Are touchscreen tablets effective design tools? — from SmashingMagazine.com
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On 03/03/2011,
in e-books, e-readers, new business models, publishing, tablets, tools,
by Daniel Christian
Textbook publisher announces ‘app’ approach to learning materials — from The Chronicle by Jeff Young
Long Beach—The phrase “there’s an app for that” may be coming to textbooks.
Today a major textbook company, Cengage Learning, announced a new e-textbook publishing platform that lets professors plug in apps, some made by other software companies, to add to traditional textbook content features like tutoring services or the ability to trade margin notes with other students.
The system is called MindTap, and it is scheduled to be announced at the annual TED conference here. When Chris Vento, Cengage’s executive vice president for technology and development, explained the system to a reporter, he felt the need to put the word “textbook” in air quotes, since traditional textbook content is a small part of the new product. These digital textbooks essentially bundle together several products sold by Cengage and its subsidiaries, including their electronic test-bank system, called Aplia, as well as videos and other materials that the company owns the rights to, including the archives of Newsweek. And MindTap allows professors to customize the presentation of the material, by adding their own slides, video lectures, articles, or free online content from elsewhere.
On 03/03/2011,
in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, accessibility / UDL, Apple, convergence, digital audio, digital learning, digital photography, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, disruption, e-books, e-readers, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, mobile learning, mobile technologies, online learning, online media, tablets, transmedia, videoconferencing,
by Daniel Christian
On 02/11/2011,
in convergence, dangers of the status quo, disruption, educational games / serious games, engagement / engaging students, game-changing environment, internet, mobile learning, mobile technologies, strategy, tablets, trends, vendors,
by Daniel Christian
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On 02/08/2011,
in analytics, Augmented Reality (AR), e-books, e-readers, education technology, educational games / serious games, mobile learning, mobile technologies, tablets,
by Daniel Christian
The 2011 Horizon Report — from the New Media Consortium; via Educause
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Time-to-Adoption: One Year or Less
- Electronic Books
- Mobiles
Time-to-Adoption: Two to Three Years
- Augmented Reality
- Game-Based Learning
Time-to-Adoption: Four to Five Years
- Gesture-Based Computing
- Learning Analytics
Also see:
On 01/26/2011,
in cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, mobile technologies, tablets, technologies for your home, technology (general), telecommunications, trends,
by Daniel Christian
Five high-tech business trends — from Reuters
1. 4G Connectivity
2. Tablet Takeover
3. Apps Everywhere
4. Online Communications
5. Cloud Computing
On 01/20/2011,
in education technology, K-12 related, mathematics, mobile learning, tablets, teaching & learning, user experience (UX),
by Daniel Christian
Algebra, meet the iPad: A year-long study explores learning with the tablet — fromMind/Shift by Tina Barseghian
Excerpt:
Q. How will the iPad-taught class different from a traditional algebra class?
What we’ve seen in practice is the fact that it’s bringing everything to one place that’s making it exciting. The convenience factor, the simplicity factor — that’s revolutionary. For example, if you’re working through a lesson, there are three or four algorithms presented. With a textbook, if you want to learn more about one of the examples, you have to stop looking in your book and go online to our website and navigate that particular section and view our video there.
Instead, on the iPad, you simply click on “view video” and up comes our professor, Dr. Edward Burger, the Bill Nye of education. Students have written to him saying he’s changed their opinion of what math is. So to have him right there, you can see how it’s natural for students to tap “view video,” as opposed to setting their book down and going to the computer.
Another example is, when students are working on a problem, they can simply click on “check answer,” and up comes, “that’s correct, and here’s why,” or “that’s incorrect, and here’s why.” As opposed to when they’re working on paper or even online, those pieces are a little more drawn out.
Executive summary from Forrester
Product strategists are struggling to make sense of the tablet opportunity: Will there be a market for tablets beyond Apple’s iPad, and if so, how big will it be? In this report, we present data from Forrester’s newly updated tablet forecast and share our perspective on market drivers and the competitive landscape. Our call: The tablet market will grow rapidly, reaching 10.3 million US consumers in 2010 and 82 million in 2015. As the tablet market grows, product strategists must nurture both the app ecosystem and the browser environment — both will be key channels for delivering content experiences on tablets.
