Jun
14
Constraining Innovation: Textbooks and Textbook Publishers
June 14, 2009 | 5 Comments
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This is the last in a series of posts about the major factors that constrain innovation in education. Let me say from the get go that I love reading, I love books, and have found textbooks to be an invaluable teaching tool. A well-written textbook can be a great support to students by providing a mental scaffolding for acquiring and assimilating new information. Teachers new to the profession can find textbooks and their accompanying teacher’s editions to be a necessary if not sufficient support as they make their way through their initial years of teaching. Textbooks provide school district authorities with some assurance of a common curriculum across many different schools and teaches.
But the textbook system is broken. There are too few publishers and those that exist are behaving badly:
- textbooks cost too much.
- teachers are often forced into adopting costly new versions with little additional benefit over the previous version.
- the physical weight of textbooks is contributing to back problems among the students who must schlep them from class to class.
- textbooks consume huge amount of natural resources in their production. Disposal of textbooks is not as easy as one may think.
Fortunately, their are alternatives.
Some publishers are starting to release electronic versions of texts. This helps to address the production and disposal issues, but despite the fact that the cost of goods is now close to zero, most e-text prices are still very high, and the texts may have onerous digital rights management policies attached to them that make it inconvenient for a student to access the text when needed.
A more promising alternative (and one I wager may take publishers off-guard) are open textbooks. Inspired by the open-source software movement, open textbooks are created by scholars and teachers who believe that high quality textbooks should be free, in electronic format, and customizable by teachers and students alike.
There are a number of open textbook projects in operation. One close to home is the California Open Source Textbook Project. There are many more. A good source for information about the state of American textbooks and the open source textbook movement is the Campaign to Reduce College Textbook Costs.
But the above criticism is more about the form of textbooks. There is also a problem with the concept of textbooks themselves.
Like AP courses and “teacher-proof curriculum (discussed in previous posts), textbooks can constraint teacher creativity, discourage the exploration of the “teachable moment,” and serve as a nagging back-seat driver that second-guesses the judgment of the teacher as to what it or is not important. The textbook is what one is supposed to “cover” in a given course, and if you don’t make it all the way through, you have somehow failed yourself and your class. Who’s in charge here? You, or your textbook?
The term “textbook case” is used to describe events that are typical or classic example of something. I submit that textbooks are a textbook case of what’s wrong with American education.
5 Comments so far
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Hey Steve-apropos in light of Seth Godin’s recent “Textbook Rant” post: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2009/06/textbook-rant.html In his post he talks not only about the form of traditional textbooks as being flawed, but like you, the inherent flaws of the model itself.
I’m in agreement with Godin that the solution is relatively simple. Make the production and publishing of free, openly accessible learning objects an integral part of what we do as learning guides and facilitators.
Ewan Mcintosh has an interesting take on Godin’s post as well: http://edu.blogs.com/edublogs/2009/06/seth-on-why-the-textbook-industry-deserves-to-die.html
I enjoyed your “Constraining Innovations” series, Steve!
~Matt
This post links up nicely with an issue I’m grappling with lately on my own blog–the question of how accountability further widens the participation gap at the college level. Specifically, I’m focusing on the rankings system as exemplified by the annual U.S. News and World Report “best colleges” rankings, which do a disservice to students and faculty alike. I know less about the textbook issue, though a friend worked in textbook publishing for a few years and left discouraged and cynical.
Ok, ok, I’ll just go ahead and plug my own blogpost here. It’s at http://tinyurl.com/kwl64v. I’d love for you to check it out….
Steve, you bring up some very good points, although I do think there may be a devaluing of authoring and editing in the idea that textbooks published digitally are virtually free. Most of my reflections on this topic are, of course, based only on what I know of my own discipline, history, so I will start by saying I certainly think it could be different in other areas. And I certainly agree there are big problems. We don’t think we need new editions all the time (especially in history where often only the last few pages change) but I am not so confident that strong readable prose will be valued in open source work at least for history. We have decent free options if all we want is too look things up one fact, name, or date at a time. That is not, however, what teachers want from a textbook, and I know it is not what students need. In many history classes, the textbook should be serving several purposes. It is a version of the material that forms a solid overview, a background of the information and the story that connects that information. It is also a fundamental tool for those who learn best by reading, rather than hearing. A good textbook is another voice, a second expert in the room, and perhaps a more concrete one for students. So while the method of delivery is a key issue, the question I keep coming back to is what can we do about setting a more reasonable way of selecting content. Length is as much the problem as anything else. I would love to see more options for shorter works, digital or not, and more options for different types of classrooms. But as you point out, there is almost no competition, and less creativity, and there is no political will to push in that direction. It is a mess.
Thanks, Steve, for this really excellent summary of the text book situation in the US. It echoes what is the case in the UK and I am sure, elsewhere.
On a related theme, I have found it difficult to source digital learning objects – you know, the things that teachers might use in class to explain or explore some piece of learning, perhaps done on screen or digitally projected. These seem to be well hidden behind passwords and, like textbooks, well moneytized.
Will follow up on your open source text book links.
Thanks for your comments, George. It is disheartening, but not surprising, that this problem affects more than the U.S. There are some positive signs of content opening up, especially amongst colleges and universities. I am sure it is happening in pockets with K-12 schools as well, but there’s little incentive or time for teachers to do this. And on the other side of the equation teachers want some assurance that the free and open materials that are available are of high quality. So until there’s a Wikipedia like source for vetting open materials, I’m afraid that things may stagnate for a bit. Watch for more about this in a future post.
steve