Inspiration, Innovation & Information for school libraries and learning.
On 1 May, the results of the annual Technology Survey conducted by the School Library Journal (SLJ) showed a mix of responses among the 1,187 US school librarians who responded, with the emergence of some clear trends.
The number of e-books in US school libraries is growing, with 31% reporting that they have some in their collections already. The trend shows a jump in schools who plan to add e-books in the coming year.
Barriers to adding e-books include a lack of devices on which to read them, a confusing array of e-reader devices, the range of competing platforms, concerns about Digital Rights Management, and vendor practices that are not school-friendly.
There are four sets of charted results from the 2011 Technology Survey: Tools and Content; Going Mobile; E-Books; and Leadership. Click on each to see the graphed results.
Going Mobile explores to what extent mobile devices (including mobile phones) are allowed to be used in schools, and whether they are being used for instruction. There’s a clear difference here between public and private schools.
Read more…and enjoy how the infographics have been used to present the information.
Here in New Zealand Debbie Price-Ewen continues to lead the NZ e-Reader and e-Book Taskforce [ http://nzert.wikispaces.com/] wiki, worth joining if you want to keep abreast of this fast-changing scene.
Janet McFadden
flickr image by Frank Gruber
140,000 industry professional attended the CEA (Consumers Electronics Association) Conference in early 2011. They emitted a cacophony of 158,000 tweets of excitement as future trends, final curtain calls, predictions and proclamations were offered by analysts, tech soothsayers, CEO’s and creative wunderkind. After the computer, the trends were all about tablets, superphones, speed and Internet enabled everything. In the immediate future watch out for these and for more detailed info great podcasts on the CEA web link.
Flickr photo by M Harrsch
Wireless power. This means wire less power and on show at the CEA as one of the most popular innovations were the luminous cereal boxes. Well may parents start shaking in their sandals. Different parts of the cereal boxes light up as you walk past them. Whether they call out ‘buy me,buy me’ isn’t mentioned. They are using inductive capability that transforms shelves into power sources for battery powered devices. Surfaces have a primary transmission coil which provides power for cereal boxes in this case but which has much wider applications. Being explored now are soup packets with on buttons,e books,frying pan alerts….
The devices go beyond cereal boxes to kitchen blenders, smartphones, ebook readers, laptops, electric vehicles, and more. Instead of plugging these devices into an electric outlet, you could power them by simply placing them on a surface equipped with the eCoupled technology (or in the case of the electric vehicles, driving onto an eCoupled parking lot). At CES, Fulton Innovation demonstrated how the technology could be used to make a “self-heating” can of soup. The soup can had a heating coil built into the packaging. When placed on an eCoupled surface and an “on” button is pressed on the packaging, the soup would heat up and a light would turn on when it was ready.
Parents beware. Shopping online might be the only economic thing to do
A teaching tool that is exciting a lot of interest is Prezi, flexible ,interactive and with multiple features. If people are using it share with us. For an introduction go to Paul Hill's very effective Prezi presentation. He shows how zoom features can really focus attention on detail. Some blog comments quote eye strain as well but many teachers are responding positively. Harnessing what this tool and many others can offer to engage learners is the amazing sometimes daunting challenge. It will transform the way we help kids learn. Soon.
L2 - Libraries and Learning is a new blog from Services To Schools. We will be writing about a range of topics that fall within the scope of libraries and learning. Expect to read about: Literacies in the 3rd millennium, technology trends for teaching and learning, research about libraries and student achievement, culture, heritage, and much more.
We are interested in the many ways that libraries impact on learning, through pedagogy, technology, collaboration and personal interactions with students. Subscribe to the RSS feed so you don’t miss any of the stimulating posts.
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