Our Next Event: Collaborative Learning & The Future Workplace

It's event time again at nsquared and below is your very exclusive invite to our next event!

Following on from our successful By The Fireplace event in October 2015 which was attended by more than 85 tech industry, Design & C-Level executives, it's time for you to save the date - Thursday April 21st - for our next event which will be held in Wynyard.

This event will be even bigger than the last one and will feature panelists shedding light on our topic: Collaborative Learning: How ‘Campfire Moments’ Will Change the Future Workplace.

At this event you will learn about:

• Collaborative learning & 'purpose mastery' in organisations
• How workplace trends such as telecommuting and virtual reality will change everything
• Why collaboration & social connection will become critical to organisations in the future

This is an invite-only event and we will have limited seating so RSVP is essential. Please contact events [at] nsquaredsolutions [dotcom] if you would like to attend!

Refined and updated

A number of the nsquared iPad education applications have been updated to support iOS7.

nsquared makewords and nsquared A to Zoo are amongst our favourite iPad applications for the younger audience.

nsquared makewords is a spelling activity for two players, or two teams. The objective is to determine the word for the object on the screen and spell it as fast as possible.

Playing nsquared makewords with friends

nsquared A to Zoo provides four fun educational activities around the zoo, pattern matching, spelling and counting are all important skills to winning stickers. With the stickers you can make your own zoo scenes and save them to your photo collection.

Explore the activities in the zoo with nsquared A to Zoo

Download to your iPad now from the App Store.

Microsoft Education Blog recommends nsquared Windows 8 apps (Twice!)

The interest and excitement for our Windows 8 education apps continues to increase as nsquared is featured not once, but twice in articles published on The Australian Education Blog this week.

 Ray Fleming, a member of the Australian Microsoft Education team, authors the blog which focuses on what’s interesting in Education IT in Australia.

Read his article, “Collaborative learning with Windows 8 multi-touch apps– flip the screen over!” here -

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/education/archive/2013/06/19/collaborative-learning-with-windows-8-multi-touch-apps-flip-the-screen-over.aspx

And read his more recent post, “Collaborating on Chemistry on a Windows 8 touch slate” here -

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/education/archive/2013/06/20/collaborating-on-chemistry-on-a-windows-8-touch-slate.aspx

Thanks Ray! :)

Taking the magic of touch technology to Tamworth

Yesterday nsquared traveled with our partners at Samsung and Worlds Best Technology Distributors to demonstrate the power of touch technology to Tamworth, New South Wales.

The event was hosted at the Tamworth TAFE and attended by a number of key decision makers, all of whom were interested in bringing leading edge technology to their students.

It was great to see the educators literally get their hands on the technology, a Samsung SUR40.

One of the main attractors was the nsquared presenter application. nsquared presenter allows you to collaboratively create and deliver presentations using all the devices you find in a meeting room – tablets, mobile phones, overhead projectors and multi-touch tables. Groups of people are able to come together to build a presentation “timeline” of content including slides, spreadsheets, documents, images and videos from different  files. The staff felt this application had the most potential for their educational environment as it has the ability for students collectively interact with their digital course material over a familiar table setting.

Some of the other crowd favorites included:

- nsquared circuits

- nsquared paint

- nsquared chemistry 

    We are very excited to be working with Team Tamworth and look forward to helping them engage their students through multi-touch technology!

Update: nsquared makewords on Windows 8. Perfect for the Surface Pro!

We have been working hard here in the nsquared studio to update our FREE educational app on the Windows 8 store - nsquared makewords. 

This educational game is aimed to help students (aged 3+) with object recognition, differentiation and to improve their recall and spelling. nsquared makewords has the ability to switch between a range of content packs, therefore allowing you to change and download new content as it is released.

Features 

- Multi Touch, Multi User (for up to 4 people)

- Drag tiles to spell different animals, objects, flags and more

- Competitive and co-operative learning against the clock

The update features the following:

- Fun music and sound effects

- Better, easier to use layout

- Great visual feedback for incorrect letters and words!

- Reshuffle the letters to make it easier to find the ones you're looking for 

- Use the bottom app bar to choose between vertical and table mode play

- Word order in each pack has been randomized for more replay-ability

- Completely revised and updated menu system

Please try nsquared makewords today for FREE - http://apps.microsoft.com/windows/en-au/app/nsquared-makewords/e182deac-77d6-4679-91a9-71ebfea82515  

nsquared chemistry on Windows 8

Here at nsquared we’re excited for the future of collaborative gaming and education.

More and more touch devices are being developed with larger and better screens. This means that the encouraging nature of collaborative learning can finally make a return on PC’s and tablets.

This new form factor, pioneered by devices such as the Sony Vaio Tap 20, is more commonly referred to as the “table” computer and it may allow all of your students to play at once on a single device!

