In a Digital Future, Textbooks Are History, by Tamar Lewin
The article explained how students in Empire High School use computers to do their daily lessons, do work and even review lectures from their teachers. At another high school, students who own their laptops are allowed to register to “digital sections” on several subjects. Beyond Textbook is encouraging teachers to use technology as a way to teach their students the subject they are teaching. Many educators believe that textbooks one day will be replaced by digital versions. Children in these days rely on technology more and depend on digital equipment. By adopting technology into their curriculum, teachers will be able to use more resources then just what the textbook can offer. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger hopes that digital versions of books will replace textbooks, and by having digital versions, it will contain more resources to help students with the subject they are learning. Not only will a digital version help students, but it will also save hundreds of millions of dollars each year. Students already get most of their information off the internet, and by having a digital text it will also save them from carrying textbooks. By using technology as a learning tool, students may learn more on the matter of the subject by creating videos, websites, and PowerPoint. Although it may take awhile for educators and district schools to adapt to the new concept of digital texts, it will happen; digital text is the new future for teachers and students.
As a future teacher, the way digital text would be incorporated in the classroom is by using it as if it was a regular text. Students will have a copy of the text in their computers. They would not have to carry textbooks back and forth or use the excuse that they lost their book. I feel as if they would be able to get more out of it by highlighting, and writing side notes onto their digital text. For a younger group it may be a little more of a challenge in that they would have to be taught how to use a digital text by the parents, and making sure they have a computer available to them. But by using technology in the class, students may learn more and be more interactive with the lesson plan, and the digital text would have extra resources to help the student with the matter of the subject.
The way this fits with NETs for teacher is number 3, as for a student it would be number 5 and 6.
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It was great how this particular school decided to use technology and the Internet to its advantage. Like it was mentioned, the use of digital textbooks not only saves a lot of money, it saves paper and resources. Furthermore, digital teaching material and textbook are much more convenient and (almost) instantly accessible. While there are great advantages to utilizing digital resources, there are a couple of drawbacks. One, not all students, like myself, like to read off a computer screen. When you have an actual textbook at hand, you are not confined to one place. You can read outdoors, indoors, and anywhere in between. Two, working on the computer can lead to distractions. Students may lose focus from the lesson plan or homework assignment by surfing the web or playing computer games. In my opinion, even though there are some drawbacks to digital textbooks, it is important that classrooms become more computer and internet literate.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if I like the idea of everything going digital. I do agree that the learning would be more interactive and that the students would engage more into the lesson. A lot of kids these days feel very comfortable working with computers but some may not have the knowledge like others. This idea of having all textbooks online would be great for the environment and the students wouldn't have to carry their heavy books all over the place. What Empire High School did was very interesting and it definately corresponds with the way the whole world is shifting towards technology; technology really is the future.
ReplyDeleteI also have mixed feelings about making everything digital. My instant reaction was that reading off of computer screens would be incredibly straining to the eyes! Technology like kindle or digital paper has alleviated this problem, but it is expensive and not totally ready for the classroom. Also, it would and could be a distraction to have so many laptops all at once with K-12 students. Another issue is that a digital copy of the book is only available if your computer is functioning...There seem to be a lot of problems so possibly books should come with a digital copy could be used for convenience in addition to the hardback.
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