Forums/How-to

Buying a classroom set of books in Subtext

Natalie
posted this on June 22, 2012 16:06

We are thrilled to announce that Subtext recently launched a volume purchasing system which allows a teacher or school administrator to purchase and distribute a class set of any book (or multiple books) in a single transaction. To register for access to this program, please fill out our Volume Purchase Survey. Subtext will follow up within twenty-four hours with instructions on how to submit a book purchase lists for hassle-free distribution to all of your students. For help or more information please contact support@subtext.com. 

If you prefer to make classroom purchases on your own, the best method is to set up ‘book holding’ accounts through Google Books. This allows you to distribute a single copy of a title to multiple users without sharing payment information. If your school shares iPads among students, holding accounts also make it easy for multiple users to read the same book on the same iPad. And because Subtext supports individual logins, students won’t have access to each other’s notes. More info >

This all may sound a bit confusing, but it’s actually pretty simple: When a purchased book is downloaded to an iPad from a book holding or user account, other Subtext users on the same iPad can access it from their own accounts.


Setting Up & Using Holding Accounts

Using holding accounts to buy books in Subtext from Subtext Video on Vimeo.


Part 1: Setting up a holding account

Schools that are signed up with Google Apps for Education can easily set up all of the holding accounts they need, just have your IT Administrator set them all up at once using Google’s ‘Bulk Upload Tool.’ If you are not yet using Google Apps for Education, your IT Administrator can easily register your school on the 'Sign Up' page and the service is free. 


We recommend naming each account with an easy-to-follow convention, such as ‘GreatGatsby1.TrumanHS@gmail.com’, or ‘iPad1.TrumanHS@gmail.com,’ or 'JSmith.books@gmail.com' (student’s first initial plus student’s full last name followed by ‘Books’). 

Once you've entered all of your information and accepted Google’s Terms of Service, you will receive an on-screen confirmation message that your new account is ready to use.

Part 2: Purchasing books for a holding account

Once your account has been created, you should automatically be brought to the Google Books section of the Google Play store. Search for the book you want by typing the title or author name into the search field. Then press BUY and follow Google’s checkout instructions to complete the purchase process. (To confirm you’re buying the right edition of the book, make sure the ‘About Book’ sidebar for the book lists ‘Flowing Text’ as a feature. In our experience, 99% of the time it does for current books. Info on Google Book formats >)

Part 3: Transferring books from a holding account to a student’s Subtext account

1) Open Subtext on the student’s iPad and log in with the holding account. (If the app opens directly to the student’s account, tap LOGOUT under the student’s profile picture, tap ‘Add or create an account’ on the bottom of the login screen and log in with the new holding account.)

2) Your purchased book will automatically appear on the holding account’s bookshelf. Tap READ IT to download the full book and open it.

3) From the opened book, tap SHELF in the upper-left corner to return to the bookshelf. Then tap LOGOUT under the profile picture. Now you’re ready to share the book with your student.

4) Either have the student log in to Subtext or log in as the student with her credentials. (If there’s no account set up for her, tap ‘Add or create an account’ on the login screen to create a student account.)

5)  From the student’s bookshelf, tap AUTO to bring up a menu of sorting options. Then tap MANAGE. Scroll down until you find your purchased book and tap READ IT. The book will be automatically added to the student’s shelf and available to read.

If the iPad is shared among students, you can repeat steps 4 & 5 to move the book from the same holding account to the additional student accounts. (This will work even if the holding account has been deleted from the device. See below.) This method allows different students to read a single copy of the book, and because we support multiple logins you don’t need to worry about students accessing each other’s notes. More info >

Optional: Deleting the holding account

Once you have successfully opened the book with the student’s account, you can remove the holding account from the iPad without losing access to the book. From the bookshelf, tap LOGOUT to return to the Accounts menu, swipe left to right over the holding account and tap DELETE.

Note: This only removes the account from the login screen, it doesn’t actually deactivate the account or delete it from Subtext’s server. If you wish to fully deactivate it, you can log in with the account, tap SETTINGS, tap DEACTIVATE next to ‘Your Subtext account is active’ and then tap DEACTIVATE again to confirm.
 

Comments

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Eric Moore

Can we then, at the conclusion of a class, have our students return the purchased books to the holding account for the next class? Or is it that once they are moved to a student account, they are forever in the ownership of the student? 

May 19, 2013 03:31
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