The advancement in technology has resulted in teaching and learning becoming ubiquitous (anywhere and anytime). One such advancement is the e-book. But how popular is the latter in programmes delivered at your university? Are students demanding these and are your libraries investing in them? What are some of the issues, if any, you are encountering? Your feedback would be much appreciated in learning from your experiences.
many thanks,
Debra
I agree with so many of the comments, especially Greg's. I see the environment changing with a shift towards e-books by many of my students because of a combination of cost and convenience. With the e-book they can access the material rapidly and search the material more effectively. As an old guy, I like to see a hard copy, but in reality I'm accessing more material from the web than that, I find myself going to the printed material. I think that we will just continue to see increased popularity of the different methodologies to deliver material that has traditionally been included in printed and bound textbooks.
This is really a difficult question to answer. Every person I know has either a smart phone, a computer, and/or pad! How they use these devises, there is no way to know. If you are asking if eBooks are institutionalized as a required or suggested venue, then the answer is no. However, you bring a great point in that engineering books are very expensive and eBooks may be the future!
Technology-inclined and knowledgeable instructors upload e-books related to their courses for students to download. It is not a very popular feature. It is now gaining roots in our university.
Dickson
They are available to our students. However, if the students are to be believed, most students in my discipline (criminal justice) do not like them. There is one university in our state that provides e-books to the students as a part of their tuition. We have had students leave that university and transfer into our program citing among other reasons that they hate e-books. Although some folks swear by them.
After converting my course to electronic, I understand that the new incumbent has regressed to killing trees! We have to maintain the momentum.
We live in a scholarly community where there are a lot of digital immigrants (Born Before Computers); hence, the integration of eText or popularly known as eBooks face a lot of obstacles. Another major issue people in my community encounter is the fact even the so-called digital natives find it difficult reading eBooks. I have had a situation where I had to give my students eBooks and force them not to bring hard Books to class; yet they end up printing hard copies.
I agree with so many of the comments, especially Greg's. I see the environment changing with a shift towards e-books by many of my students because of a combination of cost and convenience. With the e-book they can access the material rapidly and search the material more effectively. As an old guy, I like to see a hard copy, but in reality I'm accessing more material from the web than that, I find myself going to the printed material. I think that we will just continue to see increased popularity of the different methodologies to deliver material that has traditionally been included in printed and bound textbooks.
Our university, as a part of large consortium, has an agreement with Springer which allows the staff and students to use e-books at no cost. I have been choosing several Springer texts for the courses I teach. Surprisingly, students preferred to purchase paper copies and used them for studying. I also prefer traditional printed textbooks to digital copies, but I did not encourage my students to purchase hard copies!
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