In an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education, iPads are examined in real-world class situations, and found wanting.
The article, “iPads Could Hinder Teaching, Professors Say,” lays out some plusses about iPads in the classroom… but also some serious negatives. Some suggest that the older Tablet PCs would be a better choice for classroom use.
Despite the iPad’s popularity—Apple has sold nearly 15 million of them and just came out with the iPad2; and there are dozens of competitors, like the Samsung Galaxy—early studies indicate that these finger-based tablets are passive devices that have limited use in higher education. They are great for viewing media and allow students to share readings. But professors cannot use them to mark up material on the fly and show changes to students in response to their questions, a type of interactivity that has been a major thrust in pedagogy.
The inherent limitations of the iPad’s design, most notably its typing and touch interface, make it too difficult for students to take and annotate notes and material on-the-fly. Many students trying an iPad in class switch to laptops, even older ones, based on easier input usability, and in the belief that they will save material better.
Despite the input problems, there are other aspects of the iPad design that scholars and students like, such as sharing capabilities. However, most agree that iPads and other devices are far short of the “killer device” that higher education is waiting for. And although Apple (and most computer makers) would like to be the device-maker for educators, they are showing little or no inclination to work closely with educators to develop such a device.
I note that there is no mention of adapting the devices for those with disabilities, either at the student or educator end… although students with disabilities often have their own customized equipment, the teachers must be able to interface with that equipment, and most likely the device makers aren’t giving much thought to that.
The full article is on the Chronicle web site.
Eventhough it might take some time to figure out the best way to incorporate into the classroom, the iPad 2 is going to be a game changer for a lot of industries! I can’t wait to see it put to use in everything from medicine to sales.
You know, the iPad is not for everyone. Neither is a smart phone. We can say the same about almost every device.
But when articles like this appear that are so idiotically incompetent, I really wonder what kind of people are handling education in the US.
“. . there are dozens of competitors” Really ? I think Apple’s competitors would be quite surprised at this.
I just find their attitude puzzling and if I lived in the US and had kids in the system, worrying.
What are they trying to achieve with tablets and iPads in particular ? Are they trying to find out how iPads can help students by reducing books ? Are they trying to find out if they can distribute documents/notes easier ?
It seems from this amazing article that they have only one goal, the complete replacement of all books and hand note taking, and if the device does not achieve this, then it is a failure. Yet is it self evident to anyone who is familiar with tablets, iPads, Laptops et al, that this is a wholly impractical and pointless exercise that is destined to fail because it is unrealistic, and more than that – it is unnecessary !
I spent five years in University studying Science. Any device that would have allowed me to ditch my text books, and receive notes from tutors and professors would have made my life a hell of a lot easier. Why on earth would I reject that great improvement simply because I couldn’t take notes on it too ? It is just daft. I would be perfectly happy to take notes on paper and use them in conjunction with digital notes. It’s not bloody brain surgery !!
Yet such a huge advance, and a huge improvement for students day to day experience is trashed because it doesn’t deliver the academics idea of education nirvana ?
“. . at least for now, fewer textbooks are available for the iPad” What does this mean ? we all know this. It’s not any different for laptops or competitors Why is it relevant to the analysis of the iPad ?
It looks to me that the people involved in assessing these devices are totally clueless and either have a deep seated prejudice against tablets and Apple in particular, or they just have no imagination as to how devices like these can be adapted to and student’s lives can be improved and made so much easier without aspiring to some kind of perfect future universe.
@Howard: An iPad “may not be for everyone,” but in a classroom environment, everyone is expected to learn, and if a single device intended for use by the bulk of the class does not facilitate that process, it shouldn’t be used.
The article is clear: The iPad is not ready for prime time, and other tablet devices are considered to be at least marginally better. Attacking scholars and tech professionals as incompetents, considering they and not you are doing the research in classroom situations, sounds… to use your words… clueless and prejudiced.
” And although Apple (and most computer makers) would like to be the device-maker for educators, they are showing little or no inclination to work closely with educators to develop such a device.”
And when has Apple worked closely with anyone? I know that the quote includes other computer makers, and “others” may jump in to fill this gap eventually; but, really, do you see Stevie and Apple ever doing this? That would involve compromise and input of ideas from outside sources, something that the megalomaniacal mindset at Apple will never allow.
Obviously, educators hope that some computer maker will decide to work closely with them to create the “ultimate classroom device,” but it doesn’t seem to be anybody’s high priority. A shame when you think about it: The market potential alone would be huge…
The Chronicle article was very poorly done and failed to support any position on whether tablets in general or the iPad in particular would be helpful or harmful to the teaching and learning process. Most of the sources quoted had conflicts of interest of one sort or another.
Textbooks were talked about as if they could only come from publishers shackling them with DRM that precludes annotation and the other features whose absence was complained about. Students were referred to as incapable of adapting to new situations such as keyboards in software.
There was no rigorous empirical research in evidence at all, just opinion, propaganda and a smattering of anecdotal harvesting.
@Frank: Actually, students were referred to as preferring laptop keyboards over on-screen iPad keyboards. As an iPad owner, I can attest to the incredibly clumsy on-screen keyboard of the iPad (it doesn’t even have cursor arrow keys, practically a must for editing considering how hard the iPad makes it to use a finger to zero in on text). I refuse to use it for more than very light typing needs, and wouldn’t want to type this paragraph on one. Any laptop keyboard is better than an iPad on-screen keyboard, though a remote Apple keyboard would even the score there.
True, textbooks with anti-annotation security settings are a problem, but that’s a problem for any device, not just the iPad. Most Textbooks have so far not been optimized for any digital delivery media, and that does need to be addressed.
As an article (as opposed to a scientific paper), I did not see any overt signs of bias… except, of course, the attitude that education was the priority over tech use. What “propaganda” are you referring to? And are you aware of any scientifically-derived studies that show how the iPad performs in education environments?
This, if you read the actual article, is referring to a custom collaboration tool that allows the instructor to interact with student machines that runs ONLY on Windows based tablets (ie. expensive) while the software vendor waits for some PC hardware company to dominate the market before porting their software to other similar tablets.
So, of course the iPad and Android tablets can’t do this yet.
I have to wonder how widespread this kind of collaboration tool is that is being used to judge the new touch based tablets.
Actually… I’m seeing opportunity here for the first iPad developer (assuming it hasn’t been done already) who figures out this kind of multi-device collaboration on touch devices.
The comments for that article are also interesting.
I’m not sure the collaboration tools they reference are that widespread, any more than tablets in the classroom are widespread yet. I agree, there’s a lot of opportunity, and the article at least suggests that no one’s cracked it yet.
Frank wrote:
“There was no rigorous empirical research in evidence at all, just opinion, propaganda and a smattering of anecdotal harvesting.”
It is unfortunate that such flawed and biased articles like this can influence those making decisions in education.
iPads are good for reading and homework using apps. For in-class work, I suggest teachers use blackboards or whiteboards.
I’m hoping for an ARM version of Intel’s Classmate convertible tablet project. These could be solid-state storage, quite rugged, and cheap — almost back to OLPC’s notion of the ‘$100 laptop’ when issued in bulk.
Keyboarding after all is one of the basic skills of the modern world. I’m not even sure that the touch surface is so necessary; rather I’d say it isn’t necessary for education at all, except — it’s so intuitive and darned *fun* to use, that it encourages the kids to ‘play’ at learning.