How to Set Up an iPad for Music Lessons
If you haven’t tried using an iPad with your music students before, you’re missing out! They’re the perfect tool for watching theory videos, playing musical apps, and completing theory worksheets. And obviously students love them!
Here are a few tips on how to set up an iPad for music lessons, with a focus on making it effective and safe for students.
Organising Apps
One of the easiest ways to organise apps is to set up different folders for different topics. Here are the folders I have on my studio iPad:
- Note Reading
- Rhythm
- Ear Training
- Scales
- Music Theory
Alternatively, you could organise the folders by level (although this can be more difficult when you have apps which are suitable for a wide range of ages and stages).
However you decide to organise apps into folders, it makes sense to keep the most frequently used apps in the iPad Dock (which is located at the bottom of the screen) so they’re always easy to access.
Restricting Access
When students are working independently it makes sense to update a few settings to student proof your iPad. There are some things you’ll almost certainly want to restrict:
- Purchasing new apps
- Upgrading to paid versions of installed apps
- Unlimited access to YouTube
- Unlimited access to the internet
- Access to the camera
These can all be updated through Settings > General > Restrictions. The first time you update the Restrictions you’ll need to put in a four digit passcode, but make sure it’s different to your main passcode (you won’t want any students to change the Restrictions, but they may need to know the main passcode to unlock the iPad).
Once you have enabled restrictions, you can select certain apps to disable, and update restrictions on media ratings:
Watching YouTube Videos
There are a lot of videos on YouTube that are perfect for explaining music theory concepts, demonstrating technique, and showcasing pieces. Unfortunately there are also a lot of videos on YouTube that you really don’t want your students to see!
With suggested videos displayed in the app, it’s also very easy for students to get distracted when they’re using YouTube independently. Luckily there are a couple of solutions to these issues:
Cakey App
With this free app you’re able to create customised playlists of YouTube videos. The only videos that students can access through the app are the specific ones you’ve chosen, so there’s no need to worry about them stumbling on anything they shouldn’t!
This app is super easy to set up, and making playlists is very straightforward. Being able to create multiple playlists means you can also group videos by topic and/or level, making it simple for students to access the relevant material.
Cakey is available to download from the App Store.
Safe YouTube Website
Using this website, students can access single YouTube videos in a player that doesn’t allow links to any other content. It’s more time consuming to set up, but the benefit is that students can only access one specific video at a time.
The first step is to set up access to Safe YouTube. You’ll need to enable Safari, and make sure that http://safeyoutube.net is added to the allowed sites:
Now comes the hard part… you’ll need to create a link using the Safe YouTube website for every individual video you want to use. The easiest way to share the link is by saving the QR code, then printing out a copy which can then be scanned on the iPad using the camera or an app.
Some ideas for organising the printed QR codes:
Master Lists
Set up a printable page for each topic, with the name of each video and the corresponding QR code. Students will be able to scan and then watch anything on the list.
Task Cards
Create individual cards for each video, which include the name, description and QR code. You could also include a question or activity for students to complete.
Further Reading
Now that you know how to set up an iPad for music lessons, here are some helpful links on how to use one with your students:
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