPad still costing schools the price of two Chromebooks, don't see Apple gaining much ground just becuase of a couple apps and pencil support.
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Value of a $250 Chromebook after three years = $0 Value of a $299 iPad after four years = $50
 
coolbreeze said:
Eh, Apple is trying here, but ChromeOS rules the classroom.

I know every tech company is trying to indoctorinate young kids into becoming brand zombies for a lifetime, but Apple is late here IMO. Not to mention hella more expensive.

A Chromebook is perfect for classrooms, especially when typing lots of notes (keyboard is essential).
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For kindergarteners? 1st graders? 2nd graders? 3rd graders?
 
Tech198 said:
I dunno how many would buy a product based on how much you'd get after you sell it... as the only factor.
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I think the point being made was that the new entry level iPad wouldn't cost a school 2x an average Chromebook.
 
jeremiah256 said:
My son has been using Chromebooks in school (California) since 2nd grade, at least, with no issues. This new Chromebook Tab, though, is probably a better fit for certain tasks/age groups.
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Personally wouldn’t agree that it is as appropriate for k-3, but that’s just me.
 
harriska2 said:
Personally wouldn’t agree that it is as appropriate for k-3, but that’s just me.
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If you're talking about form factor, I totally agree that for P-3 (but, I feel 3rd grade is kind of a transition period to learning to type), a tablet form might be a better choice. But, the total cost of setting up for iPads was just so much more than setting up with a Chrome OS device, until the Chromebook Tab was released.

While I don't believe Apple completely addressed the issues that make many schools hesitate to use iPads (cost, easy MDM, lack of a keyboard for writing), Google has addressed the issue of lacking a cheap device when the tablet form factor is the superior GUI to use.
 
RedRock2512 said:
Apple needs to come up with a competitor to Microsoft's OneNote app. OneNote is making inroads into classrooms, even though it sucks.

OneNote has no local file storage; all data syncs to OneDrive or Sharepoint. Klunky interface. No way to customize formatting. And, of course, the PC version has more features than the Mac version.

The only thing I see going for OneNote is it's notebook organization - Sections (Tabs) contain Pages.
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This! (I'm a OneNote fan actually, but that's another post...)

This Apple event struck me as really strange (I'll get back to the top part):

  • Apple seems to have a lot on its plate right now. Overall, education seems like a weird thing for Apple to focus on at the moment.
  • Apple has really struggled with selling apple products to schools. As others have mentioned, Microsoft and Google are really strong in this market that seems to be really focused on low prices. Apple's products are expensive and fragile compared to other education products. I give them credit for lowering the prices and having the cheaper case/crayon bundle, but it still clocks in almost double a chromebook. That combined with some software that isn't ready yet, seems like a half-hearted attempt to catch up with Google. Wouldn't the Apple we know prefer to drop in with a clearer advantage over the others if they were really trying this?
  • Education, much like professional software/hardware, is a market that requires a lot of attention. I think its well publicized that Apple has been shying away from this. I personally was really upset when they dropped support for Aperture. But, I gave them some credit for owning up to who they are- they prefer to drop products they feel are great with a mic drop. I took their dropping/dumbing down pro software and slowing on pro hardware as an acknowledgement of this. They seem to be (maybe forced) doing a turnaround on pro hardware- but even that is just building powerful computers- not something tailor-made. Why would Apple dip back into the education market where to be good they need that ground level understanding, feedback, and research they don't seem to like to do.
  • Continuing on that theme... a common complaint with Apple is that has been really singularly focused- seemingly paying attention to one product at a time while all others languish. Even if this offering today was perfect for schools as is, given current patterns, I wouldn't be surprised if Apple didn't say the word "education" again for 5 years. And that would likely be another complete do-over, rather than the careful refinement this type of business needs.
  • This whole thing reminds me of the whole PCs in business thing. Microsoft (and their partners) flooded the market with $300 computers that ran MS Office and the internet, and now the world is full of them. People complained and said Apple should make a $300 computer too to compete. Instead, Apple made computers so good, that people bought them as individuals and demanded they get them at the office too, which I think turned out better for everyone.
All of that said- it seems really weird that Apple is making this push to get schools to buy iPads. Do what they do best- get individuals to buy these things, and then let those kids and parents demand that schools provide them. It's a great start that they expanded Pencil support and lowered the cost of the iPad. Now they should make the killer app- something like OneNote- a cool, efficient, well thought out way for kids to organize their school notes and such. Sell it to parents as a way to get their kids organized. Have optional tie-ins so that teachers could send digital notes to the kids who have iPads, when handing out printouts to the other kids. If it is really good enough- the kids and parents will naturally start pushing for schools to provide these things instead of the cheaper alternatives.

Edit: toned down the first bullet- the first version was distracting and not the point of the message...
 
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britboyj said:
Have you seen how much eLearning and Blackboard charge?

Also, those are TERRIBLE experiences. Like, they're ATROCIOUS. No educator I've ever spoken to disagrees. If this works half as well as those systems, it will get A LOT of pickup.
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I agree with you here. Everyone is missing this and it’s the biggest competitive piece of this announcement. Blackboard, which is incredibly popular, can cost school systems millions of dollars and includes no hardware. This new Apple software looks like it will accomplish everything Blackboard does and more, be easier to use and come for free.

When school systems factor in how much they save by dropping other software, Apple is practically paying them to take these $299 iPads.
 
To be clear, this is just bringing the management portion to Mac, right? This would be awesome if it brought Classroom to let me manage my students' MacBook Airs from a Mac... that that is NOT the case, right? Only for iPad?
 
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