As much as I quite want to like this, it does raise some interesting questions.
I would like to know how students read digitally compared with how they read print. Is it the same? Although there are hundreds of books trying to help students read print, I know of nothing about helping students to read digitally. I don’t know of any research in that area, either. It is possible that the difference is nothing to do with the medium, but rather what kind of reading strategies etc are used for the different media.
I remember listening to a paper by Agnes Kulkuska Hulme at a conference a few years ago. It was a very useful talk I was particularly interested in a point she made about modern students (digital natives?) needing guidance and retraining in the use of digital technology for learning. Just because they can deal with Facebook etc, does not mean they know how to read e-books effectively. And do we?
I’ve just read Lincoln in the Bardo on my kindle. I didn’t really like the experience. There are so many characters that you need to keep going back to check on who is who. That would be much easier in a paper book. However, once I had got to the end, it was easy to search for particular characters and follow their stories in a way that would be impossible in a book. I also did it with “matterlightblooming”! Reading A Brief History of Seven Killings was similar, also read on a kindle.
A few other articles that raise the same question for me:
In-class laptop use and its effects on student learning
Carrie B. Fried
Facebook and academic performance
Paul A. Kirschner & Aryn C. Karpinski
Computers and productivity: Evidence from laptop use in the college classroom
Patterson, R. W. & Patterson, R. M.
The Mere Presence of a Cell Phone May be Distracting: Implications for Attention and Task Performance
Bill Thornton, Alyson Faires, Maija Robbins, and Eric Rollins
The Relationship Between Cell Phone Use and Academic Performance in a Sample of U.S. College Students
Andrew Lepp, Jacob E. Barkley, and Aryn C. Karpinski
I think it is something we all need to learn. Research is needed.
From: learning development in higher education network [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Gordon Asher
Sent: 20 October 2017 15:54
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: 'A new study shows that students learn way more effectively from print textbooks than screens'
Interesting study on reading in different formats and for different purposes?
A new study shows that students learn way more effectively from print textbooks than screens
Work like you don't need money
Love like you've never been hurt
and dance like no-one's watching
"Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world." Paulo Freire (Pedagogy of the Oppressed)
"Education is the point at which we decide whether we love the world enough to assume responsibility for it, and by the same token save it from that ruin which except for renewal, except for the coming of the new and the young, would be inevitable." Hannah Arendt (The Crisis of Education)