eBooks: Inexpensive, Available Content…Why use Textbooks?
eBooks are available, inexpensive or free, and more interesting to students than the canned, static, ossified content known as "textbooks."
But, teachers use textbooks to drive instruction because textbooks…
- Are there
- Come with Teacher Editions
- Contain a lot of material focused upon central topics
- Contain safe, antiseptic content
- Provide an "It's not my decision to use this book" excuse when parents complain about the content that is being taught
- Provide lots of associated learning aids, even test-building software
So, what's the problem?
One-Third of Student don't Graduate from High School in Some Places
Has anyone stopped to assess just what role textbooks have in this "dropout rate" Answer: Yes. But, we keep using textbooks, anyway.
What are the "downsides" of using textbooks? Textbooks are…
- Boring, dull and lifeless
- Conservative
- Uncontroversial
- Academic and aseptic
- Written by committee and consensus
- Built with controlled reading levels and vocabulary
- Written to sell to large states such as California and Texas
- Outdated before they are printed
- Generally mediocre their in portrayal of minorities and minority issues, i.e., "whitewashing the issues (no pun intended)
With all these strikes against textbooks, it is a wonder that textbooks even make it to the ballpark.
eBooks Available Everywhere
A search on Google™ revealed that there were about 1,700,000 results for the search term, "free ebooks."
Link to the search for "free eBooks"...
And, Project Gutenberg™ lists 17,000 eBooks in their collection. Plus the Project Gutenberg™ has eBooks in a bunch of languages.
Link to the Project Gutenberg™ Online Catalog
Probably many teachers could teach using only Project Gutenberg™ text and Internet research instead of textbooks.
A check on eBay™ revealed that about 14,000 eBooks were for sale, page after page at a cost of $0.01 USD.
Link to eBay™
The Upsides and Downside of eBooks
The upsides and downsides of eBooks are really "flip sides" of the same issues. for example…
- All of Project Gutenberg™'s materials are out of copyright. This means that they are really old, or that they are Government Documents.
- Old documents can be primary source documents, great if you are teaching history, romantic literature, and such
- Government documents can be primary sources, too. But you have to be a scholar to know which information is accurate.
- Previewing is a pain. With textbook "pabulum" a teacher is safe not to preview. With "raw meat" sources, teachers need to "bone up" on the contents of assignments before handing them out
- Using eBooks with a strategy where every student reads the same passages and responds in the same way makes learning "equal but unfair" and boring. But, this strategy makes grading uniform, and diminishes challenges to the grades (by students and their parents). Assigning every student to read the same material defeats the advantages of using eBooks, so, if you are going to require every student read the same content, stick to textbooks
- eBook reading level is all over the place. Finding easy enough content, especially for lower level readers takes a lot of teacher time. But, over time, teachers can build a library of these materials. Why not have students read segments of these eBooks to each other and score the passages based on the number of errors. This could build a classification system in a school year
- Canned textbook questions are boring, but at least the answers are available with a key. Create your own questions, and you have to also check the answers. Maybe this takes too much thought and concentration. Create your own answers, and you have to justify your choice of questions under the challenge of students who guessed another answer. On second thought, this might be a positive approach to stimulation students to think
- It takes time to find high quality eBooks that are usable for instruction, but the ones that are useful interest students and have real-world information that benefits students
- The content of eBooks can be current, practical and useful; or the content can be outdated, goofy and detrimental to anyone who applies the eBook's suggestions. Sorting out the differences is real-world learning
- Students could pass around eBooks that they like. Imagine, students reading stuff that wasn't assigned to them "on the sly." This happens so infrequently with textbooks that€
- Students would be ashamed to admit it
- Reporting the occurrence could make the newspapers with human interest, similar to a "Man bites dog" story
The Classroom Toolkit Resources
Classroom Toolkit advocates building a library of Graphic Organizers, Templates, generic assignment for "Mix-and-Match" flexibility.
Link to the Classroom Toolkit Graphic Organizers section…
Link to the Classroom Toolkit Graphic Organizers Starter Kit…
This strategy is a natural for stirring student interest, for keeping content and instructional delivery fresh, for drumming up debate and for teaching real-world information and skills.
This strategy is also a perfect match for project-based group assignments, for rubric scoring, and for building competent citizens.
How many times have you been asked a question that you could quote a textbook answer? Maybe none unless you are "teaching from a textbook."
Great Selection…The Price is Right
With choices from modern day how-tos to the classics, the
Another catch, who pays for printing out all these eBooks?
