iPad vs everything else…

I know, it doesn’t seem fair, but it is what it is. The ipad, right now, is the main game in town (wow – I just can’t stop with the game references). Why? It has the e-reader plus more. I am a recent user of an ipad 2, and a veteran user of a Kobo. I have the first gen Kobo. It was cheap, and as it turns out, it was cheap. It froze after a few months and I had to send it away and get it fixed. There were also a couple of weird updates where you had to push some buttons in succession, and then poke a paperclip into a hole. Strange. Also, the pause to get to the next page is annoying.

That being said, my dad is a Kobo lover. Being cheap and an avid reader, he bought the Kobo and has been working his way through all the free books available. He just google+’d that he has finished A Tale of Two Cities. My sister-in-law is a Kindle nut, my brother is an ipad-er along with my husband. My husband loves his ipad for reading comics and graphic novels. I have to admit, its the first time I’ve actually enjoyed reading comics. The technology improves it in my opinion. You can choose to view one frame at a time (which I find less confusing) and you can enlarge and turn pages by tapping and moving your fingers in weird, Minority-Report-style ways. The ipad can also be used for a whole bunch of other stuff, most of which can be used to support educational goals, so it seems to be the most promising model at this point. Add to that the icloud support that allows access across devices, and it becomes even more alluring.

Now that most new textbooks are available in digital formats, how long will it take before we see MOST students with a tablet? I predict widespread use within a year or two. When we start factoring in software that can help with reading – increasing font size, highlighting key words for pre-reading, hyperlinking to definitions – and hyperlinking to supporting content, communication tools, web 2.0 capabilities, the possibilities are seemingly endless, or at least not easily predictable at this point. The app market is hot. The possibilities in providing supports within students’ devices points to lots of emerging ventures. With e-readers and tablets, it is easier to see how we will move towards personalized learning. I know, I’m blending more than one topic – sorry. But its exciting, and they fit together. I also don’t see how anyone is going to invest in a gadget that is just for reading when you can get so much more for so little more.

Emily

Posted in: Week 06: eBooks