Unbound the Textbook

Over the past two months I have attended a few conferences on the future of education. While I was excited to see the many changes headed our way, one thing bothered me: the burdensome attachment to the textbook. It seems that in education, we can’t get past the notion of the textbook. In its most basic sense, the textbook is a bound product by which a systematic path to education is paved, but isn’t there more in this day and age?

If we want to move forward, we need to look beyond the textbook and instead at the larger concept of course materials. The study of biology is not a biology textbook along with lectures built around the book; it is a set of concepts that are collectively used to demonstrate and explain the basics of life on earth. Why do we need to follow chapters 1-22 in order to master these concepts? We don’t.

The future of education is in front of us, the bound textbook is behind us. Innovative educators need to find a way to determine the concepts they want to teach in class and then find the best resources and methods for doing so, not just going back between text and talk. We know that what is valuable is a multi-pronged approach to education: instruction via a combination of video, lectures, handouts, and classroom activities. So why are we so stuck with following a textbook?

If you know you want to teach the anatomy of a neuron, why not use the video from Khan Acacdemy ? I found more than 2.8 million results when searching for this term “anatomy of a neuron” on Google, including video demos, printouts, Podcasts, study guides, and more. Why are these not considered as valid or important as the printed textbook?

Transitioning to these new techniques will likely be time consuming. These new sources are not academically reviewed like the textbooks used in classrooms today. Embracing (and even creating) the new requires the educator to spend time to personally review the content, choose the applicable parts, and then source and deliver the material. But isn’t this a more personalized experience? Is it too personalized? Surely this is a curriculum issue and we can’t have rogue instructors teaching their own pet ideas, but if there could be some method and review, there is a lot to gain by this less-rigid approach.

We are far from this being a reality but imagine how liberating a textbook-free future. Consider the ease of updates without printing: edition changes would really be nothing more than updates to links and handouts and really good teachers can post their information to share with others.

The Web was created so that people could share information without physical boundaries. Education is precisely the field that should be embracing this and harnessing the power to reach more students and provide them with more information that is more flexible and up to date than a printed text from decades ago.

2012
05/23
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
eBook
Open Source
Resources
SXSWedu
The Move to Digital
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eBook Review: Kindle

Welcome to another Textbook Guru eBook review. We’ve already taken a look at a few other platforms (Chegg, Kno, Inkling, CourseSmart and iBooks) but today we are looking at eTextbooks on the Kindle, from Amazon. Many people think of the Kindle as strictly for fiction books, which has been Amazon’s marketing angle for years. However, the Amazon library boasts an ever increasing collection of eTextbooks ranging from K-12 Chemistry books (like the one I’ve selected) all the way to college level texts.

For this review I’m using a Kindle touch 3G w/special offers which has a 6″ screen and multi-touch interface. The features vary from Kindle to Kindle, most dramatically when you jump to the Kindle Fire which has a full color display but some older models use some sort of physical keyboard for navigation rather than touch screen. The ‘special offers’ model saves you $40 off the purchase price but ‘special offers & sponsored screensavers display on Kindle Touch when you’re not reading.’ Basically you save a bit of money by agreeing to let Amazon sell your screensaver as ad space when you’re not reading.

Features

eInk

The Kindle has made it’s claim to fame on two main features, any time 3G access to the Amazon library of eBooks and it’s revolutionary eInk/ePaper display. While you can’t use your Kindle’s 3G to surf the web, you can use it to download eBooks from the Amazon library from anywhere with cell reception. This feature is included in all Kindles and does not have an extra fee.

The technology behind the Kindle’s display is truly impressive.  The surface of the screen itself actually looks like paper and has no glare or backlight to strain your eyes. The ePaper is backed by a layer of eInk capsules which are black and will either rise up to the ePaper to display black or fall back to display white depending on the electrical charge applied to them. Essentially the display can negatively or positively charge each point on the display to make it show black or grey.

Amazon Library

Whether you’re browsing textbooks or the latest from Oprah’s book club, the Amazon Kindle library boasts over 1 million titles. You have the option to buy or rent your textbooks as long as the rental period is at least 30 days. One thing I like about rentals on the Kindle is that when your rental period is winding down, you’ll get a notification and have the option to do nothing and the book will become unavailable, extend your rental period or you can purchase the book, applying the already charged rental fee towards the total price of the book.

