Tell us a little about yourself and your background.
A Physical Education teacher from Country Victoria Australia, with a passion for mobile devices and emerging technology.
What lead you to develop the PE Geek Apps?
A desire to bring my ideas to life, in a way that would benefit my own classroom and ultimately others.
Is there one app you are particularly proud of?
Easy Portfolio is my crown and jewel. It has been downloaded well over 100,000 times, won an inventors award and been pre-installed on the XO OLPC tablets which are being distributed to 3rd world countries.
Have you been pleased with the reception for your apps?
Very pleased and happy to be able to bring apps to life for teachers. It has become a bit of an obsession, I'm forever coming up with new ways to make improvements in my teaching. These apps become part of that.
Are your apps aimed at a specific age group or stage of eduaction?
All stages of education can benefit by varying apps. I recently brought out my new app Active Kids Coloring Book (www.activekidscolor.com) which is perfect for younger audiences. You then have Video Tagger, which is designed with older students in mind.
We've recently been using Easy Assessment and even letting kids their own rubrics with it in English lessons. Was this app always intended to be more cross-curricular or was PE still the main focus?
It started as a PE centric app, with the inclusion of Videos and Photos in the app made for this audience. However it became pretty apparent when it was released that it was very diverse in application. It has also received over 100,000 downloads.
How important do you feel the use of mobile technology is for the 21st century educator in general?
The world is mobile, if schools are seen to be preparing students for the 21st century then it needs to reflect the real world.
Why do you feel iPads are such a valuable resource for PE teachers?
They enable us to leverage the power of computing without losing movement.
What future projects have you got in the pipeline?
Easy Planner is going to be live in January. This is the definitive teacher planner app (video link to the left.)
Thanks for speaking with us Jarrod and we look forward to hearing from you again.
You can even sign up for his FREE 10 day eCourse on iPads in PE!
FACETIME: Jarrod Robinson
