Many of my colleagues know that I have a keen interest in most things technology-related and that at times, I am hard pressed to contain my enthusiasm. See, I have a history of early adoption related to gadgets and devices, from the first car-based GPS systems to cell phones.
I recall the first vehicle I ever bought that had a GPS system. I drove quite a few miles that first evening, marveling how the little dot on the map tracked my location, despite the fact that entering an address was akin to calculus.
I recall standing in line to get an iPhone (never again for anything), despite the fact that it was incompatible with my email and calendaring system. I had to have the first (very temperamental) electronic book reader, a Rocket Book in 1998.
I’ve had a laptop of one kind or another since 1992 and fooled with tablet computers in several different incarnations. Kindle? Check. A netbook? Check. Windows, OSX, Linux, Chrome OS? Check, check, check.
It is with this confession in mind that I have purposely held off writing overtly about technology in this space. My credibility is questionable, given my predilection, but tempered at the same time. I've played with a lot of technology and understand a bit about limitations and relative useful (or uselessness) in this arena.
Nonetheless, it will likely be difficult for me to convince you that of a couple of things:
- I have never been a big fan of Apple Computers.
- I have no financial interests in any of the products or companies I am going to talk about.
- There is no “refer-a-friend” program that I am secretly pushing.
With some trepidation, I’m going to propound, extol, and pontificate about a technology that I think has already significantly altered the way we, as educators, think about what we do.
Yeah, it’s the iPad that I’m talking about.
Actually, it isn't just the iPad, but all the tablet-like devices that are coming into their own. I think the concept is a game-changer, whether it is Apple’s version, and Android device, or whatever Microsoft comes up with, it makes little difference. I’m interested in the concept rather than the specific technology. So, as you continue reading, try to put your specific platform-bias aside in favor of the larger concept.
However, since the iPad is at the top of the heap and it is the device that I am most familiar, let’s consider it as a proxy for the whole class of similar devices. Think about the idea and the potential.
To begin with, you will find that the most common assessment of this genre is that people do not really need the iPad. It isn’t a laptop. It isn’t a cell phone. It doesn’t fit.
You can find plenty of websites that tell you how lame, closed, or expensive it is. It is also easy to jump on a bandwagon either for or against today’s version of the iPad. But what is irrefutable are the numbers.
Worldwide iPad sales are expected to amount to 7.1 million units in 2010. Sales will double to 14.4 million in 2011 and nearly triple to 20.1 million in 2012. In addition, there are there are at least 300,000 third-party applications officially available on the App Store, as of October 20, 2010, with over 7 billion total downloads. Some of them are stupid, useless, or merely front-ends to existing websites packaged differently. But, a whole lot of them are not.
The obvious needs to be stated:
Obviously, there are lots of helpful apps to tour you around, show you where the closest restaurants are and the cheapest bed and breakfasts, the best bargains, the plane and train schedules in major cities, GPS aware maps, places and people to avoid, and audio and video entertainment, and access to email, calendars, and most of the web (save Flash).
The iPad is a great travel companion and time waster. If you have ever played Angry Birds, you know exactly what I mean. Of course, there is more. Along with the tripe came some big leaps. AutoCAD was made available for Apple devices and the iPad became a lightweight presentation tool to demo short architectural perspectives. Structural engineering students do basic drafts using the iPad. Huge manufacturers and warehouses use of the iPad’s lightweight features and touch screen capability to do inventories and audits of stocks and supplies.
What about our classrooms? Well, I’m tempted and torn at the same time. I’m tempted to say that the iPad (or another lightweight, connected, touchscreen interface) has the potential to really change how we teach, or at the very least, how we use instructional materials. But we have heard that all before, several times, in fact.
I think the biggest potential is in textbooks -- more accurately, what textbooks used to be.
Champaign-Urbana is no stranger to the ebook concept. The first successful effort to assemble a body of downloadable ebooks was started by Michael hart at UIUC in 1971 under the name Project Gutenberg. Hart was able to aggregate over 10,000 public domain work and make them freely available to all.
Today, there are over 33,000 books, formatted to work on your Kindle, Sony Reader, iPhone, Android, or iPad. There are another 100,000 free ebooks available via "partners, affiliates, and resources". Check out the catalog.
Academic publishers in particular are eyeing this class of device with great interest. One in particular has my attention and is named Inkling.
“Inkling brings the world’s best content to iPad with interactivity, social collaboration and simple ease-of-use. No more heavy, expensive textbooks to carry around campus. Inkling textbooks are more interactive, more flexible and cheaper.”
Today, the iPad is a bit hamstrung by a lack of available titles. Some textbook publishers have thrown their weight behind the format, but the available library is still only a small percentage of a college student's required course materials. Inkling offers on 20 or so titles.
One feature of Inkling that should not be overlooked is the ability to purchase single chapters. Some classes required more than one textbook, with significant overlap, because the professor believes one book handles a topic better than the other. The ability for a professor to create a “course package” would stellar.
Several publishers are already on board to make their books available for the iPad, including McGraw-Hill. Even more interesting is a move by several universities to put an iPad in the hands of all their students. Read the Wired article here.
The iPad adoption rate among college students won't see a spike until textbook companies open up their back catalogues for a conversion to digital format. In the meantime, the burgeoning new (and FREE) Wiki textbooks may be useful.
Obviously, the proof will be in the proverbial pudding -- the market will determine the future of these devices. Certainly, in a few years’ time, the portable digital readers will greatly come down in price, the types of materials available will be abundant and the nature of university texts will totally change. Android tablets based on Google's OS are coming out as low as $150.
