Excited by Tablet Computing

I've recently begun using a tablet computer as part of a pilot project to assess its potential educational impact -- I'm impressed! I think the advent of tablet computing signals a MAJOR evolution for students using laptops at school because the tablet combines three capabilities. Some of these items are not unique to tablet computers, but the combination, in this package, creates an extremely robust platform for student computing.

Pen-based Computing: Tablet, or "pen-based" computing lets you write on the touch-sensitive screen as if you were writing on paper. The special pen also acts as your mouse. The things you write can either stay in your handwriting, or can be converted into typed text. The writing felt strange to do at first, but now seems as natural as pen & paper.

Organization: Any computer, including the tablet, can be used as an organization aid. Saving and storing files, and keeping them organized in various folders can save students from losing papers. Web site addresses can be organized. Electronic calendars can provide an organized way to keep track of homework, assignments, and extracurricular activities. Microsoft has added another tool to the organization arsenal. It's a new addition to the Office suite (just for tablets) titled "OneNote." It provides a virtually organized notebook [more on this below].

Voice Recognition: Voice-to-text dictation software takes your spoken text and converts it to typed text. The last time I tried it - a few years ago - the accuracy was not very good. I just tried it on this tablet, and it has improved greatly. It's part of Windows XP and is thus not unique to the tablet; but the concurrent release of the tablet with the improved dictation capability is a powerful evolution. As students adapt to this new computing platform, they may be more likely to adopt voice recognition as an avenue for text entry. I'd guess that in about 10 years the computer keyboard will join typewriters as an antique.

The combination of these items has produced an educational device which may actually meet the promise of student laptop program advocates. If Todd Oppenheimer is reading this I'm sure he's cringing at the prospect of yet another expensive and untested classroom technology being vaunted by an idealist, so let me explain why this technology has got me pumped…

So far, I am using the tablet more as a student during my graduate classes than in my role as a teacher/ed-tech specialist. I am taking two tough classes this semester (as well as an internship), not to mention working full time, so I am experiencing the hard-pressed organizational and note-taking demands of a student first-hand!

The tablet I'm using is a Toshiba Portégé M200 with Windows XP and Microsoft Office 2003 Tablet Edition which includes the new application named "OneNote," a virtual notebook. It looks like a blank sheet of notebook paper, and you write on it with the tablet pen. It has tabs across the top for each subject (e.g. Math, English, History, Science; or in my case: Evaluation, Seminar, Internship). For each subject you can have as many pieces of digital paper as you want. Their titles appear down the side of the notebook. Writing with the pen on the screen is a little disconcerting at first, because there is less friction than with real paper, and there is a small gap between the tip of the pen and the actual digital ink which appears under it. After a few hours of writing, this strange feeling goes away. I feel I now have a truly digital notebook with an unending supply of paper and the ability to contain as many subjects as I need. I can take notes, draw graphics, and doodle to my heart's content. I can e-mail my pages, post them to the web, delete or reorganize them, or convert them to Microsoft Word. The tablet pen also acts as the mouse; and again, after a few days with it, the pen seems a lot easier to use than a touchpad, trackball, or regular mouse. Sorry for the cliché, but I think Microsoft has hit a home run with this new application. Microsoft OneNote also includes something called SideNote, which is an application for quickly taking notes in other programs. Whereas OneNote fills the screen, SideNote appears as its own little window floating on top of whatever other application you're using. You can write little notes, or if you select some text or an image in another application, you can drag it onto the SideNote window. It is copied to SideNote and if it is coming from the Internet it includes the source URL automatically. This feature is a real boon to students' bibliographies.

I have been using Dragon's NaturallySpeaking 7.3 voice recognition software on my desktop computer system for about a year. I've started using it seriously in the last six months because of my workload taking a toll on my tender forearms. Although keyboarding is currently the standard method of entering text for almost all computer users, it is inefficient and is detrimental over the long-term. NaturallySpeaking has always been a better dictation software product than the built-in Microsoft product. Unfortunately, it's not yet compatible with the tablet PC operating system. As such, I’m forced to reevaluate the Microsoft product; and initial indications bode well! After only five minutes of training the program did a decent job of recognizing my text. It doesn't have the same correction capabilities by voice-command as NaturallySpeaking, but this may not be a stumbling block for our students who might prefer to do corrections manually. Although a quiet environment makes it easier to dictate, I've recently realized that the microphone and program still function quite well with a fair amount of background noise. I can't imagine a classroom full of students all dictating simultaneously - since no one would be able to focus on their own thoughts; but it does excite me to consider students going home with their tablets and writing papers via dictation. I think in a few years, you'll probably be able to whisper into a microphone, and have near 100% accuracy. The software just keeps getting better.

It seems predictable that the next logical item to bundle with tablets will be digital versions of every textbook. This will allow students to carry this one device, rather than a backpack full of heavy books, bursting at the seams. We are quite close to this as a reality. Now, if I could just get my professors to start giving me all the hand-outs electronically, instead of on paper...