We’re proud to announce another addition to our educational suite on the windows 8 store, nsquared chemistry!

As a collaborative game, it encourages learning between players. As the game progresses, players can teach one another how a specific element is made, or which elements the next compound will contain. The game lets players build a working memory of common elements as they build each compound, and teach others what comprises an element or compound. It is an excellent accompanying tool to any level of high school chemistry as the exercises mimic those found in many textbooks.

 

It’s also one of our first games to take advantage of the “Snapping” feature of windows 8 devices. Players are encouraged to snap the app to the side and open a browser to research an exercise if they are stuck.

Also, on a technical note, nsquared chemistry is one of the only apps in the store constructed with DirectX, C++ and XAML interoperation, and also our first 3D Windows 8 game!

Have fun bouncing elements around!

Try chemistry for free here: http://apps.microsoft.com/windows/app/nsquared-chemistry/122ae62d-6c0e-4f2f-878d-25716293959d

Windows 8 Education Apps

At nsquared we have been busy getting a range of educational applications ready for Windows 8. 
A number of the new computers being released are incredibly exciting, providing new ways for multiple people to interact around a single screen. Devices such as the Sony Tap 20 and the Lenovo Horizon will bring small digital tables into the home and classroom at very affordable prices.
Our history producing software for digital tables, such as Microsoft PixelSense, has lead to creating some truly outstanding multi-user experiences for Windows 8 devices. 

To start the new year we have released six new applications aimed at the younger audience, that is learning to read, write and count. These applications are great for small group learning.

nsquared letters 
A free form language application designed for use with or without guidance. The nsquared letters application allows students to explore words in virtually any language that uses the Latin alphabet. 
Get it here

nsquared numbers 
A free-form application that can be used to teach basic mathematical concepts. How many ways can your students make the sum of ‘7’, or ‘48’, or any other number you’d like to explore? How many ways can they create those same results? 
Get it here

nsquared make words
This structured educational game will help students learn object recognition and differentiation, and improve their recall and spelling. nsquared makewords has the ability to switch between a range of content packs through the menu and download new content as it's released.
Get it here

nsquared herding
nsquared herding is designed to develop numeracy, pattern matching and object recognition skills.

Designed for one to four players (depending on the size of your device, you may only be able to have up to two players), herding requires each player to collect the correct numbers of each target object and place them into their own playing area.

Get it here

nsquared snap
nsquared snap is designed to develop pattern matching, memory, and object recognition skills.
This turn based memory game requires up to four students to match overturned cards. Only two cards may be turned over at any time in an attempt to find a matching pair.
Each player must take a turn individually, with a point being awarded when a pair of cards is matched successfully.
Get it here

nsquared missing card
nsquared missing card is designed to develop pattern matching and object recognition skills.
This is a multi-player game for up to four students. Players must chose the best match from three options presented to them. 
Get it here

A to Zoo summer special

For the month of August we are reducing the price of A to Zoo for the iPad!
For just 99c USD you can have these four fantastic educational activities for the children (ages 5+) to explore.
The activities include spelling, counting, pattern matching and simple sets. there is also a bonus sticker book that you can use once you unlock the stickers form the other activities.


What a fantastic way to keep the children both entertained and educated during the summer (if you live in the northern hemisphere)

Watch a video review of A to Zoo

Buy A to Zoo now.

The nsquared education pack at CEFPI OZ

Lat week we had a great week at the CEFPI Australia conference in Sydney.
The nsquared team was there with a Microsoft Surface table demonstrating the nsquared education pack for Microsoft Surface.

Here are some photos we took of the event.

On the first day we had a students from two different schools visit the event.

The nsquared paint application is always very popular.

Learning to spell can always be a challenge, nsquared letters can make it fun and competitive.

Proud to be a sponsor of the collaborative learning space.

Steven Wong from TeamBoard using nsquared make words for Windows 7 on his dual touch TeamBoard screen.

nsquared education pack updates

If you have been paying attention you will have noticed that the nsquared education pack website was updated 2 weeks ago. With the growth of the iPad and more schools starting to install Windows 7 touch screens we have been busy building our multi-user educational applications for both platforms.

Our iPad applications have recently all been upgraded. Now any new content we make available will synchronize with the iPad application the next time the application is run. We are creating new curriculum based content all the time and expect to have updates out each month with new activities.

A week of conferences

Over the last few weeks we have been at a lot of conferences but last week was special. On Tuesday and Wednesday we were at the K-12 National Education Congress in Sydney with 3M, demonstrating our Windows 7 touch applications for education. Then on Friday we were at the Association of Independent Schools conference in the Hunter Valley where we presented a session called "Let's Talk, conversations around digital content". In this session we explained how we focus our efforts on building educational applications to enhance the conversations between students.
If you want to find out more about what we are doing please drop us a line and we can show you our educational applications.