I just shipped my parents my 2016 iPad with cellular with my unlimited T-mobile data plan. I removed all of the unneeded apps, installed all of the streaming apps that either I had a log in to, they had a log in to with their cable subscription, and the free streaming apps. I put both of their email addresses in Mail. I also put Office 365. My mom already has one of my six accounts.

Since I can’t see them because of Covid, I can now Facetime them. It was frustrating talking to my dad since he is losing his hearing. He can understand me a lot better when he can see me and FaceTime audio is much clearer than phone calls.

I bought an iPad Air and a pencil to take notes.

Have you considered earphones for your dad? I only ask because my grandmother was quite hard of hearing before she passed away recently and would often miss a lot of the conversation on FaceTime, but once I bought just some standard EarPods for her iPad, she could hear much better.

Sounds like FaceTime alone is a big improvement over the regular phone, but I thought maybe earphones might be even better.

They won’t go near earphones. They think it will make his hearing worse. Whether that is true or not, that’s a hill I don’t want to die on. iOS has a live listen mode too that will pipe sounds from the iPhone (and maybe iPad?) to AirPods.

Ah, that’s a shame. I wouldn’t be surprised if FaceTime gets closed captions in a future iOS release (with all recognition done on device, of course), which I can see being very useful.

Got my nephew the $329 iPad, and its been great. No major complaints. We initially got him a similarly priced Chromebook, as they’re education targeted, but quickly returned. The Chromebook was unexpectedly sluggish and cumbersome.

Any educational apps you can recommend?