Now onwards and upwards to our latest tech snack…
For today’s tech snack I would like to share a tool that allows you to view flash content on an ipad/similar tablet. Today’s tech snack may be found at the following url: https://www.puffinbrowser.com/index.php
What is it?
Puffin is a web browser specifically designed to be used on tablet devices. You have to download it on your device as it is an app, but it once you download you can use puffin to surf the web and access any site that uses flash. **Full Disclosure: depending on how a particular website has been set up, some of the flash components may not fully work on puffin. (for example, dragging items from an interactive site). So before you use this with your students, make sure you test out the site you want them to access to make sure everything works as it should. I have found most sites work just fine with puffin, but there are a few that don’t.
Regardless of which version of the app you download, it is a valuable tool for any educator. No longer are flash based websites inaccessible to your students when they are using tablets/ipads in the classroom. Additionally, puffin also has a companion app called Puffin Academy. This app is free and was designed specifically for K-12 students as you can only access web sites designed for K-12 e-learning. You can look up content on the home page using keywords and once you find something that interests you, you can “install” that site on your device. Puffin Academy calls this “installing” an app, but what it is really doing is just making a short cut to that site for easy access.