Effective communication is one of the most important resources for successful outreach efforts. This article addresses the benefits that can emerge from successful communication as well as the negative effects that may stem from ineffective communication. A case study of Florida Gulf Coast University Archives, Special Collections, & Digital…

The future for primary and secondary school textbooks is moving to digital ones, and faculties of schools, colleges, and departments of education (SCDEs) need to prepare preservice teachers for this change. Already, legislatures in 23 states have mandated that school systems use digital textbooks or digital resources as part of their textbook…

Numerous policymakers have called for K-12 educators to increase their effectiveness by transforming science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) learning and teaching with digital resources and tools. In this study we outline the significance of studying pressing issues related to use of digital resources in the K-12 environment and…

There has been a noticeable divide the past few years within the library world regarding electronic books. Many academic libraries have been purchasing or leasing web-based academic ebooks for years. Most public libraries on the other hand (thanks in large part to services such as OverDrive) have directed their attention toward downloadable…

Adopting digital materials such as eTextbooks and e-coursepacks is a potential strategy to address textbook affordability in the United States. However, university business relationships with bookstore vendors implicitly structure which instructional resources are available and in what manner. In this study, a document analysis was conducted on…

The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of microblogging as an authentic real-world technology in a middle school classroom in response to the 2010 Department of Education's call to provide students with more relevant digital experiences. The non-equivalent control group, pretest-posttest design study was used to determine if…

Traditional paper portfolios have been used to assess student work for performance and employment purposes for decades. The advent of electronic portfolios incorporating audio, video, hyperlinked documents and scanned images takes the use of portfolios to a new level. Evaluators can use these easily accessible portfolios to gauge student…

During the first-ever Digital Learning Day, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and Federal Communications Commission chief Julius Genachowski unveiled an ambitious plan earlier this year to get schools to switch from print to digital textbooks by 2017. Dubbed the Digital Textbook Playbook, it's a recommendation for how schools could transform…

To celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of the Isser and Rae Price Library of Judaica at the University of Florida, the Price Library launched the first stage of a project to digitize an important, special collection of anniversary editions of Jewish newspapers from around the world. This article provides the history of the collection, need for…

Recently, electronic books (e-books) have become prevalent amongst the general population, as well as students, owing to their advantages over traditional books. In South Africa, a number of schools have integrated tablets into the classroom with the promise of replacing traditional books. In order to realise the potential of e-books and their…

Commonly spearheaded by librarians, Kindle pilot programs are springing up in schools around the country, bringing ereaders to K-12 students, who are cracking the spine, so to speak, on these alternative learning tools. From full adoption of the devices at Clearwater High School in Florida to tentative beta projects, educators are exploring how…

Within academic library collections, electronic journals are a mainstay. Ebooks, on the other hand, have established themselves as a viable alternative to the print book more slowly. The growing acceptance and prevalence of ebooks cannot be ignored. As libraries continue to build their collections, ebooks play an increasingly larger role in…

This article presents a case study on two fourth grade students with learning disabilities in two different writing situations: writing for test preparation and writing for digital stories. The students' writing behaviors, processes, and products in these two settings are contrasted. The differences in the students' writing experiences suggest…

This research was designed to explore the learning experiences of state college students using mobile electronic textbook (e-book) readers. The purpose of the study was to build a rich description of how students used e-books delivered on mobile computing devices for college-level, introductory sociology courses at a public state college in the…

This paper is a summary of the project that the author completed at Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) library for providing online access to 80 open access E-journals and digital collections. Although FGCU uses SerialsSolutions products to establish online access, any one can provide access to these collections as they are free for all. Paper…