Showing posts with label evernote. Show all posts
Showing posts with label evernote. Show all posts

30 of the Best Apps for Children's Ministry

10:31 AM  Dale Hudson  

If you're in Children's Ministry, you probably depend on your smartphone to help you be more efficient in your work.  Smartphones have definitely become a staple in our day-by-day tasks.

If your smartphone is your tool belt, then apps are the tools you place in it to work with.  Here are 30 of the best tools (apps) you can place in your smartphone. 

SHARE YOUR FAITH
This app gives you an easy, visual way to share the plan of salvation with kids and parents.  It is interactive, compelling and easy to use.  It comes in 17 languages which also makes it a great tool to use on a mission trip.

THE BIBLE APP FOR KIDS
The Bible App for Kids is an animated Bible storybook.  It has vivid illustrations with touch-activated animations.  It also features games and activities that help kids remember God's Word.

INSTAGRAM
Instagram is a simple way to feature and promote your children's ministry to parents, volunteers and families.   It's also a great way to personally connect with volunteers, families in your ministry and other children's ministry leaders.  There are over 500 million people on Instagram.

CHARADES
Charades is a fun game to play with kids and volunteers.  It takes the time-honored game further with many hilarious bells and whistles, from impersonating celebrities to name that tune.  It's the #1 Word & Card game in the USA.
EVERNOTE
Evernote allows you to create notes.  And a note can be anything - a do-list, a reminder, a picture, a sketch, document, etc.  And once you make a note, it's accessible wherever you go.  You can also share your notes with others.  It's great for shared projects, meeting agendas and more.

FACEBOOK
There are many ways to use Facebook for your children's ministry.  A parent group, a volunteer group, a page that highlights your ministry, etc. 

BUFFER
This app lets you post to multiple popular social networks at scheduled times throughout the day, and has built-in analytics so you can see how your updates are faring.

TWITTER
Twitter is another major way to connect with parents and volunteers and promote your children's ministry.  It's also a great tool to stay connected with other children's ministry leaders.

 YOUVERSION BIBLE
Best free digital Bible available in my opinion.

FILE MANAGER
Great app to organize and view your files. 

PAPER by 53
Paper is a great way to capture and connect your notes, photos and sketches.  Create checklists, spotlight details in photos and sketch diagrams with unbeatable speed and ease.  Paper is like a wall of sticky notes for everything that inspires you.

30/30
This app will guide you task by task, counting down until it’s time to move on to the next one.  You  can adjust the timer in five-minute increments in either direction if you need more or less than 30 minutes for a task.

SEND ANYWHERE
Send Anywhere enables you to easily send large files.  Your recipient uses a six-digit code to download the file you send.  There are no file-size limits!

SLACK
This app is a great way to keep in touch with your team.  It provides chat and file sharing along with third-party productivity services.

MINUTE
The Minute app helps you make the most of your meetings by combining pre-meeting agendas and necessary files, along with in-meeting notes and post-meeting action items.

SIMPLENOTE
Simplenote is an easy, no-nonsense note-keeper, with the added bonus of cross-platform support and notes that sync in real-time to all of your other devices.

YOUTUBE
YouTube is a great way to put the ministry videos you create online and share them with parents and volunteers. 

PANDORA
Pandora is a free, personalized radio that plays music you love.  Great for when you need music for pre-service, post-service, events, etc.

SPOTIFY
Another great app that gives you access to millions of songs.  Another great option when you need music for pre-service, post-service, events. etc.

PINTEREST
Great place to get ideas for all aspects of children's ministry.

WAZE
A community based traffic and navigation app.  Gives you real-time traffic and road info.

DROPBOX
Great tool for saving and sharing files.

GOOGLE DRIVE
Another great way to save and share files.

DOCS TO GO
Allows you to view, edit, and create Microsoft® Office files (Word, Excel, PowerPoint*) & view Adobe PDF® files.

MINT
Can help you manage your personal and ministry budget.

 MAGISTO
Use this editing tool to turn your ministry photos and video clips into music videos.  Great way to promote and highlight your ministry. 

OVERCAST
A powerful yet simple audio podcast player, with features such as Smart Speed, Voice Boost, and Smarter Playlists to help you listen to more podcasts in more places, try new shows and completely control your experience.

 PRISMA
Turn your ministry photos into awesome artworks with these modern art filters.  Stunning features and fast sharing. 

SKYPE
Use this app for video meetings and connecting with other children's ministry leaders. 

WHATSAPP
This free messaging app uses your phone's Internet connection to message and call volunteers, family and friends.

Your turn.  What other apps do you recommend for Children's Ministry?  Share them with everyone in the comment section below.
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7 Apps That Will Help You Be More Productive

8:24 AM  Dale Hudson  

With the right apps, technology can help you be much more productive.

Here's 7 apps that will save you time and help you get more done.

Buffer 
You can use this app to schedule your social media posts and it will post for you.

Coffitivity
Do you like working while sitting in Starbucks?  Is the ambiance of a coffee shop your sweet spot for productivity?  Can't always make it there?  Bring the background noise to your office with this app.

Do Nothing for 2 Minutes
Need to unwind or gather your thoughts after a tough meeting or hours of intense work?  This app will help you unwind.  Sit back and relax...and if you touch your computer before the 2 minutes is up, it will scold you.

