Is Apple providing another game changer with their e-textbook initiative? Or is it another example of so-called technological 'solutions' directed at the wrong problems?

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Posted by Rob Walsh, community karma 1466

Today, Apple had their first big post Steve Jobs announcement. It had to do with one of Steve's last passions, that of improving the textbook industry.

Apple has announced electronic textbooks (with the cooperation of some major publishers) as well as the ability for anyone to make ebooks (that are sold in the iBookstore) and with greater control over content, layout, and rich media.

I had an interesting discussion about this with some colleagues who presented some reasons why this initiative is misguided. For instance, none of these tools necessarily do things to affect students being inspired to learn. Also, none of these tools necessarily encourage teachers to learn how to make the rich media to intersperse within a textbook. Additionally, iPads aren't even accessible to poorer students. Finally, we've had 'educational cd-roms' for years - and who ever cared about those things?

On the other hand, my opinion is that Apple is doing things to level the playing field regarding content production. For instance, one of my dreams is to teach a philosophy course for underprivileged youth. If I could say, create my own course reader I could make original animations describing things like Hegel's dialectic that may help a group of students understand the content more easily. But on the other hand, underprivileged youth would likely not have access to this type of technology, so my idea is stunted before it's even begun.

What are your thoughts on the subject? Another case of "let's blindly throw technology at kids" - or something that's actually helpful?

Find out more:
• Today's Apple Presentation: http://bit.ly/AvSk4G
• iBooks2 hands on: http://engt.co/A0alX6
• iBooks Author App: http://engt.co/zu04WS

almost 13 years ago

2 Comments

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Brian Cody, community karma 172752

There is a recent and well-touted study of iPads helping educational outcomes, and I think this study lends credence to your argument that there is a set of necessary economic conditions to reap any of the iBooks educational improvements.

The textbook publisher HMH (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) conducted a pilot study in Riverside, CA with their iPad-based Algebra 1 textbook app (HMH Fuse). You can read a summary of the study, but the main positive outcome was "over 78 percent of HMH Fuse users scored Proficient or Advanced on the spring 2011 California Standards Tests, compared with only 59 percent of their textbook-using peers" and on the California Standards Test "students [using HMH Fuse] scored approximately 20 percent higher than their textbook-using peers".

 

One question we should ask is, how were the classes selected (or, was there any difference between the test group and the rest of the school)?

The white paper published about this study says that "two teachers would each have one of their Algebra sections randomly selected to use the HMH Fuse: Algebra I app, while all other Algebra classes, taught by the same teachers, would use the textbook version of the same program." We don't know if there are honors courses or any other non-random grouping, but it *seems* like the two test classes are pretty much the same.

 

A more important question for this thread is, what kind of students are in these classes, compared to national averages?

We don't get a class-by-class breakdown, but the white paper does give us some statistics to compare against.

Within its school district, Amelia Earhart Middle School has the lowest percent of underrepresented groups (37%, compared to a high of 80% at University Heights Middle School), and a significantly lower percent of underrepresented groups than the State of California as a whole (57%).

The study middle school has 29% of students receiving free or reduced lunch (a soft indicator for economic disadvantaged students), which is about half of the California average of 57% of students receiving free or reduced lunch. The national average is 45.2%.

 

I think that this pilot study supports your argument that Apple's textbooks can improve education – but only if you have the dough to access them. I think most educators would agree with you that this is another improvement aimed at the wealthy and high-performing students, and not a widely-applicable fix for most educational environments.

 

almost 13 years ago
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Lawrence Bowdish, community karma 347

just FYI, saw this "infographic" on mashable, no real answers, but some interesting stats.

http://mashable.com/2012/02/16/higher-education-digital-infographic/

almost 13 years ago
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