The world's largest publisher in the field of education has taken the first step towards the gradual phasing out of printed books, making all of its learning resources digital. The press service of the British educational firm "Pearson" noted that from this point on, regular textbooks will be updated much less frequently. The company hopes this move will force more students to buy e-books that are constantly updated.
“Now we have a digital turnaround,” said John Fallon, BBC. “More than half of our annual revenue comes from digital sales, so we decided it was time to completely switch to a more modern level.”
Opt out of textbooks
The company currently receives 20% of its revenue from training software in the United States, but is experiencing difficulties as students increasingly choose to rent printed textbooks to save money. To counter this, Mr. Fallon said that Pearson would stop reviewing printed book models every three years, as it had done before.
This means that next year the company will update only 100 of 1,500 books in print - compared with 500 in 2019.
“For many more years, printed textbooks will be used, but I think they will gradually become a smaller part of the learning process,” Fallon said. “We learn by interacting with others, and the digital environment allows us to do this in a much more efficient way.”
Digital tutorials can be updated quickly, and include videos and grades that give students feedback. However, many Pearson digital products are sold by subscription. This raises doubts that the company's plans will be successful, because not all students can afford electronic books.
Can e-books replace books?
Fallon is right in one thing: e-books contain much more information than the more familiar print media. This makes it easy to find the right topics and generally simplifies the learning process. In some countries, a law was adopted 5-10 years ago, according to which, by 2020, it is only necessary to switch to the electronic training format.
However, surveys of students themselves show that material is better absorbed if it is printed on paper.
Surveys and Research
Specialists from the University of Maryland have published the results of many years of research. It turned out that children at school read electronic textbooks much faster than paper ones. But although the level of reading comprehension is approximately the same, it was found that e-book lovers cannot clearly answer the questions attached to the text. That is, the level of analysis of the read is low.
True, experts believe that this may be the result of a habit - they say, we are used to reading texts on gadgets quickly in order to save time. As a result, we do not always understand the meaning of what we read. If you read it carefully, then the perception of information submitted in electronic form will be quite acceptable.
Nevertheless, scientists note that the format of training depends on the purpose for which it is conducted. Information that needs to be learned as a whole is best served electronically. What needs to be studied in detail in memory is printed.