Studies without textbooks?

Today I read this interesting article in the paper that in California the school children have been asked to throw away their textbooks to help the state avoid bankruptcy! This statement was given by the Governor of the state, none other than Mr. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Instead the children will now go 'Digital'.

This statement really took me by surprise. All along from generations, ever since paper was invented (though our grandparents where using slate and chalk) we have been using textbooks. Now suddenly a world without one was a totally new idea to me.

Then another picture flashed across my mind. My children and all the other school going children walking with straight back minus the loads of books on their already bent backs.What a relief!

Imagine the scene where the children go with one digital notebook to the classroom and the teacher can just ask them to open a particular subject and so and so page and it will be just a click away. It's bye bye to heavy books. We might also in the bargain be contributing towards a green world too with less paper around.

But then another thought assailed me that in this process we will be so very dependant on gadgets. But somehow I do not feel like saying bye to all my good old books, the books that took me on a flight of fantasy, that musty smell of the much thumbed book that I grew up on. Do you?