The Death of the Textbook

We are at a crossroads in education in which our choice will be made by us or for us--I for one hope that we rise the occasion and firmly establish our own selections and resources as a reflective exhibition of our professionalism and competency to select texts that intersect exactly with the needs of our students.

I have long been suspicious of textbooks--especially in my subject area of English.  It may have its roots in my first classroom that came with everything except textbooks and so I was forced to scrounge for materials until the books arrived--when they finally did, the exercises in them paled in comparison with what my students had been doing without them.  Unfortunately, self doubt set in and I broke down and did what I was supposed to do--following the guidelines, assigning the questions and activities, and handcuffing my students in the process.  It took a little while, but by my second year of teaching, I had given up on the textbook once and for all and adopted a pragmatic view where the book served as a convenient repository of texts, reducing the drain on my monthly copy allotment.

Last year, while still in the classroom, I assembled my own text and published the partial draft for my students using iBooks Author--granted, I barely scratched the surface of what I could do with the program, but it was a start in taking back my content for my students.  What I sought to do was to implement the very things that I was preaching to my fellow English teachers--keep it engaging, relevant, and move between genres as students explore ideas and themes.  I brought in news and journal articles, many just days old, finagled with the district internet connection to show YouTube videos on our topic, and tasked my students with discovering and creating meaningful content.

Our task is not too great, especially for the scores of teachers I have observed this year who gather resources on a daily basis, bridging the difference between the task and the proficiency level of the students.  The rightful place of textbooks is as a resource--but just one of many.

Digital Natives: Outright Lie or a Stretch?

According to Megan O'Neil, http://chronicle.com/article/Confronting-the-Myth-of-the/145949/, digital citizenship  is more about responsible citizenship and multi-tech-variancy than it is about the simple assumption that everyone born after 1980 has been steeped in technology to such a degree that they are the supposed "digital natives."

My spidey sense has been going off for years as I have heard others declare the digital native generation, but I never really figured it out until the other day.  How presumptuous it is for people to tout this as truth when every other technological advancement simply led to a variety of tech usage and understanding--how many of us understand the intricate steps necessary to tan leather, let alone print a book, but we all have worn leather shoes and (hopefully) read a printed book.

Consider the following metaphor:  How many of you have owned five or more cars? Ten?  (my hand went down)  Fifteen?  More?

How many of you have changed a flat tire? (I see those hands)  A windshield wiper?  An air filter?  Oil filter?  Spark plug?  Oxygen sensor?  Head gasket?  Piston ring?

You see where this is headed--we have all ridden in a car and yet the inner workings and ability to modify, build, and repair are lost on most people.  Utilization of a technology does not necessitate a real understanding of its workings, or even the ability to use it well for both intended and creative purposes.

While we lost rich cultural traditions and history with the eradication and dissolution of the "natives" of previous centuries, there is no such wealth in these new natives.  The truth of our new natives is that they lack the skills and knowledge that they need to be successful in the new global community--their quirks should not be celebrated and the metaphor does not hold.

My point is that those of us in education stand in a place where we are obligated to assist our students in utilizing technology for significant purposes.  The assumption that the digital natives are responsible to utilize technology for these purposes is erroneous.  We must step in as the mediators between the complexity of the task and the student's ability as we seek to bring them into the new world.