--- Forwarded Message from [log in to unmask] ---

>Date: Mon, 30 Nov 2009 19:41:20 -0500
>From: [log in to unmask]
>To: Language Learning and Technology International Information    Forum
<[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: #9295 eBook question
>References: <[log in to unmask]>
>In-Reply-To: <[log in to unmask]>
>User-Agent: Internet Messaging Program (IMP) H3 (4.0.3)

Bonsoir!

My students in various high school French courses and in a Global Civilization
course use online textbooks & ancillary materials from Holt Rinehart Winston
publishers. Publishers' success at rendering the materials with reliable web
access can vary, but all are attempting the same task. As an 
instructor, having
the materials online is helpful, especially when quizzes and tests are
downloadable AND editable and not fixed. What is extremely helpful is also
having test banks, where you can indicate the number and type of different
questions you want to pull into your test from a fairly large bank and make up
an exam very rapidly.

What I find frustrating is actually not having been provided with paper 
versions
of the many, many layers of materials, from overheads to maps to 
activities, or
whatever for my Global Civ course. (This is the social studies' department's
fault.) I do have this in paper form for my French courses. A book or notebook
full of all these papers is MUCH easier for me to look over and ponder using
than going from screen to screen to look at. The publishers tend to almost
supply too many ancillary materials. Sometimes it takes a few years of getting
used to the materials before you find ways to use them all.

So, bottom line is: I feel more comfortable having the real book 
versions handy
to look over to see what we're dealing with, but the online version for DVDs,
audio, maps/visuals/graphics (use with smartboard) and editable tests 
is useful
for in-class. As for the students, their primary complaint is that half 
the time
the website does not function and they can't get further than the 
log-in screen
or whatever... -which means I try to assign homework from the printed version
of the workbook that I know the students have and then I reserve any exercises
or textbook work to be done in class when I can provide the material and
project it on the smartboard (& htus not rely on students' inability to access
this outside school.) Many students would still like to have the real book to
look at and thumb through, even if it weighs a ton to schlep around... In one
course, we just keep a set in class for all sections. But the future seems to
be in e-readers or website location for the text etc., so kids have to 
get used
to it.

If publishers could divide the text into smaller paperback segments to 
have and
hold, and spend MORE time on providing extensive exercise banks to choose from
(so you can test the same grammar topic multiple times and in different ways)
and authentic video from real places and real conversations, and LESS on
filming made-up skits and stupid dialogues and scenarios, it would all be more
useful...

My two cents...

Sincerely,
Emily Wentworth
Trumbull (CT) High school & Yale University


Quoting LLTI-Editor <[log in to unmask]>:

> Hello,
>
> Have any of you adopted the eBook version of the traditional language
> textbooks from publishers like McGraw-Hill (http://www.mhcentro.com/books)?
> If so, could you share some comments on the experience, both positive and
> negative?
> Thanks,
> Eduardo
>
> Eduardo Lage-Otero, Ph. D.
> Director of Blume Language & Culture Learning Center
> Raether Library & Information Technology Center,  # 121
> Trinity College
> 300 Summit Street
> Hartford, CT 06106-3100
>
> Phone: (860) 297-5282
> Email: [log in to unmask]
> Web: http://blume-center.trincoll.edu/
>
>
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> Otmar Foelsche, LLTI-Editor ([log in to unmask])
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