I’m a maths tutor and year on year, student after student, I end up writing down the same notes during the course of the lessons. I have been thinking for a while now that if I had the appropriate combination of tablet pc and software, I could use it during lessons as I teach and then store the notes so that I can provide students with, say, pdf files to help them revise - and spend less time writing out concepts in lessons - which would give more time applying those concepts.
This seems like a niche market and I’ve struggled to find enough information on any of the products out there to convince me to buy. Anyone shed some light?
beowulff - the whiteboard is neat, but not appropriate for the one-to-one tuition format. Hari, I really want to be able to write down my notes rather than type them, so the process is more easily integrated into the type of lesson I teach.
Scanning is time consuming, and would intrude on the lesson time, as the student needs to take the notes with them. Going straight into a tablet format means that the notes can be stored and sent after the lesson.
I’m seeing that microsoft has some downloads that should deal with this situation, and there are some other applications out there that should do the trick. Now its a case of finding the right bit of hardware.
I’d just get some cheap sort of wacom tablet or something, if you just want to be able to write.
Still, lowtech solutions existed in the past: write all your stuff on carbonless copy paper, give the student the copy, and then take the time to scan things in later (or, prior to computers, photocopy). Though I’m not exactly sure how much time you’d save by doing what you are doing, as the student will likely get much more out of you actually doing the work in front of them. The best you could get is to write down everything you are saying, but that’s gonna cost you more time than scanning each sheet of paper, which you don’t want to do.
Consider a LiveScribe pen. It will let you capture pen input (on specialized dot-encoded paper*) that can be exported to PDF.
It also records audio synchronized with the pen stroke, so if you write your notes during a lecture, the playback will provide some audio context for what you’ve written. (The PDF exports will be static, of course, so they won’t carry this synchronized audio, but if your students are willing to install the LiveScribe software they can read/hear the native files you create.)
I own one but have barely used it, so I can’t tell you much more about it, but check out their website to see if it fits your needs.
(* The paper isn’t all that expensive, and they even have software available that will allow you to print your own.)
If you just want a scan or scribble-capture mechanism that will save an image of what you write down, some kind of tablet device is the way to go, but it won’t “mathify” your scribbles in any way.
If you want the actual content/format of the math represented in the electronic document, you’ll need to encode it in some way, which means typing.
If you want flexible output for web use, MathJax is probably the way to go.
Any Windows tablet PC that runs Microsoft One Note should suffice. It’s like writing on paper, and then being able to save as .pdf. I used it on my ThinkPad tablet for class notes, and was able to scribble notes (including math notations - basically any freehand) on blank pages as well as on the instructors’ powerpoint slides. Just go down to a Frys or Best Buy and try it out, see if that’s what you want.
The LiveScribe concept is one of those really clever ideas which, if only it could reach critical mass, could provide imaginative solutions to a great number of specialist tasks. Sadly I expect it will wither and die and never achieve the success it deserves.
:rolleyes: I know Apple fans might find it hard to believe, but tablets have been around for a while now. It is not a new idea.
Anyway, any tablet notebook or a standard notebook with Windows 7 will suffice. Windows 7 has built in handwritten math recognition. There is also software out there that will do maths handwriting recognition. I’ve never used it though; I’ve had the most success with just Windows 7.
Thanks for the replies everyone! dogeman - what you’ve linked to is pretty much exactly what I’m after.
BigT, I get what you’re saying about the student watching the work being done in front of them. I certainly don’t intend to stop working through examples with the students; I am looking for a way to streamline processes such as writing down methods, revision techniques etc.
In the long run I hope to be able to catalogue all the notes, examples, resource references and exercises into something resembling a textbook; I know I don’t have the time to sit down and do this as a separate project, but I figure if i’m going through all this in lessons I might as well start organising it into digital format.
Cheers for the help folks, I think I know what my next step needs to be.
Cheers,
David.