Rendcomb College encourages its students to be responsible and sensible in how much time they spend on electronic gadgets. (We also provide as many alternative leisure distractions and activities as possible!)
However, we’re more than happy for you to use handheld devices for fact-finding, study support and healthy fun. Here are ten apps we recommend for boarding school students.
StudyBlue
This ever-expanding app is great for revising and just generally reinforcing information from your studies. It helps you to sort important material into flashcards and quizzes, for example, to test your own knowledge and understanding.
Microsoft Office Lens - PDF Scanner
Everyone learns at their own pace, and sometimes students prefer to capture information and then read through it slowly later. This app is great for that. You can capture an image of a whiteboard or a page of notes for example, then convert it to a PDF, Word or PowerPoint file. This can be stored on OneNote or OneDrive so you can read and revise it in your own time.
My Class Schedule (Android) or Class Timetable (iOS)
Particularly in exam season, or when you have a lot of additional activities on the go, having an app that schedules your week clearly can be handy. These apps put everything into a colour coded spreadsheet format, to view your week and any deadlines at a glance.
Evernote
Keeping all your study notes and materials – and your personal data files – in order can be a juggling act too. Evernote is a great app for document storage – and you can organise everything with lists, images and memos to yourself. It’s like a digital organiser for students and has handy tools for all sorts of tasks.
Headspace: Meditation & Mindfulness
When all this being organised and focused gets too much – or you just need to relax at boarding school – this app is a wonderful source of meditation and mindfulness methods. It has features to generally calm you and ease tension, and to stimulate healthier sleep patterns.
Skype
Sometimes the only way to clear your head when studying, or to gain new ideas and inspiration, is to chat things through with a friend, sibling or someone else whose ‘brains you can pick’. This makes video call apps useful, such as Skype. This one’s also a fabulous and free way to keep in social contact with people while you’re at boarding school.
GoConqr
What if you want to explore a topic with other interested people, not in your immediate social circle? This app enables you to safely connect and chat to people anywhere in the world, in study groups, to share ideas and discuss information. It provides mind maps, flashcards and quizzes too.
Cotswolds Walks
Perhaps exploration of a different sort is more ‘up your street’. This one is especially relevant for students at a certain award-winning independent school in the Cotswolds of course! Why not get a walking group going at Rendcomb College, to enjoy fresh air and exercise in this fabulous Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
Zombies, Run!
This one is just for fun, but it can also help you to get fit. It’s an interactive game and music provider to encourage you to enjoy your daily running and to challenge you to work harder.
Oxford Dictionary Apps
Talking of zombies, this one is a ‘no brainer’! Having access to a vast dictionary of words and their meanings can prove useful, whatever courses you’re studying, or to even settle a debate about spellings and other word features.
Keeping everyone ‘appy’
Whatever you need for work and play, there’s an app for that!
Online safety for young people is a serious priority at Rendcomb College, but there is an important place for mobile technology in modern education, and for enriching the lives of young people.