It may be that the iPad and its family members are just the predecessor to some future class or conception of a device that is yet to come. Ultimately, academics need a device they can quickly and easily port information in and out of and the more open and inter-operable our new ecology of applications, devices, and content providers are, the better off our students will be.
The iPad, or some device like it deserves to become an important part of the academic’s arsenal of gadgets.
Thoughts?
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Let's try again - the 1st post didn't go through....
ReplyDeleteFor those who want a good laugh, take a look at the stuff I came up on - Kaypro IIs and Tandy TRS-80s!!!!:) (http://oldcomputers.net/trs80i.html)
My students can't relate to my statements about my freshman physics classes and having to type out DATA CARDS and feed them into the computer to enter data (which was stored on tape reels:) You would then start the computations - go have lunch - and hope things were done by the time you returned. My-oh-my, the times they are a changing! Now I have to worry about whether or not I'm a "thin client", or if I want to use "cloud storage". - jm
PS - FWIW, I still have my slide rule!!!!!:)
My husband is a nursing student, and it would be wonderful if he could access all of his textbooks through a tablet. Not having to stress about having the right books for class that day, or being able to take them anywhere when he has some downtime to study, would be great. And, hopefully, this would lower the cost as well. Having PDF's of all his handouts would be helpful too, and save paper.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the apps and GPS, has there ever been any talk of making a Parkland GPS app, helping students navigate the halls, make a note of which lot they parked in, which door they came through?
If students will not read anything longer than a Twitter feed (140 characters), how will downloading textbooks on Inkling or some such other application help us convey what they need to know?
ReplyDeleteIn addition, even when students read, many seem unable to critically comprehend what they have read. Perhaps joining forces with high schools and constructively collaborating to use technologies in order to assist future college students may be a far more fruitful jumping-off point rather than waiting on textbook publishers to come up with the next big thing to save their profit margins.
There are some real hazards, though, when one arm of technology doesn't know what the other hand is doing.
ReplyDeleteA student went to the bookstore site to look up her books, since she'd had no luck finding out in person. (I don't know exactly how she asked.) She found the course and section, and two books were listed as 'required' -- $62 for the first, no used option, $120 for the second (but a little cheaper used).
However, underneath, it said "Recommended" for "ebook." NO title. That was free.
And underneath that was a book with the same title and author as the 120 dollar book, as 'ebook' or some other version of that, for about half price. That was, I think, "Optional."
Do what now? What does "required" mean? I told her that I suspected that she could get both "required" books as ebooks, but that yes, she'd have to figure out whether she could use her technology to read them, but ... that she should contact the teacher. She really did want to avoid those eternal lines, but that may not be an option.
John - thin client AND cloud computing. Luddite...yeah right. :)
ReplyDeleteSarah - The accuracy of GPS inside the main campus would be quite challenging. Some areas, it's tough to get a cell signal at all. And, who isn't in favor of lighter backpacks?
Anonymous - Come on...they will read. Although it might not seem like it, the are probably reading more in total per day than peers did 20 years ago. Now, quality of what is being read is another story...
Sue - thanks for pointing this out. I'll talk with some folks about the confusion.
Reference: "...quality of what is being read is another story." My point exactly. If our job is to help prepare students to be the best so that they can perform academically and also, become the best in the professional careers for local and other employers, the quality of what they read is just as important and perhaps even more important than the tools used to convey information. Sorry to sound so cynical, but when I watch television and see that even the chyron operators creating the crawl across the screen do not care enough to run Spell-Check, I have to wonder if we are pushing quality as much as we are new technologies. What we "produce" reflects who we are. And I have to disagree with the amount read. Even if we were able to total up the amount of twitters, texts, etc., students read, I doubt seriously that they would amount to what college students read 20, 10, or even 5 years ago.
ReplyDeleteWhy? The brevity of these forms of communication seems to have created technological ADD in our classrooms and other venues. Don't take my word for it. Ask others to include academic advisors, enrollment staff, etc. Many, not all, but many students seem to possess a clicker/push-button response to their readings, homework, etc. If we don't respond quickly enough, then some become impatient and downright rude.
On the other hand, we do have students who are well-read and who possess great personalities. I just think we have to become more cautious about creating a technological environment where one size really does not fit all.
Part of suggesting collaboration with high schools or perhaps even middle schools through K-20 joint venture may help to decrease the percentage of students who become highly upset when they enter our doors and find they have to take remedial courses.
FYI, Parkland Library has an iPad available to Parkland faculty and staff. Check it out for a test run and see if you like it. Contact us at library@parkland.edu.
ReplyDelete>> John - thin client AND cloud computing. Luddite...yeah right. :)<< - from Dr. Ramage.
ReplyDelete1) "To know your enemy, you must become your enemy." - Sun Tsu
2) "I said I didn't have much use for one. Didn't say I didn't know how to use it." - a quote from Mathew Quigley (Tom Selleck) in one of the greatest contemporary westerns - Quigley Down Under.
Cheers! - jm
Why limit the possibilities to simply ebooks. I think that the iPad could completely transform my classroom. Yes, the textbooks could be on them, but they can also access readings on Angel easily in the classroom. They can use them as clickers. They could attach probes and collect real-time data for a week, then send the data to the classroom computer where we can analyze everything in a minute or two. They can search websites, call the companies in class to ask their questions, and put up YouTube videos of their thoughts on climate change.
ReplyDeleteAll of this could be done in the classroom, and I think I could more easily guide them, showing them how to instantly connect their addictions to quick technology with critical thinking and resource use.
Please stop making me want an iPad. I resolved in the new year to stop wanting so much new technology!
ReplyDelete