This method of renting seems the most convenient of the platforms I’ve reviewed so far because it is so adaptive to the way students work. For example, it’s hard to say at the start of a term how useful the required book will be or how much the professor will use it. With this method you could start with the 30 day rental and only extend it if you find you are actually using the book enough to justify it. Also, if you get into the class and realize the book isn’t useful, or you drop a class, you have 7 days to return the rental for a full refund.

X-Ray

My favorite feature, X-Ray, was invented by Amazon for the Kindle and is not available in any other eReader. X-Ray is a feature that “Lets customers explore the ‘bones of the book.’” With Xray you can see the definitions of important words, phrases or names and see a visual diagram of every passage that pertains to that word. In textbook this is particularly helpful for understanding core concepts, vocabulary and remembering important people and events. It is also very useful in fiction books, especially those like Game of Thrones or other fantasy novels with hundreds of characters over thousands of pages.

It also works as a sort of heat map for which topics in your book are most important to pay attention to. Like cliff notes of cliff notes, the X-Ray feature lets you see a top level view of what is important in a chapter or section and easily reference all those key vocabulary words you forgot.

Navigation

Being one of the first large market eReaders, the Kindle packs all of the features we assume to be standard across all readers today. Search functionality lets you search the book for terms, search the Kindle Store for related books or search Wikipedia or the Dictionary for definitions.

You also have the ability to highlight words or passages which can be referenced later. Anchoring a note to a selected word or passage is easy, although I found typing on the Kindle to be rather difficult and slow with the ePapers slow refresh rate.

An interesting feature I haven’t seen is the ‘Share’ option which allows you to publish a selected bit of text to your connected social media accounts. This feature is probably not a big hit in textbooks, but I can see how it could be fun to share an interesting passage from a novel you’ve been reading or to brag that you were the first in your book club to finish the book of the month.

One of the hallmarks of the Kindle is how easy it is to read the ePaper display, but it can get even easier (or at least more custom) by adjusting the font settings. The Kindle offers 8 font sizes with #3 being the standard and fitting 100% of the intended words for the page.

Font size #1 fits 160% of the words while font size #8 is so large it will only fit 8% of the words, usually about half a sentence. You can also choose between three type faces, regular, condensed and sans serif depending on your preference. Adjusting spacing is also an option allowing you to choose small/medium/large spacing between lines and between words on each line.

Conclusions

The Kindle has a lot of great things going for it. It has an ePaper display which really does feel like you’re reading paper. It has all the standard functionality you’d expect an eReader to have, allowing you to search, change the text dynamically to your liking and highlighting and note functions for studying. Possibly most important, it has a totally free, always on 3G connection to the vast Amazon eBook library.

However, there are a few ways in which it is lacking. While the ePaper display is easy on the eyes and surprisingly can do great grey-scale images, it is not capable of some of the advanced, interactive features many eTextbooks come with today such as 3D modeling, embedded video, interactive diagrams and so on. It is a hybrid with its two feet firmly planted in the digital and print worlds.

That said, whether or not it will be useful for you boils down to personal preference. If you really love the look and feel of printed books and are skeptical about reading on an iPad for example, the Kindle is a great step in the digital direction. Not to mention your chiropractor will thank you later for not carrying around so many textbooks. On the other hand, if you’re looking for an interactive, digitally connected experience to make your boring paper textbook more interesting, there are other platforms that will serve you better.

2012
05/22
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
eBook
The Move to Digital
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Dog Days of Blogging

Sorry about my brief blogging hiatus. I realized today that I haven’t posted in nearly a month. Boy, time flies! Over the past month I’ve been busy with trips to the ASU conference on Education Innovation and a family trip to Southern California. I look forward to getting back to blogging and sharing industry happenings and my take on them. I am humbled by the almost daily comments I get from people who read my blog and I look forward to sharing more with you as we build to the August back-to-school period.

2012
05/21
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
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International Textbook Editions: It’s all legal until it isn’t.

A decade ago, the term “grey market” referred to electronics being produced or distributed in Asia or the former Soviet Union and sold new (though often without the box or instruction manual) via eBay or another seller vehicle rather than a licensed distributor or the manufacturer.

