In our fifth week of Digital Technologies, we learned how to use the application Book Creator on the iPads and the benefits of using an eBook for children and educators. Today we had to complete an assessment where we had to create two eBooks. The first one we created was Life as a Student at UWS. The second eBook was to create the summary of a well-known children’s book. I thought it would be a very challenging assessment as I had never used the eBook application before.

The Oxford dictionary defines an eBook as ” an electronic version of a printed book which can be read on a computer or a specifically designed handheld device” (Oxford Dictionary, 2018). Book Creator is an easy way of making your own eBooks through an application on the iPad. It is a very useful tool that can make different books such as, children’s picture books, comic books, textbooks and many more. There are many benefits of using eBooks. According to Beauchamp (2012, p81) “eBooks use many modes of communication which includes visual representation, sound, movement, gesture and language.” It is a great way of communication with others as it has various tools available. Moreover, it can also provide personalisation. By allowing pupils to write down their thoughts and feelings in a variety of ways. For example, they can write, record sound and video, draw, and even combine them together. This depends on their age and ability (Beauchamp, 2012, p101). Ebooks are considered to be multimodal as they combine two or more semiotic systems. Altogether there are five semiotic systems which are linguistic, visual, audio, gestural and spatial. By using eBooks this covers all of these semiotic systems. Another advantage of an eBook is “being small and highly portable with very small power requirements, eBook readers and tablets work in a tremendous range of environments” (Jarvis, 2005, p146-7). This is especially useful for children as they can take their device outside the classroom and use it to take pictures or record videos or sound. This is something I can relate to as I went around the UWS campus taking pictures, videos and sounds whilst creating our eBook. According to Education Scotland (2009), when planning for learning in any curriculum area it is important for practitioners to make sure that children have access and encounter a wide range of texts of different types, in different media. Examples of texts are novels, short stories, poems, CVs, letters, emails, graphs, timetables, films, games, reviews, text messages and so much more.

The Experience and Outcomes for this task  are:

TCH 1-01a “I can explore no experiment with digital technologies no can use what I learn to support and enhance my learning in different contexts.”  (Education Scotland, 2016)

TCH 0-11a ” I explore and discover different ways of representing ideas in imaginative ways.”

(Education Scotland, 2016)

LIT 0-21b ” As I play and learn, I enjoy exploring interesting materials for writing and different ways f recording my experiences and feelings, ideas and information”     (Education Scotland, 2004)

Overall, I think that eBooks have many advantages in the classroom and are very useful for developing literacy skills as well their technology skills. Book Creator is a very flexible, easy tool to use and is easily accessible. Book Creator allows children to use their imagination and record their ideas and thoughts. EBooks can also be used as a teaching tool and therefore children can be left to follow instructions on their own. This can improve their problem solving skills. This is also useful for the educator as one group could be working on the eBook whilst the teacher focuses on another group.  I would definitely use this tool in the classroom. I found the assessment task challenging today as there was a lot to do in the time we had but I enjoyed the challenge and learned something new that I could use in a classroom.

References

Beauchamp, G. (2012) ICT in the Primary School: From Pedagogy to Practice. Pearson.

Education Scotland (2009) Building the Curriculum 4. [Online] Available: http://www.gov.scot/Resource/Doc/288517/0088239.pdf [Accessed: 6th February 2018].

Education Scotand (2004) Curriculum for Excellence: Literacy and English. Experiences and Outcomes. [Online] Available: https://education.gov.scot/Documents/literacy-english-eo.pdf  [Accessed 6th February 2018].

Education Scotand (2016) Curriculum for Excellence: Technologies. Experiences and Outcomes. [Online] Available:  https://education.gov.scot/Documents/Technologies-es-os.pdf  [Accessed: 6th February 2018].

Jarvis, M. (2015) Brilliant Ideas for Using ICT in the Classroom: A Very Practical Guide for Teachers and Lecturers. Routledge

OxFord Dictioary (2018) [Online] Available: https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/e-book  [Accessed: 6th February].