The Ideal Textbook Does Not Exist

Takashi SatoDept. of Physics

Presented at Open Textbook Summit Vancouver, April 16, 2014

Status: 2012

• Always shared educational resources

• Didn’t know they were called “OER”

• Sharing wasn’t always well organized

• There are lots of OER

• not many are well developed into textbook form.

• Many OER have author’s style built in

• they don’t always work for others

*OER – Open Educational Resources

How I got started/involved with Opentextbooks

• Exposed to a small selection of physics books (Feb 2013)

• One stood out, free does not mean cheap

• Adopt as pilot*

(Sept 2013)

• Learned to adapt

(Nov 2013)

• mostly by deleting chapters and sections

• Print-on-demand custom edition (Dec 2013)

• Happy – students, instructor, colleagues…

*It was never our intent that students should have to pay ~$200 for each book

Original Adapted for KPU PHYS 1100

Urone, Hinrichs, Dirks & SharmaCollege Physics, Openstax College

Purpose of a Textbook

(faculty perspective)

All of us could be textbook authors

but

many of us choose to dedicate our teaching efforts in other ways.

In an Ideal World….

• I pick a textbook off the shelf

• It matches the course content and my teaching style

• I use it, students use it

• Done!

• Money & payment are minor afterthoughts

All the educational resources pre-existed as a package (the textbook) and I didn’t have to create or assemble them.

In the real world, these idealizations are challenged from many directions

The Perfect Book Does Not Exist

• We can keep searching for the perfect book, or

• We can write our own, or

• We can accept and embrace what exists, and

• We can produce supplements

Edition changes are annoying and require time & effort on my part

Status Today

• With OER, we can make edits• closer match to my course’s needs

• ebooks – reasonable to ask students to bring to class

• I control the revisions/editions

Conclusion

• I can have a book that serves the course and student needs

more closely than I would have traditionally

• but without writing my own book from scratch

• The ultimate point is not to spend time at it

Check out “my” textbook athttp://www.kpu.ca/physics/sato/PHYS1100