Sinclair Community College (Ohio) > e-Textbooks An Option For Students

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The Clarion /  January 31, 2011 / Georgia Howard

There has been a recent push in Ohio colleges, including Sinclair Community College to promote e-textbooks over traditional textbooks. On Jan. 21, there was an e-textbook workshop that covered issues such as information about e-textbooks, the State of Ohio Digital Bookshelf initiative and an e-textbook exploratory pilot project.

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A large advantage of having an e-textbook is the affordability of these books compared to regular textbooks, according to [Greg] Deye, [manager of Learning Technology Parent Support].  He said that an e-textbook can save you 40 to 60 percent off of the price of a regular textbook.

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Deye said that one advantage of having e-textbooks on one device instead of carrying around several heavy books. [snip].

According to Deye, e-textbooks would be a great fit for distance learning students who are going to be online for their classes. He adds that e-textbooks can help students learn in a better way as long as the student is comfortable learning online.  He said that some students learn easier through e-texts because it makes it easier for them to take and access their notes.

“There maybe be multimedia in the textbook such as video and audio and animations built into the textbook."

And there are some that are pretty much a copy of whatever is on the paper version, what’s online. But even with the paper version that is online , you have the ability to highlight, annotate and put notes on the page. Whenever you access that page, you can access those notes at all time,” Deye said.

A disadvantage for many people is that most e-textbooks can only be used for the quarter or semester and you can’t keep a copy of it, according to Deye. [snip].

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“The only thing I would say ultimately is that the e-textbook is certainly an option that I think everyone should look at but think about whether or not it meets your learning style. A lot of times we will put money in the forefront but if you are not able to learn from it then maybe that money saved isn’t really worth it. Keep the learning in front and follow it up with the money if at all possible,” he concludes.

Source

[http://www.sinclairclarion.com/home/news/2011/01/31/e-textbooks-an-option-for-students/]