eBook News

 From the Mental Daily (https://www.mentaldaily.com/article/2022/01/survey-finds-three-in-ten-americans-are-readers-of-e-books)  There are a substantial number of American adults that prefer to read electronic formatted books, according to a survey by the Pew Research Center “Americans are spreading their book consumption across several formats,” the authors of a Pew report stated. “The share of adults who have read print books in the past 12 months still outpaces the share using other forms, but 30% now say they have read an e-book in that time frame.” The  Pew report  found that 65 percent of American adults surveyed preferred reading a print book in the past year. The survey was conducted during January and February of 2021. These kinds of questions always make me wonder why they didn't also ask how many books the people read so that that information could also be included. If you only ask if "they have read an ebook, audiobook, or print book then that is a 0 or 1...

I am a strong believer in reading in any format, on paper, eink, digital, and even audio. They are all ways of conveying the content or story and all can be great ways to read new books or visit old favorites.  AudioFile has just opened the SYNC: Audiobooks for Teens' 10th season. Starting this week teens (and others) can download two titles that are paired each week for the next 14 weeks (till August 1). Each of the pairs will be available for free during their week. Readers can download the books using the Overdrive app, and once you have downloaded them they are yours for free. So if you know a teen introduce him or her to some new titles or format or allow yourself to try some young adult books. There are also some other greats including Shakespeare's Othello and one of my science favorites Mary Roach's Gulp. SUMMER 2019 SYNC TITLE PAIRINGS Week 1: April 25 – May 2 SWING by Kwame Alexander, with Mary Rand Hess, narrated by Kwame Alexander (Blink) BLINK &...

Last month had the Banned Books Week, and it made me think about all the good books that others don't want to exist. I agree that there are many books that I don't like, but just because I don't like them doesn't mean that there isn't someone who does like them. I always feel bad about disposing of a book, even one that I find in the road that has been run over a few times. But in case you missed it, there was a nice Humble Book Bundle of Forbidden reading ( https://www.humblebundle.com/books/forbidden-books-2018 )  and it is surprising how many banned books have ended up as commonly required reading lists.  So if you want to try some banned reading, you might go over to Project Gutenberg ( https://www.gutenberg.org/ ) to download a copy of a required but banned reading. And while it wasn't banned officially it would have had problems was Andy Weir's great book The Martian. So many teachers and students wanted to read it in class and discuss the wonde...

Ok, this has been an interesting kind of converse experiment, and an unintended one too. What had happened was this, I had a book that I had purchased, a paper printed book, that had been sitting on my shelf for quite a while that I started to read the other day. Now the resulting experience has been a surprise to me. I normally read over 100 books a year, but for at least the last four years none of the novels or other tradebooks that I've read has been on paper, instead they have all been through electronic means. Which does mean that I've become very comfortable with my ereader (usually my Kindle) as a method of reading.  And I know that more and more people are reading text from screens, but that includes things like google search results and email. Even my students have commented that once they start noticing much of what they read is on the screen, but for most of them pleasure reading is still something done with paper. As a proponent of differentiation I do try to get...

Here is a great summer reading opportunity. It is for elementary teachers and student. If you are not an elementary teacher, but have an elementary school child or know an elementary teacher the program may be used by individual students or if a teacher or school participates they have an opportunity of earning free books, as well as a one year ebook subscription to over 140 books. Best of all the books have a strong science and math connection.  Children who read all 25 interactive ebooks will receive a free book! Teachers who organize the effort and submit passports for 10 or more children will receive one-year free access to all 140 Arbordale interactive ebooks and 5 books for their classroom.  If five or more teachers from the same school submit passports, the school earns 25 or more books and unlimited school-wide and home ebook access. Arbordale has a free program for children to read over the summer to avoid a summer slump. Their “Read around the World” summe...

I do get so tired of seeing headlines like "Will Ebooks Ever Completely Replace Print?" I put such things up there with: Will Cars Ever Completely  Replace Horses? Will Microwaves Ever Completely Replace Stoves/Ovens? Will Color TV Ever Completely Replace Black & White? Will TV Ever Completely Replace Movie Theaters? Will Talkies Every Completely Replace Silent Movies? Will Cell/Smart Phones Ever Completely Replace Land Lines? Will Cloth Ever Completely Replace Animal Skins? Will Self-Driving Cars Completely Replace Standard Cars? I seriously doubt that anything ever gets completely replaced. I see it more like a half-life decay/reaction, things are changing and often by quite a bit, but in the end there is always a bit left of what you started with, it never seems to go to total change over. Horses still have jobs, black and white movies are still made, some people still use land lines, and some people still wear fur. With things like books, I think that...

I find it interesting how many times I have discussions with others about what classifies as "reading". So many don't include other forms, such as audio although they get very hesitant when I ask about braille. I do understand that with print, such as you are reading now, it is the combination of the saccades and fixations to combine the elements into a whole word, and the words into sentences, and on and on. But if part of that "literacy" is the understanding, then listening to the words, or feeling the letters and words should also count. In one of my classes the students are required to "read" a book by listening. One good thing that I think that they experience is the struggle in "learning to read" as an adult. For most of us, learning to read occurred so long ago that you don't remember what it was like to learn that. Now as my students as adults are trying to read their audio book they talk about the fatigue they experiences through...

