William Melton

Creation of an iBook as an educational resource

Topics

❖ Background

❖ Basic content

❖ Interactive content

❖ Things to think about

❖ Setbacks

❖ Summary

Background

❖ 4 week ‘Personal Excellence Pathway’ at the Manchester Medical School.

❖ Lack of prior teaching on examination of the cardiovascular system.

❖ Decided to create an iBook to rectify the issue.

Basic Content❖ Majority of the content was explanation using

text.

❖ Created using scientific papers, textbooks and common knowledge.

❖ Shadowed consultant cardiologists in the hospital to ascertain common practice and explore some of the more intricate parts of the examination.

❖ Most however was drawn from prior knowledge picked up during the first few years of education.

Interactive Content

❖ iBooks Author❖ FREE

❖ Intuitive and easy to use

❖ Numerous styles to fit any kind of book.

❖ Easy to import other content including movies and ‘widgets’.

❖ Only used to create iBooks, no other format supported.

Interactive Content

❖Glossary❖ Useful way of including fine details which are not included

in the main content of the book.

❖ Can include pictures and links to further explain and describe what is found in the main content.

❖ Links in the text in the glossary can provide a summary without pictures or can take you through to the glossary where pictures are included.

Interactive Content

❖iMovie❖ Basic video editing

application provided on all macs. FREE.

❖ Easy to use and creates basic but slick videos.

❖ Tip - if you’re creating a lot of video content use a low resolution.

❖ Can take up a lot of space on computer - bear in mind before beginning.

Interactive Content

❖iPhoto❖Once again… Apple product.

❖Only used to edit photos slightly to enhance and crop the features being shown.

❖Useful bit of free software that supported all my photo editing needs.

Interactive Content

❖Widgets❖Many websites dedicated to

creating widgets.

❖I chose bookry.com, free to use as long as you credit their widget with their logo.

❖Could employ a slightly easier method to create widgets.

❖More complicated widgets than mine could require more investment of both time and money.

Things to think about

❖ Do you want your iBook to be free? - brings a whole new range of issues.

❖ Do you want your iBook to be available on androids or kindles etc.?

❖ Think about purchasing an instructional handbook - save time on trial and error.

❖ How to control the distribution of your iBook outside of the Apple store.

Setbacks

❖ Finding and creating the interactive content - photos of clinical signs particularly.

❖ The amount of space taken up by the videos created for the iBook.

❖ Creating the cover design - required expertise in design software I did not possess.

❖ For the iBook to be used by the Manchester Medical School it had to be certified by two consultants.

Summary❖ Educational iBooks can be created by both

students and staff in a relatively small amount of time.

❖ They require very little prior knowledge and experience.

❖ There are a number of useful free applications out there that can help make your iBook look great.

❖ Prior thought should be given to publishing and distribution of the iBooks.

Any Questions?