Evernote
This simple note-taking app organizes your notes, allows you to search for text within an image, captures everything from PDF to web pages and even has a webclipper so you can save anything you see online with a single click.

FocusWriter
Need  to write a lesson, skit or letter?  FocusWriter provides a simple, distraction-free writing environment.  You get a nice, full-screen blank canvas.  It also includes timers, alarms, goal setting, themes, typewriter sound effects, statistics and spell checking.
Google Docs is a great platform for collaborating on projects or editing documents between your computer, your tablet, and your smartphone. 
This is an organizational tool that will help you organize your personal to-dos, collaborate on team projects, take notes, write research papers, keep a journal, plan a huge event and much more.

Your turn.  What are some other apps that help you be more productive?  Share them with us in the comment section below.
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20 Must-Have iPad Apps for Your Ministry

8:00 AM  Dale Hudson  

If you use an iPad for your ministry work, here's 20 apps recommended by Time Tech that can be very beneficial. Most of these are free. Links to the apps are included.

Calculator for Ipad Free
Because math is hard and the iPad doesn’t include a built-in calculator, there’s Calculator for iPad Free. Like its name suggests, the app is free and includes both a standard and a scientific calculator; a $2 upgrade gives you several color schemes to choose from.
If you find yourself in a pinch needing to work with Microsoft Office files, the free CloudOn app might be just what you’re looking for. You’ll have access to Word, Excel and PowerPoint, along with the ability to open documents straight from popular online file-storage services.
Access important files anywhere with this cloud-storage service. Save a file to the Dropbox folder on your computer and it’ll be available from the Dropbox iPad app. Automatically save photos and videos from your iPad to your Dropbox account to access them from other devices as well.

TED
Riveting talks by remarkable people, free to the world.

Evernote
Sometimes you find yourself collecting so much digital stuff that you need a place to keep it all. For that, there’s Evernote. This free app lets you store your notes, ideas, to-do lists and much more — all synchronized for access from other devices as well.
Khan Academy allows you to learn almost anything for free with a library of over 3,500 educational videos.

Flipboard
Flipboard bills itself as “your personal magazine.” Browse handpicked articles on various topics and pipe in updates from your Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Tumblr accounts for a one-stop shop that caters to your interests.
Of all the things to shrink down so it fits inside an iPad, a world-class education might top the list. Apple’s iTunes U app features over half a million lectures, videos and books from some of the top learning institutions around the globe — all for free.

There are several worthwhile e-book reading apps to choose from, but Amazon’s Kindle platform gets the nod thanks to its availability on just about every other device on the market. If it’s connected, you can probably use it to read a Kindle book.
Murphy’s law: You’ll forget something important on your computer and won’t realize it until it’s almost too late. The free LogMeIn app lets you connect to your home computer (make sure to leave it turned on) and control it remotely as though you were sitting in front of it.

Paper is a free iPad app with a simple interface that lets you write, sketch and paint in virtual notebooks. It may not seem like rocket science, but realistically replicating the feel of various writing and art utensils on a tablet screen is a complicated feat that Paper pulls off with style.

For a free image editor, this app from Aviary features a wealth of features. Aside from being able to crop and rotate your photos, there’s red-eye reduction, blemish removal, teeth whitening and more. You can add doodles, text and stickers to liven up your images as well.

Pinnacle Studio
Believe it or not, editing videos on an iPad isn’t quite as cumbersome as you might think. Case in point: the $13 Pinnacle Studio app, which sports an easy-to-use interface and powerful editing features. After your masterpiece is complete, use the built-in uploader to share it with others.
It took Pinterest, the Web’s most popular pin board, until last August to roll out an iPad app. Better late than never, as the free app makes for a great couch companion. Pass the time browsing your friends’ pins, or pin things from around the Web that you’d like to revisit later.

Pocket lets you grab various bits from around the Web — articles, videos, images and more — and save them for later perusal. The free app takes text articles and takes out all the ads, buttons and other digital items to present a clean, easy-on-the-eyes reading experience.
The iPad’s built-in FaceTime feature makes it a snap to video-chat with other Apple owners, but — surprise! — not everyone owns Apple products. Skype makes video chatting a bit more universal, with apps for just about every platform and tons of active users.

For $10 a month, Spotify acts like a giant music store where you can listen to as much music as you want. You can create playlists of your favorite tunes and download songs for offline playback. There’s also a streaming radio option, which is free for U.S. users.

Titan Downloader
The free Titan Downloader app features a built-in Web browser that lets you save video files you find on various sites for playback at a later time. You can queue up multiple videos to play one after another and set a pass-code lock to prevent others from accessing your collection.

Think of the free TuneIn app as being able to turn your iPad into a radio capable of pulling in just about any station from just about anywhere in the world. The service boasts 70,000 live radio-station feeds and 2 million podcasts to choose from.
Previewing e-mailed PDF files is built in to the iPad’s Mail app, but Adobe’s free Reader app includes advanced functions such as annotations, text search, highlighting, online synchronization and the ability to fill out form fields. If you work with PDF files a lot, this one’s a must.

What other apps do you recommend?  Share with us in the comment section below.
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