The Kindle Fire: Appropriate for the School Environment? KySTE 2012 Bryan Sweasy Chief Information Officer Erlanger-Elsmere School District

First Things First This entire presentation, and all of the information gathered from this presentation, is available at

Outline for this Session 1.Kindle Fire Specs 2.General Criticisms 3.The Kindle Fire for Administrators and Teachers 4.The Kindle Fire as a 1:1 Solution 5.How to Choose if it’s Right for You 6.Essential Apps for the Educational Setting

Kindle Fire Specs 7 inch tablet Modified Android operating system Display: 1024X600 Storage: 8 GB (6 GB available) Wireless: b/g/n Camera: None Microphone: None GPS: None Speakers: Stereo RAM: 1 GB Processor: Dual Core

General Criticisms Screen size too small Locked down operating system (not really Android) Too Little Storage (only 1 GB for apps, no room for expansion) No camera No microphone No GPS Cheap, tinny speakers No way to turn off 1-click purchasing No parental controls

The Kindle Fire: A Productivity Tool for Teachers and Administrators?

Tool for Teachers/Administrators ?  Access to work , including calendar, contacts, tasks, notes  Office productivity program, including the ability to make basic edits  A.PDF reader  A web browser capable of running the web apps for work (i.e. Infinite Campus, district Help Desk program, network monitoring program)  An app store with the programs I need

“Out of the Box” vs. “With some Work” Tool for Teachers/Administrators ?

 Access to work , including calendar, contacts, tasks, notes  Office productivity program, including the ability to make basic edits  A.PDF reader  A web browser capable of running the web apps for work (i.e. Infinite Campus, district Help Desk program, network monitoring program)  An app store with the programs I need Out of the Box

Tool for Teachers/Administrators ?  Access to work , including calendar, contacts, tasks, notes  Office productivity program, including the ability to make basic edits  A.PDF reader  A web browser capable of running the web apps for work (i.e. Infinite Campus, district Help Desk program, network monitoring program)  An app store with the programs I need With some work… …and $34.94!

The Answer is simple… 1:1 Solution? …It depends…

So how do you make that decision? 1:1 Solution? By deciding what you want your 1:1 device to do.

So what if you decide the Kindle Fire IS the device you want to use? Essential Apps

Some Final Considerations Consumer Device, not a business-class device. As such Limited manageability Unknown reliability Teachers will need to be willing to be “hands on” with the devices. If your district doesn’t have transparent proxy, the device cannot get online AT ALL. You'll need a document camera (and apparently a file folder) to project onto a screen. Mobicip (or a similar product if it becomes available) is a necessity until Amazon fixes the 1 click purchasing problem. Mobicip for Android is currently in Beta. The iOS version left Beta and went from FREE to $4.99.

The Kindle Fire: Appropriate for the School Environment? KySTE 2012 Bryan Sweasy Chief Information Officer Erlanger-Elsmere School District