Grey-market goods were risky in that the product was real, but where it was coming from, how it had been obtained, and why it was so cheap was always a little questionable. There were middlemen, middlemen in other countries and they were not legitimate exporters but they did have the right to sell property that they owned.

Times have changed in the sense that globalism and connectivity have become even bigger, faster, and more powerful. Price comparison is a product in and of itself and a tool that keeps sellers competitive and buyers informed. Sales now take place on mobile devices where people are on the go and not on their computers during business hours. Another big change is that grey-market goods are now as much about intellectual property (in the form of copyrighted material such as books, CDs, and DVDs) as about consumer electronics.

What was once “I got this Canon EOS that retails in the States for close to $4000 from a dude in China for $699” is now “I got this copy of The Godfather Trilogy on Blu-Ray from India for $4 and I don’t care that the UPC or cover art is a little different.” Sounds like a good deal, but is it legal? Ethical? Does the studio that produced The Godfather get paid as it would when a box-set from them is sold? Is the quality the same? Who’s checking? Does anyone pay taxes on the transaction (sales or income)? What’s to stop the seller from just making more copies and selling copies of copies? When does a little smart buying and selling become a business that needs to follow business laws? Where do you draw the line? Can laws be upheld consistently and globally?

With grey market, the answer is “we don’t know, but we’re about to find out” — not because of any cutting-edge gadgets or even the music-piracy threat that record labels so complained of, rather because of textbooks, international editions to be exact (which I think shows just how expensive and valuable these things have gotten).

Yes, it’s textbooks that have taken the issue to the Supreme Court. The case driving the issue being the appeal of Supap Kirtsaeng, a Californian whose family in Thailand “sent him textbooks to resell. He reportedly sold $37,000 worth of John Wiley textbooks in the US. The publisher sued Kirtsaeng for copyright infringement in eight textbooks and won to the tune of $75,000 in damages for each book.” Kirtsaeng is appealing and he “argues that he is protected by the first sale doctrine — a rule that lets copyright owners exercise their right only the first time an individual book or record is sold.”

So yes, what we are about to see this fall when SCotUS takes up the case is a ruling that will determine the legality of selling international textbook editions, but it’s really so much bigger than that as what’s at issue isn’t just some Wiley editions but the idea of owning ideas and words and concepts and how long the creator and producer retain the rights to such. There is no doubt in my mind that while it took textbooks to get this issue before the most-powerful court in the land, the repercussions will be far reaching and they will affect books, movies, music, video games, and items we haven’t even considered as “copyrighted” yet. Ladies and gentlemen, prepare for the words “used” and “ownership” to take on different meanings.

2012
04/18
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
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1000 Educational Apps for Your iPad/iPhone #sxswedu #EdTech #edchat #k12

When I was at SXSWedu last month, I attended a presentation by folks from KinderTown, a company specializing in iOS apps for preschool kids. KinderTown is not a team of developers, instead they bill themselves as “working hard to find the best educational apps for children. Each app we select has been tested and reviewed by educators, parents, and most importantly, children. Not all, or even most of the apps meet our high standards. We take many factors into account including educational value, ease of use, engagement value, design features, artwork, cost, and shelf life.” Their angle is the testing and vetting process and reviews and ratings they provide parents before downloading.

While iTunes has a ton of apps and app developers are a dime a dozen, we all know how frustrating searching and finding quality apps can be and how reviews and ratings can often be misleading or simply too disorganized to be of much help. Yes, “there’s an app for that” and you can “just Google it,” but how much crap (and bias and paid-for placement) do you have to wade through to find real answers and solutions and get to the good stuff? Too much.

So tons of information, an app for everything you could ever imagine (and more), and still not much sense of where to really get what you want and need and find what’s reputable. In terms of educational apps, KinderTown is doing it right for the preschool set. Beyond that, I recommend the work done by the team at The Texas Computer Education Association who have painstakingly listed, categorized, and filtered hundreds of educational apps and even color-coded the downloadable doc so that you can see what is free.

http://www.tcea.org/learn/ipadipod-resources

Enjoy the list and bring on the feedback about your favorite edu-apps!

