Forgive me but, hogwash! The article title reads “School courses dissapear into the tablet”. (“Schoolcursussen verdwijnen in de tablet”)
I happen to be a firm believer that mobile internet does bring the whole information cycle full circle, away from the stationary desks, into “real life”, and therefore will be adopted by many more users than limited to the computer-savy fanatical few (yours truely being a card carrying member). And my expectation is also that tablets will be sighted more often in the lecture halls and their use will grow amongst students.
Mobile in education is the next big step. But to state it in this Draconian manner, scaring all tentative users, arming skeptics and nay-sayers to new technologies. It might be my age but I have seen this response too often. I prefer to focus on the possible advantages and lets put energy into taking the best of both worlds, the old and the new, and make learning an even more richer and tantalizing experience than it already is.
Alright, 86% percent of the tablet owners says it makes them study more efficiently. I wonder what this percentage would be for Laptop users (I’d guess 100%).
I’ve been using a Ipad in education, and think it’s inferior to a laptop or netbook; and in my opinion, that’s the reason why we don’t see that many of them in the lecture halls yet.
Consider Typing; You either hold the tablet in one hand, and type with the other hand, and you’ll end up with a tired arm within ten minutes. You can hold the tablet in two hands and only type with your thumbs; very slow.. Last option, you can put the tablet on your desk and type with the full two hands, but you can’t see your lecturer (there’s no feedback from the Keyboard, so you’ll have to see what you’re typing) and you’ll end up with a stiff neck.
Alternative; Buy a tablet and a docking with keyboard (or an Asus Eee Pad transformer).
Smartphones are getting bigger and bigger (Samsung just announced an 5.3″ model http://bit.ly/qFaJhn) and can do the same as a Tablet. Netbooks can do more, for a lower price.
Definitely; Mobile is the big step in Education; but has been taken already, and the mobile devices are called smartphones.
For now my conclusion would be that Tablet’s are great devices, especially for when you’re travelling, but not in education.