iterativelearning

When it comes to academic research, lots of improvement has happened in terms of making more journal articles available in electronic format. But what has lagged behind somewhat is making electronic copies of book chapters. How often have you been in a situation where you only need one chapter from an edited volume, but because that volume is in high demand, there’s a long line of hold requests? I’m not a librarian and so I’m not in the loop on all the developments regarding journal or database pricing, etc., but it would be nice if some kind of arrangement could be worked out so researchers could obtain select copies of chapters with the same ease they now retrieve copies of individual journal articles.

Richard MacManus of ReadWriteWeb has a good post on another player in the ebook market – CafeScribe. A couple of important contextual points he includes are

• ebook adoption among students is still pretty low
• iPads are too pricey for most students, so little inroads there

In skimming some of the features he describes, one place where CafeScribe seems to have done its homework is making it easier to create opportunities for collaboration. Students can see others who bought the same book, and so, in theory, I could see organically-generated groups forming to work on difficult concepts, problems, etc. What I like about this, pedagogically, is that it doesn’t restrict collaboration to specific courses or even semesters. It could also encourage more student-based scaffolding where perhaps upper-division students who are majors in a given area (e.g., accounting, engineering) could assist struggling students. Faculty can also use CafeScribe to create collaborations within specific courses.

From the research corner … Weston & Bain have a good article in the Journal of Technology, Learning, and Assessment – The End of Techno-Critique: The Naked Truth about 1:1 Laptop Initiatives and Educational Change.

They agree with the Techno-Critics that there’s been a lot of exaggeration when it comes to describing the link between tech and learning improvement; they agree because of the conspicuous lack of empirical data. But rather than throw out the proverbial baby with the bathwater, as the Techno Critics are prone to do, they suggest six extensions of Jonassen, et al.’s notion of tech as cognitive tools. For example, one of the six recommends not only involving all members of the school community but positioning each as an active agent in assisting with defining … clearly articulated roles, responsibilities, and performance measures. This emphasis on specific roles for stakeholders is one way to keep the focus on concerns related to learning rather than technology.