TCEA-Recommended iPad Apps – Google Docs
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv?key=0AvFbfb1mWoNwdGlweWtkZkFRS1gzUDMtTUtoTEw0MkE

2012
04/02
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
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Interview Series – Rob Reynolds, Ph.D. – Next Is Now

Dr. Rob Reynolds is the Director of Direct Digital, a service of MBS Direct, LLC (a former employer of mine). You can read Rob’s thoughts at his personal blog.

I was first introduced to Rob’s writing with a special report he did called “Digital Textbooks Reaching the Tipping Point in the U.S. Higher Education “.  Expanding on the throughts from this report, Rob authored the book “The Future of Learning Content”  where he explores digital textbooks, open content, Apple and more.

Jeff – Dr. Reynolds, Thank you for your time. I look forward to understanding more about the tipping point for digital textbooks so lets jump right into things. Your research indicates that digital textbook sales will account for about 6% of the market in 2012 and 11% in 2013, to what do you contribute that growth to? Is it more titles being available or more students willing to try the digital format?

Dr. Reynolds – There are a number of trends driving the growth of digital textbooks in Higher Education. The biggest factor is cost. Increasingly, students are looking for lower prices alternatives to new print titles. And, while digital textbooks are not necessarily the cheapest option (used books with some form of guaranteed buyback or the general winner here), digital is a consistently less expensive solution and it is convenient. Another important factor, as you mention, is title availability. Because of issues with rights clearance and a lack of clear market strategy, most large textbook publishers have only recently begun making most of their front list titles available in digital format. Having complete title coverage will certainly hasten the adoption of digital.

Some of the other trends that I discuss in the book include the popularity of tablets and smartphones, a continued increase in online shipping by students, the evolution of e-textbook reader software applications, and the textbook rental market. This last item is actually an important motivation for textbook publishers to make the shift to digital.

Jeff – Many argue that until Digital Books are significantly cheaper than a physical book the market will still push towards print. What do you think is the tipping point in terms of price?

Dr. Reynolds – While cost is a leading factor in consumer behavior around digital textbooks, it is but one of many. We will see the current growth patterns continue for the next several years even with current pricing patterns around print and digital. Now, if the price of digital learning content drops beyond certain thresholds, we will definitely see an uptick int hat growth. And, keep in mind that this price drop may not be (will likely not be) driven by traditional publishers. Low-cost alternative publishers such as Flat World Knowledge, Textbook Media, and Soomo, as well as a growing open textbook catalog, are gaining increasing traction and this sector of the market will grow significantly over the next five years.

Regarding tipping point for price, I think it’s safe to say that $40 will likely become a maximum value for stand-alone textbook products in the future. It is also possible that traditional publishers will adhere to this pricing for many of their core stand-alone textbook products. Of course, their primary interest is in selling fully integrated technology products – e-textbook, assessments, media, adaptive learning programs, and learning outcomes – and redefining a simple textbook as only a part of what instructors and institutions need to be successful. Integrated technology products allow publishers to target the more lucrative enterprise sales market and eliminate both the used and rental markets.

Jeff – You revised your report to show the impact of Apple’s iPad. Is that the game changer that is necessary and will programs such as the iBook publishing suite speed things up even more?

Dr. Reynolds – The iPad is indeed a game changer. This coming fall approximately 22%-25% of all incoming freshmen in 2-year and 4-year institutions will have tablet devices. Most of those will be iPads. Of course, the overall tablet craze will only increase with the release of Google’s low-cost iPad-challenger this summer and Microsoft’s Windows 8 tablets in October.

Regarding the iBooks Author application and other digital publishing platforms such as Inkling Habitat, the ease of production and distribution can only have a positive impact on the growth of digital textbooks. That said, there are two important things to keep in mind. First, writing or constructing textbooks in their current form is a sizable task, even with an intuitive technology platform. Second, and related to the first, I think we will see a pretty dramatic shift towards the disaggregation of textbook content. This will lead us to assign a greater importance to digital authoring tools that facilitate the mashup of disparate content types and sources.

Jeff – Content is still king and even with the growth of Open Education Content the publishers still hold the rights to the content being used in higher education. Is the final battle over content or platform. For our readers content would be the physical content included in a textbook while the platform would be the system used to deliver the digital content such as Chegg Digtial, CourseSmart, Kno, Inkling or Dr. Reynolds platform Direct Digital.