If you are planning your next semester for your students, you might want to consider using some open source textbooks for them to use instead of purchasing or renting. I know that my students have commented on their appreciation of me providing them a free open source text over them having to purchase an additional book. I believe that the numbers that I read before were along the line of undergraduates having an ongoing credit card debt of over $5K, and graduate students of over $8K, a good portion of which was attributed to extra costs at college/university of which a big part was textbooks. I know that the college board estimates that the average student spends about $1200 on books and supplies and that a single book can cost as much as $200. I read that according to National Association of College Stores, the average price of a new textbook increased from $57 in 2007 to $65 in 2010 and to $79 in 2013, which would include some pretty low cost required reading like pape...

Perhaps it is familiarity breeds contempt, or maybe it is just familiarity breeds a giving break. Either way, we do know that students will work harder on their writing when they know that what they are writing is going to be read by more than just their teacher, their parent, or the student next to them. So as the school year is ending and you are thinking about what to do next year, think about having your students produce and publish their work and put it out to the world. Below are two articles about how teachers have gotten their students to activity publish their work either as books or magazines. If you want to try some book publishing yourself (or with your students), you might want to start with a tool like StoryBird (https://storybird.com/), there you can write your story, then have it published into their digital library, and if you really want to you can even buy a printed (soft- or hard-cover) copy of the book for your shelves - or the school library's collection. ...

Pre-K and Kindergarten teachers can have free access to StoryBots from  http://www.storybots.com/educate  . StoryBots Classroom offers an expansive new suite of classroom-ready activities and resources,including: Math Skills – Common Core-aligned kindergarten-level math games  Learning Videos – a library of 110+ animated musical videos that explore a wide range of topics  Starring You® and Learning Books – 90+ eBooks that help kids practice reading  Starring You® Videos – offering fun, quick and personalized reward for the classroom and can be used for brain breaks  Activity Sheets – 20 printable books and 350+ sheets for teachers to use in their classrooms  Teacher Tools – including Class Roster, Lesson Planner, Group Builder — to help educators manage their classroom and create custom plans.

Here is an interesting experiment that was done with ebooks, that would be very hard to do with print books and get good results. These publishers wanted to know if reading completion rates were the same for males and females. They added a bit of code, called candy.js, to the ebook that sent back information on the reader with the completion of each chapter the next time the reader device was online.  Then they found out that the completion rate was about the same for each gender. Instead, bigger issues for completion rates were things within the book like the writing style, characters, and topic were more influential on book completion. This trend held true across multiple genres including non-fiction, and literary fiction (including fantasy, science fiction, and crime). Now as a research tool this is very interesting, as it eliminates the self-survey issues that have been commonly used to interview people - either the book was read or not, and there is specific data to show it....

Ok, schools out and perhaps you were planning on spending some time relaxing with a best seller.   Perhaps you were thinking on catching up with those from last year, or the ones just coming out for that great beach read. In 2014 that would include: The Fault in Our Stars by John Green  Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul by Jeff Kinney  Divergent by Veronica Roth  Insurgent by Veronica Roth  Killing Patton by Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard  Allegiant by Veronica Roth  Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn  Frozen by Victoria Saxon But instead of just catching up with last year's reading, you might go back even further and read the best sellers from 100 years ago, those from 1915, with the added bonus that you can read them for free online or on your device. The Best Sellers of 1915 The Turmoil by Booth Tarkington - https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1098 "The Turmoil", the first volume of Pulitzer Prize-winner Booth Tarkington's...

I've always felt that anything that attracts kids to reading it a good thing. From getting them to read books about movies that they have seen, to using their own interests and experiences, and technology. I remember in many of my middle school classes that there were many more girls carrying books to read for themselves than boys. And the study reported here notes that same that: "twice as many boys as girls look at or read online stories for longer than they read traditional books (24 per cent compared to 12 per cent)." It also reminds me about the studies concerning video gaming, that more boys were attracted to those than girls (although there was controversy concerning the types of games created and who they appealed to). One thing that was found out from gaming was that even boys at the time were showing increased communication activity as they talked, wrote, and shared about how to play the game with others. Here is another tech experience that seems to be at...

Just heard from one of my publishers that my Ebooks for Elementary School books will be out soon. It is a combination reference, tutorial, and strategy guide will help all teachers and school librarians to effectively use the reading applications described, regardless of the classroom computing platform. eBooks offer students as well as teachers, school and public librarians, and parents tremendous possibilities. This book explains how to expand and enhance the reading experience through the use of technology. Today, eBooks are everywhere, and the use of digital learning materials is beginning to supplant traditional printed materials. As the world shifts to digital books, both teachers and students need to be comfortable and effective using materials in this format. This book helps you to apply eBook materials to existing curricula to create interactive educational activities and have access to more materials to support reading instruction, literacy, standards, and reading in the co...