August 2, 2007—Can the use of wireless handheld reading devices, or eBooks, in classrooms boost students’ interest in reading? According to a group of Ball State University researchers, the answer might be “yes.” A team of graduate students led by Richard Bellaver, associate director of Ball State’s Center for Information and Communications Sciences, is in the midst of a multi-year study designed to test the effectiveness of the wireless handheld device as a reading tool. The team has released its latest study results, which suggest that many elementary students who have been ambivalent toward reading in the past have displayed enthusiasm for reading with the devices.
“The evidence from teachers says that the kids are more interested and the poor readers are more eager to use the eBooks,” Bellaver said. “If we can get one student in 100 to start reading just because of the novelty of the eBook, it’s a great advantage.”
For this latest round of research, Bellaver and his team partnered with an Indiana elementary school to study the effects of eBooks on uninterested third- and fourth-grade readers. Teachers scanned a book and uploaded it to the eBook reading device, and funds from the research team’s grant were used to purchase access to the Reading A-Z web site.
Fifty students in all participated, and they used the $700 REB 1200 eBook reader from RCA as their hardware platform. (The device is now obsolete, Bellaver said; he and his team tried to procure new handhelds for this project, but their plans fell through when several companies declined to lend them devices for the duration of the research.)
At the beginning of the study, all 50 participating third- and fourth-grade students were familiar with the eBooks and had used them before for reading purposes. The research team hypothesized that the students, based on their previous exposure to the devices, would use the eBooks more quickly and without much difficulty. Twenty students completed a post-use satisfaction survey, in which 17 expressed a solid interest toward reading books, while the rest said they still did not like reading. Fifteen students said they liked reading on the handheld devices better than reading hardcover books, and most students reported that the activity was fun and interesting.
