I’m pretty slow at updating to new technology. I finally got a smart phone (which I still jokingly like to call a magic phone) at the end of 2012, largely because I wanted to have maps readily available on an upcoming trip to San Francisco.
I know I’m not the last one to move this way, but at the time nearly everyone I knew had upgraded. I did so grudgingly.
Now I’ve moved into the 21st century by purchasing a Kindle. I’d held off from buying one, because I really do like the feel of having a book in my hands. I love the smell of the pages. I love the coloring of the pages of an older book. I love perusing my book shelf to reread some of my most-loved tomes. But, I also find myself purging my book collection from time-to-time. When I move it is inconvenient to move so many books. So with Amazon Prime Day occurring this week, I found an offer that I couldn’t refuse.
I’ve been playing with it, and I am amazed. There are so many free books available. Gutenberg.org offers thousands of books that are public domain in Kindle format. Amazon.com also offers many books for free. Often these are older, classics, but I’m looking forward to catch up on reading I missed out on either during middle and high school, or even college. Even so, there are many newer free books too. And, any books I do decide to buy, I’m looking forward to getting them at lower prices.
As I’ve been playing with this new tool, I’ve also been thinking about how wonderful it would be for each of my students to have one. Since I work in a low income school, there are many students who struggle with reading. The Kindle offers options to help find the definitions to words as you are reading the text, and those words are saved to a vocabulary builder. You can highlight and bookmark text so you can go back. You can take and share notes, which would certainly be useful in a class setting. It will provide the same sorts of services for many other languages too, and I’m looking forward to using some of these tools with French texts. And eventually Spanish…
But I wish my students had something like this.
When I bought it, I didn’t think I would need a protector for it. Once it arrived, and I realized how I would end up using it (i.e. I would probably throw it in my bag and take it with me a lot.), I decided I did. Instead of spending $20+ for a protector, I made one out of a leather scrap I had. I’m pretty pleased with how it turned out.
I’m so excited to have so many stories and ideas at my finger tips with this device. I am glad I took the time to make sure I would really use this tool.
I can definitely say I will.