While Apple's iBooks 2 and iBooks Author tool received the main plaudits from their education-focused announcement last week, they also announced an updated version of the iTunes U service. The app is designed to let students access course content from top universities wherever they are.

Institutions like Oxford, Stanford and the Open University are already offering materials via iTunes U, with many more to follow now that Apple have concentrated their iPad for education efforts. The updated app has all the look and feel of paper-based course materials, being organised into digital binders for easy browsing, but interactive elements like video and other apps can also be added and launched from the same interface.

Students can now add notes to the different course elements as they're using them - a feature that's been missing from digital educational tools so far. Courses can also host their own content outside iTunes U and the App Store, meaning course-specific lecture notes, study sheets, and PDFs can be attached to any part of the syllabus, and tutors can also use iBooks Author to create their own documents, then share them inside the iTunes U class binder.

To find out more about using iPads in the classroom, call our Education team on 03332 409 300 or email learning@Jigsaw24.com. You can also keep up with more news about technology in education by following @Jigsaw24Edu on Twitter.

Tags: iTunes U