My child/student needs textbooks in digital format: how do I get them?
“I am a teacher and about half my class choose to lug a heavy book in and out everyday rather than download the textbook for use at home. This indicates how difficult the process is.” - Mary, Galway.
Unfortunately, Mary’s experience resonates with hundreds of teachers and parents across Ireland.
Even before the academic year ends, parents and teachers of children with learning difficulties are increasingly worried about obtaining textbooks in digital formats for the next year. This is because of the lack of a central repository of accessible textbooks for primary and post-primary students. The task often becomes complex as parents, teachers and schools are expected to contact different publishers individually, with each having their own process to request for books.
Even after a book is made available, their different formats, software compatibility and features do not always match the accessibility requirements of children who use them.
As a result, parents often feel frustrated and lost about how to proceed. To help parents deal with the challenge of obtaining and using digital books, we have outlined below,
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formats in which books are available (e.g. PDFs, e-books, etc.) from different publishers and organisations for primary and post-primary
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how you can get them
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technology required to use them