Norwegian University of Science and Technology
NTNU University Library
photo Morten Oddvik
The E-reader project was launched by the University library of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology(NTNU) in 2009. The project tried to challenge the traditional ways of teaching information literacy by introducing digital reading lists on e-readers for the participants and ask them to give feedback on the positive and negative outcome of their studying experience.
A very large amount of the literature budget is used every year by the library into purchasing electronic resources, that is e-journals, e-books or reference databases thus the idea of investigating the possibility for an electronic information resource service seemed important. The aim was to be able to provide increased access of the digital recourses for the university users. The project chose to examine possible ways of digital service applications for learning communities of the NTNU University and established pilot-projects that could give us an insight in the challenges one had to face in such a process. The “libridgets” project established different collaborations with academic departments at NTNU, in order to promote the available digital resources. The project established a blog for communication purposes in 2009 (http://e-pensum.blogspot.com) and a network with other university libraries experimenting on the same subject in 2010 for experience exchange and technical support.
The project has been a collaboration with teachers and students at the Institute of Archaeology and Religious Studies and the Program for Teacher’s Education at NTNU (PLU) in Trondheim. The University library has bought for that purpose, 3 Irex, 2 Sony readers, 6 ipads and 8 Kindles. The e-curriculum is already a technological possibility - and thus a practical reality for a modern university and its library. 16 students in total, that is, three Archaeology students, three Process engineering and ten PLU students from NTNU, have been testing and reading their assigned articles through these e-readers during two semesters 2009-2010. The project was initiated by the NTNU University library after receiving the NTNU Strategy funds in 2009. We asked the students to give us feedback on the use of the e-readers through online surveys at the beginning and at the end of the semester and through emails. We held an introductory face to face class at the beginning of the semester to get them started and an endnote introductory course in the middle of the semester that became very much appreciated according to their responses. The library examined how the students access their reading lists and discipline related e-books and articles and how quality assured information resources, and how they use that information in their academic writing.
The project would also observe and collect answers on the technological skills and the digital skills of the participants and evaluate the impact of a multi-purpose tablet technology in a particular learning situation. We saw pretty early that the marketing value of using new gadgets made the project very popular among our users especially in the case of the ipads that were bought in at a time that apple would not yet sell them in Norway. We also realized early that technological skills and personal interests of using the readers and fully exploit their possibilities among users was very varied and thus influential on the learning outcomes of the participants.
Even those who were very interested and skilled commented that "synchronising across different standards and platforms can be just as frustrating as a twisted copy machine.”(Morten Oddvik`s blog, visited November 2010). Five different questionnaire surveys were developed in cooperation with the subject teachers and adjusted to the course context for the participants to answer. We got 72 responses collected by both pre- and post tests. In both projects the teachers were very positive about the use of digital formats and tools and that allowed the students to be willing to experiment with the new tools.
Students who have borrowed reading devices in both projects have given positive feedback on the cost savings and the practical advantages of using e-readers instead of buying books and journals. Ida, a participant from the 2010 project says in an article published at the University newspaper, "I'm going to the University for a writing task and what i carry with me is what I need. It is no longer five books and a compendium packed as it was when I began to study five years ago . The heavy bag is replaced with a small bag, and in that there are two digital tools. My ipad and my mac. The bus ride allows me to use the ipad easily and read. No thousand sheets to be kept track of, because I read on a black thin screen”. Most of the participants have commented on the advantage of having an easy access through multiple media like both iphone and ipad no matter where they were to their reading lists. The fact that the Kindle and ipad had very good readability and longer battery life than the pc or mac was also very important to the students. Irex and Sony did not seem to satisfy the users for many reasons. Cost and technical limitations of Apple's application systems though, has been a problem for the ipad users. Poor annotating tools on the pdf files has a negative feedback from Kindle users. While at pre-tests on the general question whether they would prefer to have printed articles instead of digital reading lists, 93% prefer to print out on paper instead of reading on screen or read on the readers and 12 out of 46 declared an interest in borrowing a e-e-reader. That seemed to change at the post-tests where out of the 10 that used the e-readers during the whole semester 80% preferred to read through the digital readers than to print the articles. The most positive experience students had in using the electronic tablets was that they actually read and reviewed their assigned readings more frequently. They also started studying much earlier at the semester because their documents were accessible to them at anytime and at any place. The most important outcome for the library was the close contact with both students and their teachers along the way. After the experience of two e-reading projects from 2009 and 2010 we have seen that “availability” and “easy access” are the services everyone expects and appreciates. They are willing to both use the digital resources and reduce paper consumption as long as it is easy to do it on their pc / mac / e-reader, by one click.
The feedback we have received can be summarized in three sentences here:
1. Tomorrow's graduates - in all areas - are faced with increased demands for digital literacy.
2. University Library can play an active role in strengthening students & researchers' digital literacy.
3. All e-resources University Library pays for must be clearly accessible by only "one click" to all users.
Alexandra Angeletaki, Project Manager
NTNU University Library
The E-reader project was launched by the University library of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology(NTNU) in 2009. The project tried to challenge the traditional ways of teaching information literacy by introducing digital reading lists on e-readers for the participants and ask them to give feedback on the positive and negative outcome of their studying experience.
