U of Washington Study: Kindle DX not quite there as a replacement for textbooks

[RockdaMan]

Might never be.

Here are the findings:

"There is no e-reader that supports what we found these students doing," first author Alex Thayer, a UW doctoral student in design and engineering, said in a release. "It remains to be seen how to design one. It's a great space to get in to, there's a lot of opportunity."

Seven months into the study, more than 60 percent of the students had stopped using their Kindle regularly for academic reading -- and these were computer science students, who are presumably more sympathetic to an electronic book.

Why?

With paper, three quarters of students marked up texts as they read. This included highlighting key passages, underlining, drawing pictures and writing notes in margins.

-- A drawback of the Kindle DX was the difficulty of switching between reading techniques, such as skimming an article's illustrations or references just before reading the complete text. Students frequently made such switches as they read course material.

-- The digital text also disrupted a technique called cognitive mapping, in which readers used physical cues, such as the location on the page and the position in the book to find a section of text or even to help retain and recall the information they had read.

Sounds like a combination of dead-tree books and tablets/slates/e-readers is the best combination.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm...ents_uw_s.html

[Barty]

We need more studies like these. It's amazing how many k-12 schools jump on the bandwagon and hand out iPads willy nilly without exact ideas of what the students should use them for.

[GeoffC]

It's a bit like the idea that PCs will reduce the amount of paper being printed - it didn't happen.

[Nexutix]

Originally Posted by GeoffC

It's a bit like the idea that PCs will reduce the amount of paper being printed - it didn't happen.

That's pretty much true in case of students. PCs(and Internet) just increased the flow with which information flows across society. Not much to dig-in for students as replacements/alternative to textbooks.

[thrawn_aj]

Nice article. I would have to (reluctantly) agree. I had great hopes for ereaders but after using them for over 7 years now, I find them useful only for essentially linear reading (which I still do a lot of, so they are greatly useful for me in that respect). However, textbooks (or other serious nonfiction reading) are something I never have any luck with no matter what new ereader I switch to in the course of time .

Having said that, it is nice to have a searchable PDF available for when you just want to find something, so reference books are particularly useful on ereaders.

[FF2]

Interesting observations.

I found this very true of the only hiking guide I downloaded. It just does not work the way my paper hiking guides work. Leafing back and forth to compare hikes, data pictures.

And I recall when I did read textbooks (law school) the observation of recalling which side of the double-leaf something appeared on or even the context of a paragraph were retained making it easy to re-find the info I KNEW was there somewhere.

Same even with paging through a magazine where I know I saw "IT" and can almost "taste" its location on some page. Back and forth - and there IT is. Can't do that with ebooks. But maybe that is the result of how us oldsters read/think and the young-ens will be better at this.

I think reading literature (plays, poems (if structured correctly), novels, etc) work well. FACTS, charts, data - maybe not so much.

[dreams]

I wondered what a study's results would show. I was always taught to preread a text before a first assignment.

Open text and check out how it is sectioned and the chapter title divisions below that. Then check out the back of the text for conversion tables, index, glossery, etc.. Some texts even had the glossary in two languages.

Next was to open to the assigned chapter and read the intro and the ending summary. Read the bolded chapter sections, the side notes, and bolded words. Then check all the tables/charts, pictures, and the text attached to them.

Finally, start reading the text chapter assignment. At this point is where I do my mark up.

I remember information for reference by where I recall I saw it. Top of page, bottom of page, left side, right side, by this picture or that chart, etc.

Even now, I can pick up a text and recall where to find something by where I remember seeing it in relation to what was around it.

I wonder if this is something related to how our generation became accustomed to learning and future generations will be brought up to learn to gather and recall information differently?

[kjk]

Oklahoma State University seems to be having better luck with the iPad:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-20059325-17.html

According to OSU, it found that student expenses went down in the classes featuring iPads, since students were able to use cheaper electronic textbooks, rather than hard copies. Moreover, the university found that if all the students' textbooks were available electronically, they could save enough over two semesters to cover the cost of buying the iPad, which retails for between $499 and $829, depending upon storage requirements and connectivity options.

Students also benefited greatly from Apple's App Store, OSU found. They were able to find "thousands of educational software possibilities" in the App Store to help complement Web-based tools they employed. Students also used Apple's tablet as a "substitute for paper and pen."

