Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced a new electronic book-reading device, the Kindle, just days after the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) reported a continuing decline in reading among today's students.

...the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) announces the release of To Read or Not To Read: A Question of National Consequence, a new and comprehensive analysis of reading patterns in the United States. ... The compendium reveals recent declines in voluntary reading and test scores alike, exposing trends that have severe consequences for American society.

For example, about 54 percent of 9-year-olds read every day for "fun;" employers consider as "deficient" in writing 72 percent of high school graduates. Dana Gioia, NEA chair comments, "Kids are doing better (reading more) at 9, and at 11. At 13, they're doing no worse, but then you see this catastrophic falloff. If kids are put into this electronic culture without any counterbalancing efforts, they will stop reading."

The Kindle reading device uses a new, high-resolution display technology called electronic paper, which aims to give the reader a crisp, black-and-white screen that resembles the appearance and readability of printed paper.

The screen recognizes ink, just like books and newspapers, but displays the ink particles electronically. Watch for costs to decline from the $399 initial suggested manufacturer's retail price. Sony's Portable Reader System, for example, sells for about $300, and the ASUS Eee (a subnotebook PC) is in the same price range.

eBooks for the Kindle cost about $10.

The Kindle is thinner than most paperbacks, weighs 10.3 ounces, and can hold about 200 books, along with newspapers, magazines, and a dictionary. Users can purchase secure-digital (SD) memory cards to increase the device's memory.

Readers can buy and download books directly to the Kindle without a PC through SprintNextel Corp.'s high-speed EV-DO cellular network without fees or contract commitments. They also can take notes on what they read and store their notes on Amazon's servers.

Now seems an appropriate time for teachers to buy a Tablet PC, UMPC, Kindle, Eee, or Portable Reading Service in order to learn to use them. Then, as teachers we can have an informed place at the table to address content issues, content management and licensing, and other policy decisions about ways to increase student reading and related learning rates.

What do you think: Will Kindle go to school?

Hmm. I wonder whether the NEA looked at reading rates of teachers? It would be interesting to see data that indicates relationships between teacher reading and student reading. That would be a nice master's thesis review of lit and PhD. dissertation research for someone.

Tablet PC Education Blog