A very large amount of the literature budget is used every year by the library into purchasing electronic resources, that is e-journals, e-books or reference databases thus the idea of investigating the possibility for an electronic information resource service seemed important. The aim was to be able to provide increased access of the digital recourses for the university users. The project chose to examine possible ways of digital service applications for learning communities of the NTNU University and established pilot-projects that could give us an insight in the challenges one had to face in such a process. The “libridgets” project established different collaborations with academic departments at NTNU, in order to promote the available digital resources. The project established a blog for communication purposes in 2009 (http://e-pensum.blogspot.com) and a network with other university libraries experimenting on the same subject in 2010 for experience exchange and technical support.
The project has been a collaboration with teachers and students at the Institute of Archaeology and Religious Studies and the Program for Teacher’s Education at NTNU (PLU) in Trondheim. The University library has bought for that purpose, 3 Irex, 2 Sony readers, 6 ipads and 8 Kindles. The e-curriculum is already a technological possibility - and thus a practical reality for a modern university and its library. 16 students in total, that is, three Archaeology students, three Process engineering and ten PLU students from NTNU, have been testing and reading their assigned articles through these e-readers during two semesters 2009-2010. The project was initiated by the NTNU University library after receiving the NTNU Strategy funds in 2009. We asked the students to give us feedback on the use of the e-readers through online surveys at the beginning and at the end of the semester and through emails. We held an introductory face to face class at the beginning of the semester to get them started and an endnote introductory course in the middle of the semester that became very much appreciated according to their responses. The library examined how the students access their reading lists and discipline related e-books and articles and how quality assured information resources, and how they use that information in their academic writing.
The project would also observe and collect answers on the technological skills and the digital skills of the participants and evaluate the impact of a multi-purpose tablet technology in a particular learning situation. We saw pretty early that the marketing value of using new gadgets made the project very popular among our users especially in the case of the ipads that were bought in at a time that apple would not yet sell them in Norway. We also realized early that technological skills and personal interests of using the readers and fully exploit their possibilities among users was very varied and thus influential on the learning outcomes of the participants.
Even those who were very interested and skilled commented that "synchronising across different standards and platforms can be just as frustrating as a twisted copy machine.”(Morten Oddvik`s blog, visited November 2010). Five different questionnaire surveys were developed in cooperation with the subject teachers and adjusted to the course context for the participants to answer. We got 72 responses collected by both pre- and post tests. In both projects the teachers were very positive about the use of digital formats and tools and that allowed the students to be willing to experiment with the new tools.
Students who have borrowed reading devices in both projects have given positive feedback on the cost savings and the practical advantages of using e-readers instead of buying books and journals. Ida, a participant from the 2010 project says in an article published at the University newspaper, "I'm going to the University for a writing task and what i carry with me is what I need. It is no longer five books and a compendium packed as it was when I began to study five years ago . The heavy bag is replaced with a small bag, and in that there are two digital tools. My ipad and my mac. The bus ride allows me to use the ipad easily and read. No thousand sheets to be kept track of, because I read on a black thin screen”. Most of the participants have commented on the advantage of having an easy access through multiple media like both iphone and ipad no matter where they were to their reading lists. The fact that the Kindle and ipad had very good readability and longer battery life than the pc or mac was also very important to the students. Irex and Sony did not seem to satisfy the users for many reasons. Cost and technical limitations of Apple's application systems though, has been a problem for the ipad users. Poor annotating tools on the pdf files has a negative feedback from Kindle users. While at pre-tests on the general question whether they would prefer to have printed articles instead of digital reading lists, 93% prefer to print out on paper instead of reading on screen or read on the readers and 12 out of 46 declared an interest in borrowing a e-e-reader. That seemed to change at the post-tests where out of the 10 that used the e-readers during the whole semester 80% preferred to read through the digital readers than to print the articles. The most positive experience students had in using the electronic tablets was that they actually read and reviewed their assigned readings more frequently. They also started studying much earlier at the semester because their documents were accessible to them at anytime and at any place. The most important outcome for the library was the close contact with both students and their teachers along the way. After the experience of two e-reading projects from 2009 and 2010 we have seen that “availability” and “easy access” are the services everyone expects and appreciates. They are willing to both use the digital resources and reduce paper consumption as long as it is easy to do it on their pc / mac / e-reader, by one click.
The feedback we have received can be summarized in three sentences here:
1. Tomorrow's graduates - in all areas - are faced with increased demands for digital literacy.
2. University Library can play an active role in strengthening students & researchers' digital literacy.
3. All e-resources University Library pays for must be clearly accessible by only "one click" to all users.
Alexandra Angeletaki, Project Manager
