Best for a school to give to children during lock down?

jago25_98 · 03-23-2022, 12:47 AM

tdlr;
How likely am I to find that PDFs of children's books don't read well on small screen readers due to poor formatting?

I'm thinking of buying a bunch of tablets to hand out to parents for reading at home
because I don't have space for a book cleaner ((my 'school' is 150sq'))

On the one hand, eInk would be popular with parents as a way to reduce LCD screen time.
On the other hand, eInk basically doesn't work with PDF and ALL of the resources I have right now are in PDF format.
Low level example:
https://www.speldsa.org.au/image/cat...the_bus-DS.pdf
Medium level example:
https://downloads.allaboutlearningpr...he-Kitchen.pdf
High level:
(I tried a novel in PDF once and found it was really badly formatted.)

I can have parents bring devices back to be loaded up with new content but I'd rather be able to update it remotely. I found that cheap Chinese devices often kill Syncthing. I also found sending to the kindle email address to be unreliable too.

I can get a cheap Chinese tablet for as little as $30 here but I think what this boils down to is :

How likely am I to find that PDFs of children's books don't read well on small screen readers?

ekbell · 03-23-2022, 01:04 PM

The examples you've given would likely work reasonably well as long as the tablets are up to rendering the PDF's in a reasonable time. For the second example I would recommend using a reading app such as EBookDroid with the ability to split two page spreads.

However I've found many educational PDF's, either ones offered for free or sold through educational sites, that give permission for the purchaser to copy for a classroom are not well suited for small screens as it is assumed that they will be printed as needed.

Scanned copies of Public Domain books can work well if the original book had reasonably small pages.

Although unless you have reason to be confident in the basic quality of the tablets and the willingness to use them, it may be worth considering investing in a decent laser printer and paper to provide them with disposible books.

jago25_98 · 03-25-2022, 12:26 PM

That's what I basically thought for all of the options. That is, I'm not sure what budget I'd need for the spec to read PDFs. I had a $30 big screen tablet that could do it. I still have it but the battery blew up into a spicy pillow. I haven't been able to get a replacement battery for it yet, since I'm can't find a way to fit a new battery without soldering terminals.

Thanks for the eBookDroid tip. I will definitely make use of that on my small screen Hisense A5Pro.

The thing with printing is no so much the cost; we've negated that by retrofitting inkjets with refillable inkwells. Nor the paper either; we have recycling. It's more the effort in putting the thing together and since each read may be less than 10mins for 30 A5 pages... it still seems very wasteful. And of course, someone has to actually come here to collect the print off.

I'm in the same position: nothing really works :/

03-23-2022, 12:47 AM	#1
jago25_98 Zealot Posts: 114 Karma: 3200000 Join Date: Dec 2005 Device: n35 p800 n30	Best for a school to give to children during lock down? tdlr; How likely am I to find that PDFs of children's books don't read well on small screen readers due to poor formatting? I'm thinking of buying a bunch of tablets to hand out to parents for reading at home because I don't have space for a book cleaner ((my 'school' is 150sq')) On the one hand, eInk would be popular with parents as a way to reduce LCD screen time. On the other hand, eInk basically doesn't work with PDF and ALL of the resources I have right now are in PDF format. Low level example: https://www.speldsa.org.au/image/cat...the_bus-DS.pdf Medium level example: https://downloads.allaboutlearningpr...he-Kitchen.pdf High level: (I tried a novel in PDF once and found it was really badly formatted.) I can have parents bring devices back to be loaded up with new content but I'd rather be able to update it remotely. I found that cheap Chinese devices often kill Syncthing. I also found sending to the kindle email address to be unreliable too. I can get a cheap Chinese tablet for as little as $30 here but I think what this boils down to is : How likely am I to find that PDFs of children's books don't read well on small screen readers?

03-23-2022, 01:04 PM	#2
ekbell Guru Posts: 627 Karma: 12345678 Join Date: Jan 2015 Location: Canada Device: none	The examples you've given would likely work reasonably well as long as the tablets are up to rendering the PDF's in a reasonable time. For the second example I would recommend using a reading app such as EBookDroid with the ability to split two page spreads. However I've found many educational PDF's, either ones offered for free or sold through educational sites, that give permission for the purchaser to copy for a classroom are not well suited for small screens as it is assumed that they will be printed as needed. Scanned copies of Public Domain books can work well if the original book had reasonably small pages. Although unless you have reason to be confident in the basic quality of the tablets and the willingness to use them, it may be worth considering investing in a decent laser printer and paper to provide them with disposible books. Last edited by ekbell; 03-23-2022 at 01:13 PM.

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
Tania's School Picnic - A free children's story [Tania Series book 17]	Kanila G	Self-Promotions by Authors and Publishers	0	01-26-2015 11:36 AM
Tania At School - A free children's story [Tania Series book 16]	Kanila G	Self-Promotions by Authors and Publishers	0	12-30-2014 08:31 AM
School Gangsters young adult and children's novel	kuda	Self-Promotions by Authors and Publishers	0	08-16-2012 05:26 PM
Pandigital: We'll give you Android, you give up your warranty	RockdaMan	Android Devices	6	01-12-2011 12:17 AM
Android lock your Edge with a password - all apps lock including Journals	cheyennedonna	enTourage Archive	11	01-03-2011 05:04 PM

03-25-2022, 12:26 PM	#3
jago25_98 Zealot Posts: 114 Karma: 3200000 Join Date: Dec 2005 Device: n35 p800 n30	That's what I basically thought for all of the options. That is, I'm not sure what budget I'd need for the spec to read PDFs. I had a $30 big screen tablet that could do it. I still have it but the battery blew up into a spicy pillow. I haven't been able to get a replacement battery for it yet, since I'm can't find a way to fit a new battery without soldering terminals. Thanks for the eBookDroid tip. I will definitely make use of that on my small screen Hisense A5Pro. The thing with printing is no so much the cost; we've negated that by retrofitting inkjets with refillable inkwells. Nor the paper either; we have recycling. It's more the effort in putting the thing together and since each read may be less than 10mins for 30 A5 pages... it still seems very wasteful. And of course, someone has to actually come here to collect the print off. I'm in the same position: nothing really works :/

Advert