Shenel Mason

Professor Lannon

ENC1101

29 January 2015

Text Books or Digital Books?

The once forest green leaves are transforming into a beautiful shade of tangy orange stars descending from the trees, creating puddles on the hot floor. 2015-fall term has just begun, and college students have once again flooded university bookstores in hopes of not breaking their crying wallets and purses as they are used for over priced, difficult to find passages, non-advanced textbooks. While on the flipside, a majority of students have moved on to E-Books or Digital Books. “E-books are essentially electronic digital text similar in content to traditional print books”(Fliess). Digital textbooks are better than traditional textbooks. They are more affordable, have multi-learning styles and have great search engines (ProCon, par.5).

To begin with, the era of traditional textbooks are over because of the noticeable cost deductions in digital books. Students pay an average $12,000 for textbooks every year, not including room, tuition and board charges (Lee, par 5). E-books are more cost friendly to students with “discounts that range from 50- 60 percent less than traditional texts”(ProCon, par. 3). For example, “Technology Ventures’’ business textbook costs $151.40 for a new copy, $113.55 for a used copy, and $83.90 for the e-book. Students can save even more by entering the e-book, which costs $65.60 ”(Lee, par.3).

That’s a tremendous discount from the original. Clearly, e-books in comparison with traditional textbooks would be the better option.

Furthermore, textbooks only have one learning style. This method is the act of the student only reading words on a page. All students have different ways they like to comprehend when they read by themselves. Some for example, are visual learners, who like videos and pictures. These students understand the passage better when there are videos that display examples and therefore create an in depth meaning in their minds (Fliess, par.1). They “need to see it to know it” (Moskowitz-Sweet, par. 3). Then they’re auditory learners, these student need the passage to be read aloud for them. They need “hear it to hold it.”(Moskowitz-Sweet), in order to capture the essence of what the passage means (Fliess, par.3). Only 34% of surveyed male and female students combined (18-25) can only read and understand which means more than half the student population is either a visual or an auditory reader (Fliess par,8). Consequently, students with traditional textbooks don’t completely understand the material that is given to them.

Moreover, E-books are not only light in weight and hold one’s personal notes, but they also have great search engines. E-Books are known for their searching database and memory. With just a type of a word or a phrase it locates all the passages where they may have been used, which is considerably better than spending hours trying to find the desired section. E-books are time effective and can turned wasted time in productive work (Lee ,par.4). More than half of college surveyed students’ preferred digital books over textbooks because they have less difficulty finding notes and passages (Lee, par.3).

In a nut shell, students should be able be able to buy digital text books because not only is it cost effective, but it provides another style for students to learn as well. E-books are also better than Textbooks because they have a great search engine for finding important passages without wasting time. “Since the conversion to digital, which began in 2007, graduation rates have increased from 64 percent to 90 percent (Lee, par.9). Test scores and attendance have also improved”(Lee par, 6). One can guess for them, which is the better textbook here.

Work Cited

Fliess ,Douglass, Suzanne. "What It Means to Be an Auditory Learner." What It Means to Be an Auditory Learner. Education, 5 Mar. 2009. Web. 1 Apr. 2015.

Fliess, Douglass Suzanne. "What It Means to Be a Visual Learner." What It Means to Be a Visual Learner. Education, 5 Mar. 2009. Web. 1 Apr. 2015. H

Lee, Ellen. "E-Books And Cost Pressures Push College Students Away From Textbooks." The Daily Beast. Newsweek/Daily Beast, 24 June 2013. Web. 1 Apr. 2015. .

Miller, Suzanne. "Learning Styles." Untitled Document. Faculty, 1 Jan. 2000. Web. 1 Apr. 2015. .

"Tablets vs. Textbooks - ProCon.org." ProConorg Headlines. ProCon, 9 Apr. 2014. Web. 1 Apr. 2015. .