The Kindle e-Reader is an electronic device that can store 3500 books, articles and documents downloaded from Amazon website. Tim Wilson, director of Student Activities at College of Education, Seattle University is planning to store study materials in e-book format into Kindle Readers for students of his class.
Upto five graduate student volunteers from Wilson’s class will test the device during the entire quarter. The university, faculty and students hope to learn from the trial and determine whether future courses can be offered with electronic readers.
The Kindle readers, available from Amazon, cost $489 each and are not exactly cheap. However, if enough text books are available in e-book format, students can save money in the long term as e-books cost significantly less than paper text books. Then, of course, there is the prospect of replacing the heavy school bag with a compact device.
On the other hand, students will have to learn new skills for using the device. Taking notes, for example, is more complicated than adding them to the margin of a book using a pen.
Seattle U has been trying out modern technology in teaching. Classes are offered both on-line over the Web and in classrooms. Wilson corrects his students’ papers electronically via e-mail and uses podcasts in a project.
Read the story at su-spectator.
Tags: electronic learning, electronic reader, kindle e-reader
