Abstract
The VText framework is designed to provide many of the desired features of an e-textbook in such a way that it provides pedagogical value rather than just convenience for students. Many so-called e-textbook solutions available today provide few features beyond those possible with hardcopy textbooks. The VText framework is built as an add-in to Microsoft’s note-taking program, OneNote. The add-in provides features which facilitate the use of OneNote as a reader and educational tool while leaving in place OneNote’s strengths in note-taking, collaboration, and search.
This paper discusses the necessary features of e-textbooks, the user experience of VText, and the planned evaluation of VText. The evaluation will consider factors such as usability, student learning performance, and satisfaction. The main areas of interest for the evaluation include effective note-taking in the e-text, rehearsal skills, facilitation of collaboration, ease of use for the student, improvements in integrating lectures and individual study, and the general utility of tools included in the plug-in such as the Bluetooth Scanner, which allows pictures to be inserted into OneNote from an Android device. The results will be used to generate suggestions for further improved work in this area.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Aust, R., Kelley, M., & Roby, W. (1993). The use of hyper-reference and conventional dictionaries. Educational Technology Research and Development, 41(4), 63–74. http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF02297512#page-1.
Daniel, D. B. E-textbooks at what cost? Performance and use of electronic v. Print texts. Computers & Education. http://www.citeulike.org/group/13454/article/7136283. Accessed 1 Nov 2012.
Guess, A. (2008). E-textbooks—For real this time? Inside higher education. Accessed 1 Nov 2012.
Kiewra, K. A., & Benton, S. L. (1988). The relationship between information-processing ability and notetaking. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 13(1), 33–44.
Kno. http://www.kno.com. Accessed 2 Nov 2012.
Marmarelli, T. (2010). The Reed College Kindle study. https://reed.edu/cis/about/kindle_pilot/Reed_Kindle_report.pdf. Accessed 1 June 2012.
Martinez, A. (2010). Amazon.com’s Kindle fails first college test. The Seattle Times. http://www.seattletimes.com. Accessed 1 July 2011.
Shepperd, J. A., Grace, J. L., & Koch, E. J. (2008). Evaluating the electronic textbook: Is it time to dispense with the paper text? Teaching of Psychology, 35(1), 2–5
Snowhill, L. (2001). E-books and their future in academic libraries: An overview. D-lib.http:// www.citeulike.org/group/13454/article/7136283.
Tront, J. (2010). Operations needed in e‐textbooks of the future. http://filebox.ece.vt.edu/~jgtront/wipte/e_textbook_functionality.pdf. Accessed 21 Feb 2011.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2015 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Cristy, J., Tront, J. (2015). VText: A Tablet Based E-Textbook Framework. In: Hammond, T., Valentine, S., Adler, A., Payton, M. (eds) The Impact of Pen and Touch Technology on Education. Human–Computer Interaction Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15594-4_15
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15594-4_15
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-15593-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-15594-4
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)