Stacy Grant and Jason Crist (2005) outlined ways Tablet PCs increase efficiency while lowering costs of teaching and learning. Teachers and others responsible for increasing learning rates while decreasing costs may find their observations useful. In short, they argue that mobile PCs add teaching-learning workflow compatibility variables to other forms of computer technologies in schools.
Workflow compatibility … substantially enhances the usability and productivity of computing in education … Tablet PCs permit computing to more closely mimic standard teacher and student work flows while substantially increasing efficiency.
Here’s why they argue efficiencies and lower teaching and learning costs:
With a Tablet PC and appropriate software, students can create, edit and organize handwritten (digital) Ink notes in a searchable format and can capture text and drawings typically created by using pen and paper.
Microsoft Office OneNote 2003 brings together ink, text and Web content in one simple location increasing the integration of classroom notes with other research resources. Students can (a) integrate ink into everyday programs, including Microsoft Office System and many third-party programs; (b) send ink e-mail messages to friends in Microsoft Office Outlook 2003; (c) mark up a Microsoft Office Word 2003 document; or (d) annotate a Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003 presentation for a group project.
Students can dictate audio notes as they read through their textbooks or record a class lecture. Also, with linked audio capabilities, students’ Tablet PCs can record audio at the same time the student is taking notes! And, because notes are directly synched with the audio track, students will never miss any lecture content. A student can view notes that correspond to any audio segment at any time. When doing homework, the student can make use of typical desktop peripherals.
Teachers can annotate classroom presentations, write corrections on homework using digital ink and send students handwritten e-mails. In addition, teachers can instantly access Web-based content, streaming multimedia content, annotate key points on classroom presentations and e-mail comments to the entire class.
Each of these Tablet PC features and their various permutations save teaching and learning time, thus increasing efficiencies without interrupting customary teacher-student workflows.
Newer than the 2005 versions of Tablet PCs these authors describe, Ultra-Mobile PCs and other upcoming mobile PCs offer even faster processing power, more memory and other features that likely increase teaching-learning efficiencies further.