Computers are only a tool, one of many to help learning. Computers ARE NOT critical for learning. Computer are however, critical in the real world, so it is critical for them to know how to use them.
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Publisher Touts 20-Point Boost in Student Performance with Textbooks for iPad
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Computers are only a tool, one of many to help learning. Computers ARE NOT critical for learning. Computer are however, critical in the real world, so it is critical for them to know how to use them.
More than twenty years ago I advocated giving public high school students a notebook when they entered school. If they graduated, they would keep the machine if they desired to keep it. Then they would have no excuse for not being able to type a report or paper or otherwise do a homework assignment.
When Kindle was first announced - and especially when the larger Kindle was released, I thought it would be great that students would no longer have to be tortured by carrying around a book bag with thirty pounds of books. Textbooks have to be revised periodically, and paper and printing are expensive. Electronic textbooks would solve that problem, making it something that could be updated any time. Those who resent electronic textbooks because they cannot underline or highlight passages or turn down pages are just unrealistic and uninformed.
As a new experience, using electronic textbooks will involve students. But that is not the reason electronic textbooks will / should be adopted.
When Kindle was first announced - and especially when the larger Kindle was released, I thought it would be great that students would no longer have to be tortured by carrying around a book bag with thirty pounds of books. Textbooks have to be revised periodically, and paper and printing are expensive. Electronic textbooks would solve that problem, making it something that could be updated any time. Those who resent electronic textbooks because they cannot underline or highlight passages or turn down pages are just unrealistic and uninformed.
As a new experience, using electronic textbooks will involve students. But that is not the reason electronic textbooks will / should be adopted.
In a hundred years everyone will be uploading the complete works of Shakespere to their brains via a Matrix-type link. It will be called the iLink system
NOT! That would not be useful for everyone.
However, the information on how to recognize edible plants or how to build an electronic power supply or how to get potable water from water that comes from a mountain stream, that would be the type of information that one would benefit from having instilled in his brain.
I gotta call BS on this one. Other studies have been done and have shown kids install games, watch videos, etc. on their iPads and don't study. What's wrong with a book (other than cost)? How long do the schools expect iPads to last before getting destroyed/stolen by other kids?
Let's focus on accurate textbooks (e.g. some states have tried to skew history via new textbook "revisions") and make kids study and learn. Eye candy and technology won't help.
Let's focus on accurate textbooks (e.g. some states have tried to skew history via new textbook "revisions") and make kids study and learn. Eye candy and technology won't help.
I totally agree. There are two purposes to school, especially at the middle-school level. One is to learn content: reading, writing, literature, mathematics, basic history, etc.
But the other and perhaps more important thing is to learn how to learn. Part of learning how to learn is to gain the ability to read and interpret dense text. Software programs like these sometimes aid in teaching particular concepts to learners, but they weaken their ability to learn, because they train the user to only learn when the content is entertaining, interactive, etc. That's not necessarily a good thing.
And so we have a generation of people for who email has become too unwieldy -- they now communicate in 140-byte collections of abbreviated words without much syntax.
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It's not the states themselves, but the state adoption committees that force changes in textbook content to skew to their own political perceptions. These adoption committees exist in about half the states, mostly in the south and west, including Texas, Florida and California, who are the three largest buyers of textbooks.
One question is whether these iTextbooks are considered core curriculum or ancillary materials. If they are ancillary, they could fall outside the province of the adoption committees and theoretically, would not have to respond to their edicts. However, if all a publisher does is repurpose a textbook without changing its content, the book might already incorporate these biases.