The Pages app is a really good word processor for students to type up their stories, their writing, or whatever activity they’re doing in class. But as a teacher, it’s also a really good app to provide feedback on that learning, and that’s thanks to an amazing feature called Smart Annotations.

Now, these Smart Annotations differ from perhaps what you’re expecting because not only can you use your Skriva stylus to mark up the text, but if the student makes changes to the document, the annotations move in line with the text so they can always follow what they need to do next.

To get started, I’m going to tap the three dots on the top toolbar and then go on to Smart Annotations. At this point, you’ll get the familiar markup toolbar, but on the right-hand side is a particular tool that works in this mode. Tapping on this new tool lets you toggle between the pen and the highlighter, and of course, you can change the colour and opacity just like the other tools.

When you start annotating your text, maybe there’s a spelling mistake you want to underline, or you just want to provide some written feedback. You can do it on top of the document as if you are using a pen on a normal piece of paper. As I go through this document, I can see that Jacob is obviously struggling with his spellings a little bit here, so perhaps I might want to give him some more input later. But for now, I’m going to give him a little bit of feedback to help develop his writing. I’ll highlight a few words, add some comments, and all that sort of stuff.

At the moment, this looks quite untidy and quite messy, but when I come out of Smart Annotation mode and then give this document back to the student, perhaps I’m AirDropping it back to him or whatever it may be, they can then go in and make changes just like normal. This means when they tap on the text and use the keyboard to start typing, as the new words appear, the annotations will stay attached to the old parts of the text—the old word that was underlined or the old word that was circled.

You’ll see on the screen now, as I’m typing, the annotations are all jiggling around to follow where the text is. When the student has made a change, they can tap on your handwritten annotation, and they can simply delete it as well to clean up that document. These Smart Annotations ensure that your students can make progress in their learning, and for you as the teacher, you can very easily add in-the-moment feedback using your Skriva stylus.