Also see:
- US Tablet Sales Will More Than Double This Year — from Forrester by Sarah Rotman
On 11/09/2010,
in analytics, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, collaboration, computer science, future, game-changing environment, mobile technologies, tablets, trends, ubiquitous learning, web-based collaboration,
by Daniel Christian
Gartner’s top 10 technologies for 2011 — from GlobalKnowledge.com by Larry Dignan; with special thanks to Mr. Cal Keen, Calvin College, for this resource
- Cloud computing
- Mobile apps and media tablets
- Next-gen analytics
- Social analytics
- Social communication and collaboration
- Video
- Context-aware computing
- Ubiquitous computing
- Storage class memory
- Fabric based infrastructure and computers
You can now draw virtual lines on your computer screen at the same time as you scribble them on paper.
A new smartpen app called Paper Tablet gives the Livescribe Echo smartpen some of the functionality of a dedicated graphics tablet, letting you write on the computer screen in real time and add manuscript text to files already on your computer.
“The essence of our business is the capture, access and sharing of written and spoken information,” Livescribe CEO Jim Marggraff told Wired: “We happen to have this tool in the form of a pen, but it’s really about capture, access and sharing.”
On 10/26/2010,
in Apple, digital audio, digital learning, digital photography, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, disruption, e-books, e-readers, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, higher education, K-12 related, mobile learning, mobile technologies, multimedia, online learning, online media, tablets, tools, vendors,
by Daniel Christian
On 10/22/2010,
in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, digital audio, digital learning, digital photography, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, disruption, e-books, e-readers, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, game-changing environment, higher education, interactivity, K-12 related, learning ecosystem, love of learning, media/film, mobile learning, mobile technologies, more voice more choice more control, multi-touch, multimedia, music, new business models, online learning, online media, personalized/customized learning, platforms, podcasting, presentations, publishing, social learning / networks, story, storytelling, student-related, tablets, technologies for your home, telepresence, textbooks, tools, user experience (UX), vendors, videoconferencing, virtual field trips, vision/possibilities, web-based collaboration,
by Daniel Christian
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From DSC:
This tablet is larger, which I love! It also offers:
- Interactivity
- Multimedia
- Ability to annotate/save annotations
- Collaboration and more
Nice!
On 09/27/2010,
in digital textbooks, e-books, e-readers, education technology, innovation, mobile learning, mobile technologies, tablets, tools, vendors,
by Daniel Christian
Kno breaks new ground with the world’s first single screen tablet textbook
Kno continues the pace of innovation in integrated learning with a smaller version of the Kno
TechCrunch Disrupt Conference — San Francisco, CA – September 27, 2010 –Kno, Inc., the groundbreaking tablet textbook and dynamic learning platform, today announced its further commitment to the education market with a single screen version of its tablet textbook. The single screen version extends the breakthroughs and functionality of the dual screen version announced in June.
“Kno fundamentally improves the way students learn,” said Osman Rashid, the CEO and Co-Founder of Kno, Inc. “We are driven to innovate in a category that has been static for too long. Even though the Kno pays for itself in 13 months, the smaller up front investment of the single screen version will allow more students to use our learning platform.”
Kno, short for knowledge, is a transformative learning platform that blends a touch-screen tablet, digital textbooks, course materials, note-taking, web access, educational applications, digital media, sharing and more into a powerful and engaging educational experience that is not available on any other tablet or eReader today.
“From day one, we designed the Kno with flexibility in mind,” said Babur Habib, CTO and Co-Founder of Kno, Inc. “We developed the product to have multiple configurations and meet different student needs. The single screen maintains the elegance of our fluid, intuitive interface while capturing the richness and ‘page fidelity’ of the original textbook.”
The company plans to ship both the single and two-screen tablet textbooks to consumers by the end of 2010. Pricing and pre-order announcements will be made in the coming months.
Also see:
On 09/14/2010,
in digital audio, digital learning, digital photography, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, disruption, distance education, e-books, e-readers, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, human-computer interaction (HCI), tablets, tools, vendors,
by Daniel Christian
Why is the device compelling? [Marc] Andreessen and [Osman] Rashid talk about how Kno is offering a total product – software, hardware and services – that will be compelling to the college user. They can purchase textbooks and view them just as they look in printed format. Users will be able to take notes, draw on the pages, etc., just like the print versions. And they’ll be able to access those books on a variety of devices – even eventually their desktop and laptops – because Kno’s software is built on webkit and designed to run on a variety of hardware setups. And there’s a normal web browser too for the Internet in general.
As for textbook pricing, Rashid says the model will work. Imagine an iTunes for college textbooks, he says, and users who purchase the tablet and all their books will be paying about the same amount v. just buying print books over the first 13 months. That means individual books on the Kno will be priced lower than the average of $100 for the print versions.