Getting children to read and love books!

I often hear complaints from parents that their children are not interested in books - this is a growing problem - I know many college students who hardly read any books other than those in their academic curriculum. The unfortunate fact is that they dont even know what they are missing and are blissfully happy with their iPods and Facebook. What makes the situation even sadder is that the reading habit is very difficult to develop later in life and if the interest is not kindled in childhood, a grand and majestic avenue of life is closed permanently.

So what can we do about it?

Well, my question to the parents would be - how many books do you read? You will seldom find a child not liking books in a household where at least one parent is an avid reader. However, that does not solve the problem for those parents who unfortunately have not developed a reading habit - what can they do?

I would suggest three steps:

1. Start early: get the children familiar with books at the earliest age possible - even 2 or 3 years is not too young. Btw, if the children are older and starting late, any type of books are fine - many parents are skeptical about comics. But, comics are indeed a good place to start.

2. Read with them: I don’t mean reading aloud (which is also very good for small children), but reading the same books that they are reading. Parents who do not typically read many books should take the effort to read a few of the children’s books - try Harry Potter for example and you might also end up loving books!. This leads to the most important thing - you should discuss the book and its story or content at the family dining table or TV room or wherever the whole family gets together. Make sure that the discussion is natural and not forced - it need not be long - maybe just a retelling of a joke or a metaphor or relationship from the book to some news in the TV or the newspaper. This will lead to miraculous results especially when one of the kids has read the book and the other has not. The one who hasn’t read will feel left out of the discussion and you can be sure that he/she would make it a point to read the book later. By the way, you will not need to (and should not) talk much - as the discussion starts, the children will take over and you can make use of the opportunity to develop their communication skills. It is also very important to develop open thinking and the ability to listen to ideas and opinions that one may not agree with. We should all learn to ‘agree to disagree’ at a very early age.

3. Visit books stores and libraries along with children: Some of the most pleasurable memories of my childhood have been the times that I spent with my parents in book stores and libraries. Opening up different books, discussing and reviewing together will create so much bonding in the family. I practiced it with my children and shopping for books was one of the most valuable treats they would look out for.

All the best and wish you all a happy 2011 of reading fun.

iPad vs eBook Reader

The Jury is still out....

After a couple of weeks of using the iPad, I am still unable to make a categorical decision whether the iPad will be the eBook reader killer. So I will list the pros and cons of the iPad when you use it to read ebooks.

Pros:

(a) The iPhone like interface is cool and the iPad offers many other applications as compared to a dedicated eBook reader
(b) All the books you bought for Kindle are available in the iPad for no additional charge
(c) The Book Directory is much better than that of Kindle
(d) Flipping pages is much easier because of the touch screen
(e) Pictures and tables come up much better in the iPad - you can enlarge them in the iPad by dragging two fingers on the screen, like in the iPhone
(f) Battery lasts for more than 10 hrs of usage - so this is not going to be as much of an issue

Cons:

(a) The screen reflects light - so readability is not as good as the dedicated ebook reader
(b) The additional weight of about 800 gms (compared to an ebook reader) is a hassle
(c) The price is about twice as much

My conclusion:

Even if the iPad does not kill off the eBook reader right away, it will definitely reduce its market share. And when iPad begins to support multiple applications it will really start being a better value proposition than the ebook reader. One of the biggest challenges all of us face is to decide how many devices to carry - you are anyway stuck with a cell phone (maybe two) and a laptop. The eBook reader becomes the third device - well, if the iPad can provide the functionality of the laptop and the eBook reader it can become the eBook reader killer; Let us wait and see!!!

iPad - the ebook reader killer?

The iPad is here!! As a geek I did make sure I got mine on the first day by preordering it. My first impression? - I like it a lot!.

There were many reports in the last few months that the iPad would challenge the ebook reader devices like Kindle and Nook, but I did not take that very seriously. But I am having second thoughts now. The iPad sold over 300,000 units in the first day and is expected to sell 5 to 7 million this year, but what caught my attention was that over 250,000 ebooks were downloaded by iPad users the first day!!! That is nearly 1 ebook per user which means most users are keen to try out the iPad for ebook reading too........

Amazon has been quick to release the Kindle software for iPad - well I guess they plan to hedge their bets and focus on their content sales if the Kindle device loses out the iPad. I installed the Kindle software in my iPad and frankly the user experience on the iPad is much better than the Kindle. I could access all the books that I had purchased on Kindle and the book arrangement is much better than how it comes on Kindle. I tried a couple of old ebooks and the reading feel is also better with the backlit screen. So will the iPad now replace the Kindle? - I guess it will depend on two issues:

(a) Battery power - how long will the iPad battery last on a single charge? Kindle battery lasts for over a week supporting more than 7000 page flips
(b) Strain on the eyes - for continuous reading will the iPad screen add more eye strain

We will find out - I will post my conclusions soon.....

iPad is heavier than the Kindle by a few hundred grams but I did not find that to be much of a hassle yet.

MBA Grand Challenge 2009

I am the moderator in a competition for MBA students in Kerala, India which is being telecast in Kairali TV, from Oct 24th onwards. The program is aired every Saturday from 3 to 3.30 PM (IST).

From over 40 MBA institutions in Kerala, 12 teams were selected to compete through a screening test. Each team had to make a presentation on the subject "Will India become an economic powerhouse in the next 20 years? What are we doing right? What is going wrong? ". The presentations were followed by Q&A - each team was given about 30 minutes. Our original target was to select 18 teams but many did not come up to the mark.

Now the 12 teams will compete, with 3 teams in each contest, which would based on a book. The three teams would make presentations and there would be some Q&A sessions (more in the format of a group discussion) and a quiz. There will be a different book for each contest. The winners will move on to the next round.

For more details please visit www.mbagrandchallenge.com

NDTV Calsoft

We can relax! There will be no recession :)

Bush says US not headed into a recession !

Fri Feb 29, 2:03 AM ET
WASHINGTON - President Bush said Thursday the country is not recession-bound and, despite expressing concern about slowing economic growth, rejected for now any additional stimulus efforts. "We acted robustly," he said.