iPads for College Classrooms? Not So Fast, Some Professors Say. – Technology – The Chronicle of Higher Education

I’d like to see the studies that this article is referencing.  I do agree — Window’s style TabletPC’s are much more flexible, and I find Ubiquitous Presenter to be a powerful educational technology.  (Great to see Beth Simon and Bill Griswold quoted in this piece.)  But I wonder if the iPad allows for a different kind of interactivity, one that can also be used for learning, but we’ll have to learn how to leverage that.

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.

Even students have issues. When the University of Notre Dame tested iPads in a management class, students said the finger-based interface on its glassy surface was not good for taking class notes and didn’t allow them to mark up readings. For their online final exam, 39 of the 40 students put away their iPads in favor a laptop, because of concerns that the Apple tablet might not save their material.

“When they’re working on something important, it kind of freaks them out,” says Corey M. Angst, the assistant professor of management who tested the tablets.

via iPads for College Classrooms? Not So Fast, Some Professors Say. – Technology – The Chronicle of Higher Education.