Phantasy Star: Fringes of Algo

It's "hello" iPads and "goodbye" to textbooks at some schools where more and more, everyone seems to be joining the electronic age for some reason or other:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/ ... 50251238/1

I'll bet school kids, and other students of various ages, will really love the iPads.

I remember having to log around what seemed like tons of books from class to class every day....it was torture!! I had a school locker but some classes were so far apart there wasn't time to go back to the locker before class so you just had to take all the books with you.

Comments or Opinions? What do you think...iPads or textbooks??

I have no qualms regarding to the use of electronic devices to make it easier and better for the students, but I think using the iPad is a huge error. The correct choice would be to use an e-reader, for it is lighter and focused on displaying books and other readable material.

Not only reading at the iPad can be tiresome for many people, like reading in the computer, but also it is an invitation for procrastinating during the classes. My aunt is a teacher and she complains about the electronic gadgets like cellphones and smartphones because our educational system is going downhill and these devices are only making it go faster. Of course there always have been the students who never paid attention to the classes, but if it is already difficult to get the attention of someone who is not interested in the class, it is much worse if the student's attention is somewhere else, like messaging, playing games or surfing on the web.

I agree with tili. I think schools should enter the electronic age like this, but yes, iPads are probably the wrong way to do it, as it invites goofing off. I think maybe a kindle would be better.

A lot of text books today are two inches thick, so moving to electronic formats is great not only for the students, but also for the environment. It means a lot less paper usage. I would have loved to have something like an e-reader back in school. I often had to carry a full day's worth of books because I had classes on opposite sides of the campus and just five minutes to get from one to the other.

I do have to agree with the concerns about using an iPad, though. That invites many possible avenues for distraction. A dedicated device that does nothing but read textbooks would be better.

I just received a iPad as a very early birthday gift. At the moment it serves as my e-reader and what apps I do have on it are towards what projects I am currently working on, mainly some drawing apps and writing ones.

I wished when I went to college that I had this tool with me. It also makes me wonder if this definitely cuts the cost for college text books (expensive!). In all honesty I think as long as all the text books are in ebook format it doesn't matter what kind of tablet you are using (also you are responsible for how you spend your time).

I would favor using e-readers over text books plus paper is saved!