Dr. Reynolds – My experience has been that distribution platforms come and go. I’ve been designing such platforms for reading and learning for more than a decade now and have witnessed this rapid evolution first hand. LMS platforms are changing right before our eyes and digital reading and distribution will continue to evolve as well.

As I discuss in my book, the modern textbook is simply the result of needing a convenient and logical construct for holding collections of learning materials. I don’t think there can be any doubt that this particular construct will also evolve (as will the associated business models). This evolution will champion content, most certainly, but will push publishers and distributors to revenue streams that are driven by services rather than content ownership per se.

Jeff – If you were a student and only had enough money to buy a single electronic device which would you suggest to purchase? An iPad, Android Table, PC, Mac, Kindle or something else? Why?

Dr Reynolds – While I’m not enrolled in a college or university, I am always a student and take online courses all the time. I think the answer depends on what you want to accomplish. If all you really want is a great content consumption device, I think the Kindle Fire is hard to beat. I also can’t wait to see what Google comes up with in the $149-$199 price range. If, however, you are looking for a productivity device, the iPad is hard to beat. It has a better app ecosystem, is more intuitive in its design, and there is a large group of peripheral manufacturers that support the device. I like the concept of the new Galaxy Note smartphone (with its stylus), and think the Windows 8 tablets released this fall will provide great productivity as well.

Jeff – Thank you for your time. I want to share with readers that if they want to read your fully revised report they can find it in Chapter 6 of your book, which they can obtain free here. Reports from past years (2010 and 2011), can be found at here (2010) and here (2011) and respectively. You cover a lot of ground and we only touched on a few small issues. Anything else you would like to add?

Dr Reynolds – I think the most important thing to realize is the rapid change inherent in the textbook industry today and the volatile nature of the overall market. There are some definitive realities we will all be facing over the coming years, but the most certain one is that textbooks as we know them today will have evolved significantly by the end of the current decade. Business models will change and so will some of the major players. Content will continue to matter a great deal but will be more disaggregated and personalized, both for instructors and students.

2012
03/27
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
Open Source
The Move to Digital
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Which e-Book reader should you buy?

I get asked this question a lot.  Since I don’t have the big budget of a major review site I typically just recommend that people go to Best Buy and try them so they can see the difference.   I have been an iPad user since the first generation but never upgraded to v2 or v3.

(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)

When I started working on eBooks I remember my wife telling me that she didn’t believe she would ever be an eBook reader, she just didn’t understand the need for a digtial copy when she could hold a physical book in her had.  Recently we went on a trip and she was reading “The Hunger Games”.  She got so into the book that she finished before our layover was complete, now she didn’t know what to do.  I suggested she go to the bookstore at the airport (that is why they have them their) and get a new one but the book she wanted to read was not in the store.After some reassurance that it can’t be that bad to try it via the iPad she purchased the book.  Needless to say, I didn’t see MY iPad the rest of the trip as she finished that book and one other before we got home.  Now she is a convert, she likes carrying it around instead of a book and the fact that she can just download another book was  a big benefit to her.

Last night she finally realized that she probably needs her own eBook reading device and asked me which one she should get.  So I started with the questions that people always ask me.

  • Do you want a reader or a table?
  • Is Flash important to you?
  • Do you want wifi or 3G/4G
  • Black and white or color?
  • Are Apps important?
  • How big of a screen do you want?

I then suggested that she go to Best Buy and check out the selection! (At least I give my wife the same advice I give others)

Today while doing some more research for her I found this great article that doesn’t just ask the questions, it provides some of the answers as to which reader does what.

Just thought I would share if anyone else is trying to make the same decision.

 

2012
03/22
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
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Ron Reed – Executive Produce SXSWedu (#sxswedu)

As we look back at the SXSWedu conference I wanted to take a second and introduce the Executive Produce and founder of the SXSWedu conference.  Ron Reed is an independent sales and marketing consultant in K-12 publishing and been involved in the educational space since graduating from college.  In 2011 SXSWedu made its debut focusing on innovations in learning. With the 2012 conference recently ending we thought we would catch up with Ron and see how the show went.

