More Free iPad Apps: Pocket Law Firm, History Maps, Think Fast, and Undecided

Pocket Law Firm is excellent for practicing reading comprehension and learning the basics of constitutional law. Player may refer to the constitutional amendment cheat sheet as many times as necessary to play the game, but this repetition will eventually help students memorize the amendments as they apply them to cases. The object of the game is to match potential clients with lawyers who specialize in certain amendments. When a person enters the law office, the player must tap on the character and read the person's story, then determine whether this merits legal action. If the client has a constitutional right to take the case to court, the player finds the appropriate lawyer to take the case. As the lawyers win cases, Prestige points add up, allowing the player to buy additional lawyers and office furniture that makes the clients more likely to wait patiently to speak to someone. Clients will not wait forever, so part of the challenge is to attend everyone in a timely manner.
Update: I used this in my classes with great success. Before the students used the app, I asked them to list any constitutional amendments or constitutional rights they remember learning in their history class. The responses were less than what I had expected. After playing the game for about 30 minutes, I asked the students to add to their written list, and they recalled at least five additional amendments they did not know (or remember) at the beginning of class. They have been asking to use this app every day since.

The History Maps app incorporates history and geography. I plan to use this app as a starting point for online research; students can find maps of the tallest buildings from the end of the 19th century, for example, and research one of these structures. I prepared several questions that will challenge students to interpret visual information from the maps.

Think Fast is another app for both ELA and Social Studies. Players choose a character that moves along a route in Boston as they correctly answer questions about American history.

I needed a versatile, free app for choosing students for our debate. Finding electronic spinners was more difficult than I had anticipated, but here's the perfect app: Undecided. Roll dice, flip a coin, spin the wheel, draw straws, or generate a random number (and if those aren't enough, buy the digital rock, paper, scissors function).