You have nothing to fear but technology …
Even though I am a technology boob, I continue to be fascinated it.
A few months ago I wrote about how Cincinnati tried and ditched the idea of using Kindle’s for City Council materials.
Now it is St. Petersburg’s Clearwater high school that is pushing the technology envelope.
Here’s one way to lighten a student’s backpack: say goodbye to textbooks.
Clearwater High School next year will replace traditional textbooks with e-readers. The gadgets will be fully loaded with all the textbooks students need, minus paper.
Besides offering an electronic format to read books, newspapers and magazines, the Kindle allows users to get word definitions, bookmark pages, highlight text and type notes they might otherwise scribble in the margins of a hard-bound book.
It also offers limited Internet access via a free 3G network. Students will be required to sign an agreement stating they will not use it to access inappropriate websites. The Kindle boasts a rechargeable battery life of one week when the wireless is turned on, two weeks when it isn’t. Additionally, it has the capability to convert text to voice so that users can listen to the books.
Clearwater is prepared to spend about $600,000, Just said. That’s money allocated to the school for technology and classroom materials over six years. But the district has agreed to juggle grants to help the school borrow the money from the district in advance.
What about those people not ready to go high-tech? Every class will have hard copy textbooks on hand.
But even a self-described “dinosaur” such as Kathy Biddle, who has been teaching more than 31 years, said she’s excited about how it might enhance her world history and sociology classes.
“I think it’s the way kids are thinking today,” Biddle said.
I hope this works out for them.
This entry was posted on Friday, June 4th, 2010 at 3:26 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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June 4th, 2010 at 7:00 am
This makes so much more sense then having to replace Text books every few years. You can bet someone, somewhere will prevent their textbooks from being downloaded. Lawsuits wil fly or the price to put the textbook on the e-reader will skyrocket. So much for a good idea!