[RainingLemur]

Originally Posted by kjk

Oklahoma State University seems to be having better luck with the iPad:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-20059325-17.html

I would imagine that something that's a little more..."interactive" would be a better route for academic applications. This would make the iPad (or some other full-featured "tablet") a very good alternative to paying heaps of cash for text books. Of course, one would hope that the cost of the e-textbook wouldn't be tremendously high (which I've seen at a couple schools, unfortunately), making the conversion more welcome. If I saw the hard copy of a text book cost $200, and the ebook equivalent was $150~, I'd probably just fork out the dough for the hard copy knowing I can re-sell it later and come out almost even.

[Andrew H.]

I'm a little skeptical of the OSU study - it seemed to focus on the possible cost savings, and didn't really delve into the issue of whether using the e-textbooks was as good as using physical textbooks.

Similarly, the fact that the students may benefit by using educational apps (although I would like more detail on this), or the fact that students may benefit generally from having an iPad, is not the same as saying that e-textbooks on an ipad are as good as physical textbooks.

[thrawn_aj]

Originally Posted by dreams

I remember information for reference by where I recall I saw it. Top of page, bottom of page, left side, right side, by this picture or that chart, etc.

Even now, I can pick up a text and recall where to find something by where I remember seeing it in relation to what was around it.

I wonder if this is something related to how our generation became accustomed to learning and future generations will be brought up to learn to gather and recall information differently?

That's interesting. I would doubt it, based on what I recall from Ellard's book about how human beings navigate. We seem to be built around some very uniform principles (landmarks vs. turn-based nav for example) that leads me to suspect that our ways of finding our place in a book may be quite slow to change. OP's article seems to bear this out. Of course, I have no idea how slow this transition may be.

Perhaps you are right and web 2.0 has been busy preparing the next generation (and even this one for that matter) to use keyword-based navigation (in the sense of "marking" passages or lines using keywords instead of their place in the physical book). Keyword-based bookmarking (I haven't seen this yet - just thinking out loud) may be a nice way to "find your place" in ebooks.

[Soldim]

Originally Posted by dreams

I was always taught to preread a text before a first assignment.

Heh, I was told the same, but never did

Now, I am telling students to pre-read; I've never had positive proof of a single one doing it Great to hear there's some saint-like people around

[MrsJoseph]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

I'm a little skeptical of the OSU study - it seemed to focus on the possible cost savings, and didn't really delve into the issue of whether using the e-textbooks was as good as using physical textbooks.

Similarly, the fact that the students may benefit by using educational apps (although I would like more detail on this), or the fact that students may benefit generally from having an iPad, is not the same as saying that e-textbooks on an ipad are as good as physical textbooks.

I agree. The previous study by the OP showed that the school was looking at how the students studied and their usage regarding classwork. This one seemed to be more focused on price as well as access to additional helping applications.

[dreams]

Originally Posted by thrawn_aj

That's interesting. I would doubt it, based on what I recall from Ellard's book about how human beings navigate. We seem to be built around some very uniform principles (landmarks vs. turn-based nav for example) that leads me to suspect that our ways of finding our place in a book may be quite slow to change. OP's article seems to bear this out. Of course, I have no idea how slow this transition may be.

Perhaps you are right and web 2.0 has been busy preparing the next generation (and even this one for that matter) to use keyword-based navigation (in the sense of "marking" passages or lines using keywords instead of their place in the physical book). Keyword-based bookmarking (I haven't seen this yet - just thinking out loud) may be a nice way to "find your place" in ebooks.

What an interesting sounding book, "You Are Here: Why We Can Find Our Way to the Moon, but Get Lost in the Mall", thank you. It was fun to read some of the listed tidbits on that page:
# Food-storing birds can remember the hidden locations of about 80,000 food stashes in a single fall season.
# The wood mouse actually makes its own direction signs by leaving twigs at important decision points on its travels.

It will be interesting to see if or how the next generations do change how they learn.

Originally Posted by Soldim

Heh, I was told the same, but never did

Now, I am telling students to pre-read; I've never had positive proof of a single one doing it Great to hear there's some saint-like people around

Not so much saint-like as a survival skill that was learned just to understand. Plus, having teacher/professors that would add test questions based on side notes, end notes, and the text under charts/tables or pictures.

[Anthem]

Oh yeah, I miss the "cognitive mapping" bit like crazy with e-books. In my mind I just have cascading sheets of text without any physical anchors or landmarks. Kinda depressing. Like thrawn_aj above, I believe basic story book linear/planar reading is the type of reading that e-readers do best.