Jeff – Thank you for joining me and congrats on a very successful SXSWedu conference. Can you share any statics from this years show?

Ron -  Our attendance grew 250% from our inaugural conference last year, to over 2000 registrants at SXSWedu 2012. Clearly there is a hunger for innovative solutions to the many pressing challenges in efficient, empowered learning. I really appreciated you’re being here, and felt energized about the positive buzz and tremendous enthusiasm at SXSWedu.

Jeff – This years shows was packed with Keynote Speakers, Distinguished Speaker, Concurrent Sessions and the new LAUNCHedu, based on initial feed back which part of the show do you think has gotten the most positive feed back from show-goers.

Ron - Certainly our high quality of speakers throughout the conference was well received. We were very proud of the program. In the post conference survey, which we really encourage our attendees to complete and submit, attendees ranked highly and particularly appreciated the wide variety of concurrent sessions. We take a little different swing at SXSWedu, hoping to engage stakeholders across an array of perspectives, from early childhood to higher education, to career & workforce development. Involving education professionals, entrepreneurs, legislative and policy leaders as well as representatives from business and industry makes for a rich conversation about innovations in learning.

Jeff – Nobody can deny that education is changing and technology will play a big role, What major changes do you foresee in the next 12 – 18 months that will impact they way education is taught to our students?

Ron -  Goodness, I should really defer to our community, who are much closer to the action than I am, but in general I was taken with the interest in open education resources across the spectrum of teaching and learning, from elementary and secondary to post secondary. This is one of the larger disruptions that is driving significant change in traditional teaching, empowering learners and leaders to access and customize resources for specific needs. I was also pleased with the rich discussion surrounding gaming and learning. Good games, by their nature, engage their audience. I’m curious about the appropriate deployment of those engagement strategies to help energize learning, and involve and personalize experiences for learners.

Secretay of Education, Arnie Duncan @ SXSWedu 2012

Jeff – Your show was a great combination of teachers, administrators, professors and tech geeks. I am sure you get a lot of feedback. Anything we can expect next year to make the show even better?

Ron -  We’ve got several ideas…as was the case last year, we dreamed and schemed about new components for the conference, then worked hard to invent and implement. One thing that struck me was the tremendous energy and synergy that resulted from driving a discussion between educators and entrepreneurs. The LAUNCHedu startup competition was very well received. We had a lot of feedback about student entrepreneurs and the merit of shining a light on their ideas. It seems odd to have a conference about learning and not engaging more fully those that are on the receiving end. I look forward to exploring how we can help make that happen in 2013.

Jeff – While I really enjoyed the sessions that you had just sitting around and meeting other show participants was a real highlight. The number of tech companies in attendance who are trying to understand trends and develop products to improve education was truly impressive. Have you considered a tech showcase for all the start ups who want to just demo their products (like a mini tradeshow floor)?

Ron -  Great question! We had a healthy amount of feedback on that point…that above and beyond the sessions, attendees enjoyed the casual conversations and interactions with others who shared their passion, albeit from a different vantage point. In terms of a tech showcase, you echo the request of many others. While I’m interested in addressing that, I’ve been reluctant to do a traditional exhibit or trade show. I tend to think that approach to showcasing vendors tends to diminish dialog at a conference of thought leaders rather than elevating it. But having said that, providing a venue for attendees to see what’s next and new from the invited finalists of LAUNCHedu makes good sense. Stay tuned, and perhaps we can come up with a meaningful opportunity to further drive that discussion about the intersection of education and entrepreneurialism.

Jeff – Anything else you want to add?

Ron -  Just that SXSWedu is really a community-driven conference. We invite the submission of panels and sessions via our PanelPicker intake environment. We’ll open Panel Picker to programming suggestion in mid to late August. After receiving session proposals, we flip the environment so that our community can provide feedback as to what sessions rock or don’t rock, and the community can provide input directly to panel organizers as to what topics and issues they hope the session will address. We really look to our community to help guide and inform what programming content should ultimately be on the program.

Jeff – Thank you for your time. As a participant in your show I can say that it was a good use of my time. I am sure others feel the same way. I look forward to seeing you next year for SXSWedu 2013, March 4-7 in Austin, TX. I encourage all my readers to add this to your show list.

