Joe
-----Original Message-----
From: Bassett, Patrick [mailto:bassett@nais.org]=20
Sent: Saturday, November 06, 2010 8:15 AM
To: ISED-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
Subject: FW: Digital 'Textbooks' - What's Working, What Didn't Work,
What Do You See on the Horizon?
See note from Will DeLamater, below. He is willing to be a resource to
any group that forms to pursue the digital texts opportunity. NAIS is
willing to join the conversation, but can't lead it: too many other
irons in the fire: PFBassett, NAIS President
Pat,
Thanks again. I would absolutely love to be involved with the project.
eReadia has had a close relationship with the Connexions project at Rice
University, which offers the same kind of open source development
environment that CK12 does. I also think very highly of the CK12 project
and their particular approach to the mash-up of materials. Was recently
in touch with their director Neeru Khosla; they are a quality
organization as well.
Of course my interest is in course materials that are designed for
ereaders first, rich media players second, so the idea of a video
repository is a different kind of project, somewhat outside the scope of
what I am trying to do. But as far as working with the group, offering
support, maybe some programming help, some infrastructure--this would be
exciting!
Please go ahead and introduce me if you want. The group is clearly
looking for encouragement from NAIS and, as you know, I am very
comfortable with that connection, whether the association's role is a
formal one or not. I do think that some very good texts could come out
of this--living, breathing documents that can change as times change,
and serve a group well beyond the community of independent schools.
Hope all is well with you as things turn chilly. Hope to come visit
again this winter sometime!
All the best,
Will
-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Taffee
[mailto:staffee@castilleja.org<mailto:staffee@castilleja.org>]
Sent: Thursday, November 04, 2010 6:33 PM
Subject: Re: Digital 'Textbooks' - What's Working, What Didn't Work,
What Do You See on the Horizon?
Fred et al.
It seems to me that this would be a wonderful opportunity for NAIS to
step in. (Pat, are you monitoring this thread?)
NAIS could add its imprimatur to the effort which immediately grants it
legitimacy amongst the member schools. Further, NAIS could help
facilitate discussions of platforms, standards, etc. (hopefully all
open-source, but that's a personal bias), and laissez with foundations
that might be willing to help underwrite the work, and bring other
partners to the table (perhaps Apple with its iTunesU, for example) that
may provide strategic and tactical assistance.
Adding rich media sources such as the videos you refer to are wonderful!
They could serve as both direct instructional resources for students, as
well as professional development resources for teachers.
Sounds like a great workshop topic for NAIS national conference if not
before.
On Thu, Nov 4, 2010 at 3:41 PM, Steve Taffee
staffee@castilleja.org<mailto:staffee@castilleja.org>>wrote:
I had a conversation with Courseload this morning, and have a follow-up
scheduled for next week From what i understand, Courseload does take
existing textbooks and creates a PDF-like document, which they then
access through their own reader to allow for some social collaboration
features within a class. Books are purchased, not leased, by students. I
see this model as transitional; a bridge that enables teachers who are
familiar with textbooks to see that model in play with e-readers and
computers. Many teachers will quickly come to see that e-texts could be
so much more with embedded links, rich media contents, and built-in
hooks to their LMS.
I agree with Fred and Bill about the potential of a consortium of
schools to contribute content. If you are not familiar with CK12.org,
they are a non-profite creating open-content textbooks (they call them
Flexbooks) that I think might make an interesting partner. Having
several teachers work cooperatively also reduces the burden of a single
person creating a text, not to mention the richer ideas that emerge from
such collaboration. Having schools collaborate on creating textbooks
also has the benefit of helping to capture the knowledge and pedagogy of
master teachers, some of whom are nearing retirement age, and whose loss
to a school represents much more than replacing one headcount with
another. Knowledge retention is as important in schools as it is in
business.
[ For info on ISED-L see
https://www.gds.org/podium/default.aspx?t=3D128874 ] Submissions to =
ISED-L
are released under a creative commons, attribution, non-commercial,
share-alike license.
RSS Feed, http://listserv.syr.edu/scripts/wa.exe?RSS&L=3DISED-L
[ For info on ISED-L see https://www.gds.org/podium/default.aspx?t=3D128874 ]
Submissions to ISED-L are released under a creative commons, attribution, non-commercial, share-alike license.
RSS Feed, http://listserv.syr.edu/scripts/wa.exe?RSS&L=3DISED-L
