The best thing about the Particle Client (CLI) is that you can get easy serial println information for testing your code. Most example programs use serial.println("Something Really Important"); Unfortunately in a school setting the computers tend to be locked down and installing software can range from supper easy (Chrome) to ridiculously difficult since the computer PATH is normally out of reach. You can always wait for a tech to install the software for you (Still waiting for them to install this new browser called Netscape 
), but then you have little ability to tweak it or update the software.
My solution has always been to flash code that communicates using the D7 LED, but as my abilities get better, I am finding that a serial connection would be better.
One of my students was loading an example arduino code on a Mega and it used an Android App to read the serial output. That made me think how much more useful that would be in the classroom setting. So I made this Thread
And then I thought wouldn't it be great to be able to control the photon over Wifi and over a connected Android App. So later on in the above thread I got that going at USB Android Serial - #4 by rocksetta the github site is at
I need to tidy up that github site and hopefully will not break it. It uses phonegap to convert a normal webpage into an Android AppI uses the online cloud9 to fully set up a development workspace with the Android-SDK.