Ron – Thanks so much, Jeff. We look forward to seeing you at SXSWedu next year!

2012
03/21
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
Early Education
SXSWedu
The Move to Digital
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eBook Review: iBook

Here we are, four reviews deep into the Textbook Guru eBook review series. If you’d like to take a look back at my other reviews, you can find them here: Kno, Inkling, CourseSmart, Chegg.  For our fifth review, I’ve chosen to take a look at the iBooks platform by Apple. I’ve chosen this platform for a couple reasons. First, being Apples native eBook reader, it is likely that iBooks is installed on more mobile devices that any other platform we’ve reviewed. Whether or not users are taking advantage of this pre-installed app is hard to say. Second, the iBook platform is the first in our series to allow self publishing. So whether you’re a self publishing author, or just need to have your own documents readily available, iBooks allows you to upload your own PDFs into the app.

PURCHASING

Self publishing is a lot of fun, but lets get down to why we are really here, to review textbooks. If you’ve ever downloaded an app to your iPhone or iPad, or purchased an album on iTunes, then you are already familiar with the purchasing process in the iBooks platform.

Finding and purchasing any book only takes a few clicks (or finger taps). When searching for a textbook, you will usually have an ISBN or the full title an author, which makes searching a breeze. However, if you’re looking for more casual reading, the ‘featured’ and ‘browse’ tabs are a great way to see what kind of books (typically fiction) are popular on iBooks. But we’re after textbooks, so if you sort by category, you’ll find that all the textbooks iBooks has to offer in one place. Many of them you can ‘sample’ by downloading a free chapter to take a preview of the features.

FEATURES

Apple has been a big player in eBooks for a while, a market they grew quickly thanks to the iPad and iPhone apps that help you view all you iBooks on any device.  However, recently they have started getting into the eTextbook market. Studying is probably one of the last things you’d think to use an iPad for but it is increasingly becoming a platform for consuming any and all media, so why should textbooks be separate? Apple touts a lot of exciting eTextbook features that are becoming popular such as 3D models, embedded video and interactive quizzes. Lets dive in and take a look at the iBooks experience from start to finish.

The photo above is your ‘Library’ which is the central place to find all your downloaded books or documents. Foregoing a simple list, Apple has a visually simple and intuitive virtual bookshelf for your digital books. This is a small touch, and isn’t much different than Chegg or Kno which use thumbnails of your book covers as buttons, but having them organized on a bookshelf makes them feel more like real books and less like files to be opened.

Once you open a book, you have a simple and hide-able menu bar at the top of each page that contain all your tools. The first and most obvious tool is the ‘Library’ button which just takes you back to your virtual book shelf. The next is a menu to help you jump from page to page in the book without flipping. This menu lets you skip between chapters in the book and the next menu which looks like a note pad lets you jump between bookmarks and notes that you have set while reading. As simple as this kind of navigation is, I have to say Apple did well to put all these markers in one place as opposed to others that have made notes and bookmarks navigable through their own menus. Apple has also included a traditionally simple bookmark tool that is always accessible in the upper right of any page. Just tap the small greyed bookmark logo and it will be replaced with a bright red bookmark to save your place.


Next on your menu bar is your settings options, indicated by a pair of capital A’s. This pop up menu allows you to adjust the brightness of your screen through a slide bar and the size of the font through two size buttons. Again, a very simple way to do very simple things. Of course, what eBook platform would be complete without a search function? iBooks allows you to search within the text, on the web or directly through Wikipedia. I find it humorous that so many teachers have a vendetta against Wikipedia and it’s use in academia as source material, however so many search tools love to include it as a searchable reference. As controversial as Wikipedia is in the academic community, I think this is proof that it is still a valuable resource for many students.

Next lets look at the more advanced features iBooks has to offer. For starters, iBooks is only the second platform I’ve reviewed to offer 3D modeling in some of its eBooks. It’s hard to see in a still image, but the molecule below is interactive directly in the page, unlike Kno which has to open an overlay window to make models interactive.

iBooks also has embedded video and image slide shows, like in the image below. Figure 1 is an image slideshow containing 4 images (indicated by the dots below the caption). Sliding your finger across the image flips it to the next image. In the next column, Figure 2 is a playable video, a very handy way for eTextbook publishers to emphasize or further explain a complicated theory.

