Sunday, October 31, 2010

Exploration of Web 2.0 Tools - E-books

E-books (electronic books) are regular printed books (fiction, nonfiction) in a digital format. They can be read on computers, e-readers or some mobile phones. A portable e-reader can hold hundres or more books in a device the size of a paperback book (Kindle). e-Books can be purchased online (Amazon, etc.) or many books that are in the public domain are available free online (Gutenberg, Librivox.org)

Task: 1. Compare and contrast a conventional book with an e-book. Determine the advantages or disadvantages of using an e-book. 2. Find 3 short e-books for children.

Homework Task -
Read a selected passage of one of the short e-books you have found.
Create a T-chart and respond in the two columns:

1. You are in a dark room. What would you have to do to read the book?
2. Your battery has gone dead. How can you read an e-book?
3. How will you mark where you stopped reading?
4. An older family member with poor eyesight (like Ms. Silverberg) would like to look at your book. What can you do to make the text more readable?
5. Pick one of your short ebooks, and create a blog response to the Tekkids Topic of the Week. Your response should be no less than a paragraph, and complete sentences. ;-)

NOTE: you may go to Vocaroo.com and record your response using your microphone headset. If so, do this in a quiet space. Then post the Homework task, and vocaroo embed code on your blog.