A new conundrum-most of my students, like many low income folks (and probably teens especially), access the internet through their cell phones. I mentioned to a couple of them that they could get ebooks on their phones, and they seemed totally astonished by this, which leads me to believe that it hasn't become common knowledge in their home communities. Having told them this, however, I find that I'm at somewhat of a loss as to what to suggest. From my perspective, any app that I recommend should:
1-not require any kind of credit card to download books
2-make it easy to download books on a phone, as opposed to downloading them on a computer and transferring to a phone
3-make it easy to access or find  free, contemporary ebooks FROM the phone
4-be free itself
5-have free books available that my students would enjoy.

So far I have not had luck finding an ereader with these characteristics. Although a lot of the commercial apps do have access to free books (Kindle is an example), it isn't possible to sort by price on your phone, the way it is online. You can get to their list of free classics, but these are not the books my students are likely to want to read. (This is also a problem with sites like Many Books and Gutenberg, which several apps allow you to add as bookstores and where books are all free but also old.) I am stymied. This seems like such a great way to get my students to read more (and to get more books to low income folks generally), but I can't see a student friendly way to do it. Ideas?
0

Add a comment

Popular Posts
Popular Posts
  • I've been thinking a lot recently about this book, Swastika Night , by Katherine Burdekin, which I originally read a couple of years ag...
  • was a really hard day. We're trying to combine 2 GED subjects into one class, but because some of the students have already taken one of...
  • I think I've written here before about the difficulty I've had with getting my students to discuss dialect in a productive way. Cons...
  • It is now the third week of the Israeli assault on Gaza , and I'm faced with the vastly less important fact that I've been trying to...
  • I know I am overdue for a post here to talk about how race and class come to intersect--I put it off not because I don't think it's ...
  • To continue from my previous post, the second thing I wanted to write about reading Communal Luxury is actually about the title. In one of ...
About Me
About Me
I'm a Jewish progressive who is really angry about racism and the uses and misuses of American history. I have a Ph.D and am currently in a Masters program for Library Science. I read a lot.
Blog Archive
My Blog List
My Blog List
Subscribe
Subscribe
Subscribe
Subscribe
Loading
Dynamic Views theme. Powered by Blogger. Report Abuse.