When people talk about getting an ipad + bluetooth keyboard combination, they often get shot down as being unrealistic and extravagant when for a similar cost, you can get a entry model MBA, and be much more productive, as the MBA can do everything an ipad does, and more. Amongst the reasons given is the lack of a trackpad, or alternative to a mouse. I thought this discussion might be interesting enough to merit its own thread, even though I am aware this will probably have been extensively discussed in the past.
What sparked a paradigm shift in my mind were actually my own pupils. I am an elementary school teacher, in a school practising 1-1 computing (each class has a pushcart with enough tablet laptops for every pupil).
My observation of the kids (~8-9 years old) is that they seem to be far more comfortable and at ease using the stylus to manipulate the windows environment. They actually preferred using the handwriting recognition program to write in ms word over typing, and the stylus over the trackpad (or whatever that little rubber point nestled amongst the keyboard is called).
While my own laptop was issued with a touch-screen, I rarely ever used it, opting to fall back on the trackpad which I was more comfortable with. However, what amazed me was when some of my students were using my computer, and I marveled at the ease with which they used the touch-screen interface to navigate the interface. I am now exploring the possibilities more, and this would never have happened were it not for my class.
TL;DR - All I am saying is that today's kids seem far more comfortable interacting with a touch environment. Could it be that we diss an ipad+keyboard setup because it is something we are not familiar with, having been raised in a desktop+keyboard+mouse environment. Might the mouse go the way of the floppy disc drive in say, 10-20 years? Maybe touchscreen computers will see a surge in demand in the future, because that is what the children of today are comfortable with?
So it is not that such a concept does not work, just that it is ahead of its time.
Your thoughts?
What sparked a paradigm shift in my mind were actually my own pupils. I am an elementary school teacher, in a school practising 1-1 computing (each class has a pushcart with enough tablet laptops for every pupil).
My observation of the kids (~8-9 years old) is that they seem to be far more comfortable and at ease using the stylus to manipulate the windows environment. They actually preferred using the handwriting recognition program to write in ms word over typing, and the stylus over the trackpad (or whatever that little rubber point nestled amongst the keyboard is called).
While my own laptop was issued with a touch-screen, I rarely ever used it, opting to fall back on the trackpad which I was more comfortable with. However, what amazed me was when some of my students were using my computer, and I marveled at the ease with which they used the touch-screen interface to navigate the interface. I am now exploring the possibilities more, and this would never have happened were it not for my class.
TL;DR - All I am saying is that today's kids seem far more comfortable interacting with a touch environment. Could it be that we diss an ipad+keyboard setup because it is something we are not familiar with, having been raised in a desktop+keyboard+mouse environment. Might the mouse go the way of the floppy disc drive in say, 10-20 years? Maybe touchscreen computers will see a surge in demand in the future, because that is what the children of today are comfortable with?
So it is not that such a concept does not work, just that it is ahead of its time.
Your thoughts?
