Electronic Text Books

[Andrew Eickstead]

My principal asked me yesterday what I thought about using a Kindle, or other such electronic textbook instead of the typical paper version. Is anybody out there using online or electronic texts, and what do you think about them?

[Rob Jacklin]

At our school, we would definitely be open to using electronic textbooks, but I haven't found any suitable for our middle school....besides that fact that we aren't a 1:1 school yet :-)

Bernard Bull started a wiki with a vision of creating open source textbooks (http://lsostextbooks.wikispaces.com/) . I started the technology curriculum (specifically digital citizenship. Will likely finish after working on a collaborative project with Kathy Maske), but that's as far as it's gotten so far.

If we could all buckle down over a summer or two and contribute, we could put together a really awesome set of digital curriculum without the need for a "textbook." Just a thought!

[Andrew Eickstead]

Rob,

That sounds like a pretty cool project. I would be game to help out with that. I would be interested in throwing together a unit or chapter in the technology curriculum about using Web 2.0 tools like google docs and other such resources.

Thanks for the help. You know anything about Kindle's for this sort of app, or would you lean more toward a laptop or netbook?

[Rob Jacklin]

I would lean more towards a laptop or netbook...truth be told I don't know much about the Kindle. But I would think that you might be limiting yourself with just a single-minded tool like a Kindle when a laptop or netbook could do so much more.

I do need to learn more about eReaders like the Kindle or the Sony product though.

[DBurk]

If you wanted to go the Kindle way, I would just dish out for an iPod touch, you can add the Kindle app and there you go. Plus you can use the iPod for so many more applications and learning. Just a thought.

I have the Kindle App and even bought a book for my Master Class on it. The only drawback beside the size, is there was no page numbers, or I didn't know how to find them, which makes it hard when we are told to read page such and such to such and such.

[bdean]

Rob - Thanks for keeping the idea of the wiki alive. I haven't thought about it for months, but I continue to believe in the idea. It would be great for a team of us to move forward with it.

Regarding use of the Kindle, I have not used it with students yet, but I have been reviewing the different options: Kindle, iPod Touch, Tablet PCs, The Sony Touchscreen Reader, and I just ordered the new Barnes and Noble E-Reader. I need a little more time to review them, but I hope to put together a review on my blog soon.

Here are some initial thoughts:

Kindle
Free cellular connection is great as well as the online storage of all of your purchases. So, if your device breaks, you can always get your books back...and you can share them among several Kindle-enabled devices.
The e-paper really is an impressive technology, completely different from reading on a back lit screen (monitor, iPod, etc.). It truly is a new technology. It isn't a book and it isn't a computer.
The note-taking and highlighting tools are limited.
The text to speech feature is also impressive. It is accurate and provides three speeds. It might work well as a resource for struggling readers, although the pronunciation isn't perfect.
Some schools tried the Kindle and at least one dropped it because you lose page numbers (important for citations in papers) and because of the limited note-taking abilities.
While the Kindle is clearly a tool to get people to buy books from Amazon, you can also transfer PDFs and some other formats of documents through a direct connection or by sending the document via email to an Amazon-provided email address (5 or 10 cent charge per transfer for the email option).
I have both sizes and the larger screen is excellent. The ability to easily switch to a landscape view is great.

Sony Reader - Touch Edition
No internal cell connection until the next version, so you have to plug it into your computer in order to transfer content. It uses an iTunes-like interface.
The next version is also supposed to provide the option of switching fom e-text to a back lit view.
You can purchase books or easily access and download anything from Google Books.
The highlighting and notation abilities are much better than the Kindle, although still a bit quirky in my opinion. I like that you can actually circle and markup a page with the provided stylus.
I don't think Sony offers an option with a screen as large at the Kindle.
The ability to re-size text in a PDF workers much better on the Sony than on the Kindle. I've had problems with the Kindle not allowing me to resize a PDF and that has been frustrating.

Barnes and Noble Nook - I ordered it, but don't have it yet. However, they seem to be doing things right. It includes e-paper, but a color interface at the bottom of the screen.
It has the built in cellular connection. And, whenever you walk into a B&N, it senses it and provides you the ability of full-text access to all of their books on your device (not sure about the educational applications, but it is very cool...down the road, perhaps this features could allow for controlled content sharing depending upon which classroom or building students are in).
Like the Sony Device, this also has a touch screen interface.
This device actually lets you lend a book from your device to a friend! So, you could purchase a limited number of given titles and then circulate them to different students at different times. This really would potentially allow for a check-out sort of format in a school setting.
They claim "thousands of free ebooks", but I need to check this out further.
Like the Kindle, this one boasts of great tools for quickly looking up definitions of words while you are reading (another neat applications for students...and myself).

I know that Dr. Val Keiper, one of our education profs, just ordered a Sony Reader and Kindle in order to let the undergraduates begin to experiment with them as teaching and learning devices. Perhaps that first class will also do a little research for us and share their discoveries. And, I'll try to post more about what I've found regarding educational uses. I'll try to remember to drop a line in Twitter once I start blogging about it.

I look forward to ideas from the group here, also.

[bdean]

By the way, I forgot to note a major limitation with most of the e-readers right now. Given the B&W epaper, use of color pictures is not possible, and more detailed graphics are limited. In a time when I think it is especially important for us to teach concepts through visuals, I see that is a significant limitation, one big enough to keep me from using it in place of textbooks (use of visuals is one thing that the textbooks companies are doing well, in my opinion). However, I can see great uses as part of a reading curriculum.

For digital replacements of textbooks as learning resources, I'm still more interested in web-based sources and back lit technologies that allow us to not only usual color and visuals, but even have integrated multimedia...not to mention the ability to have embedded collaboration options and the ability for a team to continually update the resource.