Tag Archives: textbook

Flat World Knowledge goes Public Beta!

David Wiley, via iterating toward openness, emphasizes the significance of Flat World Knowledge (FWK) going Public Beta, and outlined the common and distinctive features of FKW textbooks in light of traditional ones. Excerpt:

FWK textbooks are much like traditional textbooks in that they are:

  • beautiful looking printed books,
  • written by world-class authors,
  • supported with all the supplementals and teaching aids (like an instructor manual, slides, and assessments) teachers expect, and
  • available as review copies (for teachers),

FWK textbooks are UNLIKE traditional textbooks in that they are:

  • licensed CC BY-NC-SA,
  • always available in full-text online for free,
  • offered in a variety of additional, affordable formats (paperback black-and-white ($30), full-color ($60), audio book ($30), individual book chapters as audio ($3), etc.),
  • supported by a variety of study aids available at the student’s option (NOT forcibly bundled with the book)

I’m SO excited about FWK because we’re going to show the world that extremely high quality open educational resources can be produced and disseminated in a way that is sustainable over the long term. Jump over to the Catalog page, choose a book with a Feb 2009 publication date, and click “Start Reading” to see what I’m talking about.

The Case of the Textbook: Open or Closed?

“The Case of the Textbook: Open or Closed?” is the focus of the recently launched EDUCAUSE Review Magazine, Volume 44, Number 1. (Thanks to DigitalKoans). A brief description of the contents of the magazine reads:

As the price of college/university textbooks continues to rise, new electronic models and various “open” options are being proposed from all sides: by publishers, by students, and by authors and institutions. Viewpoints from these segments, along with discussions of their solutions, are presented here. First is an excerpt—the “College” chapter—from the latest edition of Book Industry Trends, published annually by the Book Industry Study Group, the leading U.S. book industry trade association for policy, standards, and research, with a membership consisting of publishers, manufacturers, suppliers, wholesalers, retailers, librarians, and others engaged in the business of print and electronic media. Second is the “Executive Summary” from Course Correction, published by the Student Public Interest Research Groups (PIRGs) as part of the Make Textbooks Affordable Campaign. Third, authors and higher education institutions are represented by the stories of three open-source textbook authors—Rob Beezer, Robert Stewart, and John Gallaugher—and two open-access institutional repositories: CCCOER and Connexions.

OERs- Alternatives to Textbooks

CCCOER drew attention to Susan Dean’s presentation entitled “The textbook is…free? Open Educational Resources”  at the California Math Council Community Colleges (CMC3) 36th Annual Fall Conference in December 2008.