Online Textbooks - The Wave of the Future?

In the not-too-distant future, your classroom textbook may not be a book at all. Increasingly, colleges and even public elementary and high schools are exploring the possibility of digitizing their textbooks and putting them online.

It’s a revolutionary concept with both fans and detractors.

On the plus side, online textbook supporters argue:

•  Going online will reduce costs. Currently, college students can pay up to $150 for a single textbook. (Some studies show textbooks account for an average 25% of tuition costs.) California, which is currently facing a $24.3 billion deficit, spends about $350 million every year on new textbooks for its public schools. Going digital could be a money-saver for both governments and individual students.

•  Going online will provide needed flexibility. Hardcopy textbooks force instructors to teach information in the way the books present it. Digitizing texts will allow teachers to cut, paste, rearrange and modify learning materials to better meet their classroom objectives and individual teaching styles.

•  Going online will keep information current. One reason states have to constantly buy next(new?) textbooks is because new information is always being added. (This is particularly true of textbooks that deal with history, politics, science and other rapidly evolving subjects.) Digital textbooks could be updated or modified as needed at relatively little cost.

• Going online will improve portability. Textbooks are heavy, clumsy, and if carried improperly, can lead to back strain and even long-term spinal problems. Digital texts can be carried on a single laptop computer or Kindle-like playback device.

Opponents to online textbooks argue that they will further divide rich from poor, that many families don’t have the money to buy laptop computers or even Kindle-like e-book readers. To overcome this problem, school districts will probably have to provide such devices to their needier students, thus seriously cutting away at any potential cost savings.

Is there an online textbook in your future? If the rapid digitization of music, movies and newspapers is any indication, the real question is not if, but when. Already many colleges are offering “open textbooks” for student download, and by the middle of the next decade, traditional hardbound textbooks may have gone the way of the vinyl record album and VHS videotape.

 

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