Kindle vs. Hard Copy
The Kindle is an electronic book. Not just any book; it can hold up to 200 titles, access newspapers and magazines, and email. Sound amazing!? The Kindle is an electronic book put out by Amazon. It works much like an IPod downloading music.
By connecting to the network EVDO, a free wireless network, the owner of a Kindle can purchase reading material, access email, and preview books. The battery lasts up to 2 days and can be charged in 2 hours. Unlike a laptop, the screen is not hard to see in the sun light, in fact, it reads much like a text book.
Why is this important, because this may be the wave of the new library? In Ashburnham, Mass. at Cushing Academy, they have got rid of 10,000 books in their library and are planning on getting rid of the other 10,000 books. They decided to go this route because of the lack of use of both the library and the books. They tracked that less than 30 books were being checked out on some days, which is 0.15% of their books. Their answer, get rid of the books and bring in the Kindle.
The heat that was received over this switch was an expensive espresso machine (12K), cost of the Kindle, technology becoming obsolete, and the sentimental value of the books. The 12 thousand dollar machine was a huge debate, but it did bring in new customers and they will be able to sell their drinks. The cost of the Kindle at $259 was justified that the books are at most $9.99 from Amazon and as cheap as $5 compared to $30 for a hard copy book. The other fear is that the technology will become obsolete in 10 years where as hard copy books have not changed much in 100 years. Finally, people just hang onto books. They get sentimental and think that it is against the rules to throw things out.
I think that this move is bold and on the cutting edge. I just heard about the Kindle 3 weeks ago. I know; I had to come out from under my rock. We also landed on the Moon! They are a neat little technology. Why hinder technology if it is cost effective, efficient, gets the job done and kids love it.
I do support their idea of keeping some of the texts around in order to use the hard copy versions. I think that the Kindles will increase student usage of the library and will be easier to use for research with the 360,000 titles that Amazon has to offer. Without innovation and stepping out into the unknown, the Portobello mushroom would have never been discovered. Yes, some people have gotten sick, but progress was made. I think that we need to step out as educators and try out new technology.
What do you think?
Philip
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As long as this isn't another fad educators are
ReplyDelete"trying" that costs thousands of dollars to implement and it only lasts a few years...I'm all for it! Kids are getting more out of this than regular books it sounds like and what do we want more out of our kids....TO READ! I don't however agree with how Cushing Acadamy gets rid of their library books. Regardless of how techno savvy this school is becoming, getting rid of text books is a little premature. What if in a few years they need the books again. How much will it cost to restock the library shelves? Ideas are wonderful things to implement, but not without testing the theories first.
Our school has some classes that use online textbooks (I teach at a middle school). I think that it is great way to cut down on the cost of books and incorporating technology. Many of our classes have one class set of text books and students can not take them home if they need to. By using online text books, a student can look at their chapter any time, it will help their backs (not carrying home textbooks that way a ton), and help reduce the amount of paper that is used to print a book. But the down side is that not eveyone has acces to a computer and can not get to the library when they need to use a computer. If a district purchased a Kindle, the student could check them out and take home. Our district purchased Ipods for some teachers to use in their classroom, why not Kindles.
ReplyDeletePhilip,
ReplyDeleteTechnology always seems to prevail in every situation, whether good or bad. I think that getting rid of some great books, probably even some rare publications or only copies left was a detriment. However, I can see the business side of things. The school felt no students were using the library the way it was supposed to so they got rid of the books and created a digital database of what they had. Now, it could possibly save them millions in upkeep and storage space, but there is also an emotional side to seeing certain books. I remember when my undergrad school remodeled our 2 libraries. It was dramatic. The result was more study space and computers and books being put in upper, unvisited areas of the library or in boxes elsewhere. The Kindle is a great idea and it would cut a lot of the nonsense out with hard copies. If they begin putting textbooks on there it will become even more popular. I LOATHE purchasing a $200 book I may never even open just because it's the new edition and the teacher thinks it's important. Buying an e-book for $50, I can stomach that a little more.