College v2

All this time you have probably thought that our iPod was just for playing your favorite songs. Wipe that misconception out of your mind, as we will explore how you can make your iPod a useful tool to study for your classes. You can use your iPod to downloaded books, textbook study guides and languages. Not only that, can buy additional software for the iPod that will let you record your professors lectures (so while your sleeping in class you catch up when you might not be nursing a bad hangover).

Stanford University and University of Wisconsin-Madison are among schools that have professors upload their lectures on iTunes so that they are available for students to download. You can probably get some brownie points if you share that information to a hip professor and encourage them to do the same thing. Not only will you impress the professor with a great idea, you’ll be helping your fellow students and not get bugged when some bozo keeps asking you for the notes that you took during class (for the ladies out there, the guys that are doing that probably have no interest in the notes and are just hitting on you).

Audible.com has a great product that brings textbooks to Mp3 format. That is a great for those who learn better through hearing or lectures and do not want to take the time to read the book. They offer a free chapter of a book so you should check the site out and see if you can locate a book that you may be using in your classes to see exactly how it works. The site includes Pearson Education textbooks in Business, Education, English, History books among many many others. “Right now it’s a small part of our business, but we believe it’s going to be a growing part of our overall strategy,” said Sandi Kirshner, chief marketing officer of Pearson’s higher education unit.

So is the future going to be full of people just listening to their tiny Mp3 players while in college? No, the big bad books will always have a place in college but the Mp3 players do have amazing potential to revolutionize they way we all learn. One thing is for certain, technology will allow for us to learn in many new ways that will enhance the learning experience and make it easier to tailor education to best fit our needs. I urge you to at least try out an e-book to see if it works for you. Sometimes you would be surprised at a book that you can’t just get through actually makes more sense if you listen to it.  I actually had the experience when I listened to “All Quiet on the Western Front” which was an abysmal read but a wonderful listening experience.