One of my favorite features on iBooks is one I haven’t seen anywhere else, virtual study cards. Similar to the way iBooks displays your library as a bookshelf, it displays study cards as traditional 3″x5″ note cards. These have chapter specific glossery terms on them so you can quiz yourself. Simply define each term then flip the card to see if you got it right. Swiping puts the card at the bottom of the deck and moves on to the next one.

Each section and chapter has a review section to help you remember what you learned. This is nothing new for textbooks, but many iBooks textbooks have interactive quiz questions built into these section reviews. You get to chose an answer for each question and instantly see if your correct or not. The beginning of each section also has study tools to help you generally understand what will be covered in detail in the coming section.

CONCLUSIONS

For the features it offers, iBooks delivers them in Apples traditionally simple yet elegant way. As a general eReader, iBooks is a solid choice and integrates easily into the lives of any iOS device owner. As a study tool for eTextbook users, I think iBooks is a great choice because it is leading the move to digital with many of the most advanced features found in eTextbooks today, but wrapped up in Apple’s intuitive and simple design. The iBooks library of eTextbooks is growing as Apple expands into this market, and chances are many of your textbooks are already available. I think it’s important to note that if you are in a communication or writing field of study, iBooks is likely to have all your assigned novels, biographys, non-fiction etc. This means that iBooks could be your central place not only for textbooks, but other assigned readings (including PDFs your tech savvy professor uploads) and any books you find time to read just for fun.

2012
03/20
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
eBook
The Move to Digital
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Don’t Call It the iPad 3 (#ipad3 #sxswedu #ipad)

Quick comments on Apples announcements from yesterday. That it would be about iPads was no secret, and the expectation was for the iPad 3 that would feature a bulked-up camera and . . . the and was the unknown.

In a move not unlike the last iPhone release when we got the iPhone 4s instead of the expected iPhone 5, what we got today was not the iPad 3, but something called “the new iPad.” And that’s an apt moniker (though hardly seductive and inviting or creative) because this iPad is more third-generation than it is an iPad 3. What I mean by that is that it’s been substantially upgraded and modified, but it’s not a radically new machine.

So what is it and what is it not? Well, it is a lot more like a full-on computer in terms of capabilities, features, power, and memory. Rather, the new iPad is getting closer to approaching (and replacing) a laptop (first stat of the announcement: “More iPads were sold last quarter than any PC maker sold PCs”). The new iPad sees changes in the forms of retina display, 5MP camera with face recognition, faster processor, upped graphics (four times the performance of earlier iPads) and HD processing, 2084 x 1537 display at 264 ppi, and 4G LTE network, and 200,000+ apps that are priced much lower than most software packages.

It’s definitely fair to say that the emphasis of the new iPad is on multimedia. Today was all about creating and sharing and collaborating (all relying on connectivity and iCloud storage) and being the device to power that. This was shown by demos of Garage Band, iMovie, iPhoto, and SketchBook Pro — all audio-visual apps and all with integrated email, Facebook, Twitter, etc. buttons. The increased power and graphics and network speed will also satisfy gamers (The new iPad has more memory and screen resolution than the Xbox and PS3). It’s a multimedia and recreation tablet that is not any sort of productivity machine or eBooks reader (though between iWork and iBooks, it handles both quite well). This is a machine for making fun and having fun with friends and family.

So what about productivity and eBooks? Well, Apple’s made it pretty clear that the iPad 2 fills that niche and that it’s not going anywhere anytime soon, even mentioning the pricing and calling it attractive for the education market.

In a nutshell, the new iPad isn’t a replacement for the iPad 2 so much as a veering off in a different direction and toward a new sort of tablet line for a very different target user. For once, Apple isn’t really making an older version obsolete or phasing it out so much as giving it a sibling. What we have here in iPad 2 is a reliable and down-to-earth older child who always comes through without a lot of flash or power or speed or adventure now being joined by the new iPad, a wild-child sibling with a much more “sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll” attitude.

  • iPad 2 will remain priced starting at $399 and reaching $529.
  • The new iPad starts at $499 and goes up to $829 for maximum storage and connectivity.
2012
03/08
CATEGORY
A Textbook Guru Report
eBook
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