Textbooks in schools?

[clairecloutier]

Question for teachers/parents/grandparents of middle school and high school kids: Do your kids use textbooks in school?

My girls started 6th grade this year, and they do not have any textbooks or hands-on study aids so far (vocab lists, reference tools, workbooks, dictionaries, even homework pages, etc.) Everything is online. At first, I didn't think anything of it. But then the girls struggled when they started Spanish this past quarter. And I was thinking back to my own experience taking French in 6th grade, and how often I flipped around in my French textbook to check verb conjugations and vocab words. So now I am wondering about the lack of textbooks and other study aids. They go to a small public charter school, and I don't know how much funding may play into this. Curious to hear what other people's experiences are.

 

[PrincessLeppard]

A couple of years ago, we were encouraged to put everything online. Social studies now only has online textbooks (which I kind of get--information changes fast in that subject). But a lot of the kids print out readings and assignments because it's easier for them to focus.

I also found that when the stuff is online, it's too easy for many kids to get distracted and go to a game or movie site, and now the push it to be online less, but then the pandemic started, and...

So, English teacher here, I use textbooks in class.

 

[jeffisjeff]

My kids are in high school. For them it is a mix. For example, they have HUGE hard-copy science books (one is in Chemistry and the other in AP Physics) that they lug around. They also mostly get hard copies of the books (mostly non-fiction this year for both) they are reading for English, although sometimes they've mentioned electronic versions (scanned copies I think). Math and social studies seem to be entirely online versions of the texts.

 

[rfisher]

Most of the big textbook publishers push digital textbooks due to production costs but we find the students don't like them or do well with them.

 

[Sarah]

At the higher ed level, we (the library) have been pushing faculty towards OERs (open education resources) as students often don’t buy the textbooks due to cost. I often wonder how well students learn just from online resource/textbooks, but if so many students can’t or don’t buy the books, they’re not going to learn anyway. Some OERs do have a print option for a reduced cost (one of the ones our anatomy course uses can be printed for $30 vs the old proprietary text that was $350) or individual chapters can be printed.

Are OERs used much in k12?

 

[mjb52]

I like OERs but I wonder if the answer is less to push students towards digital resources than to take action to bring the cost of textbooks down.

 

[syzygy]

I do private online school. They send us textbooks but also provide them all online. I prefer the online version because of desk space, but if that wasn't an issue I'd prefer the real book. I'd really just prefer we didn't waste all that damn paper with a book that's going to get a new revision every two years, but they send the book to me whether I ask for it or not, so it's not like there's anything I can do. Might as well use it if I have it.

 

[Aceon6]

@clairecloutier Similar for my family’s middle school kids. Their parents have purchased some physical materials and we were able to scrounge some from our collections. (My family can’t seem to get rid of old textbooks.) The 8th grader, in particular, prefers to curl up with a physical book and says it provides a nice break from the screen.

 

[Prancer]

At the higher ed level, we (the library) have been pushing faculty towards OERs (open education resources) as students often don’t buy the textbooks due to cost. I often wonder how well students learn just from online resource/textbooks, but if so many students can’t or don’t buy the books, they’re not going to learn anyway.

Hmm, well. There were a couple of years of college where I was too poor to buy textbooks. I made dean's list every quarter anyway. Even when I could afford books, I hardly ever bought them after that experience, because I didn't see the point. The only time I would buy a textbook was a) if I had to study questions or problems out of the book for homework and the textbook wasn't on reserve; b) if the professor took all the tests straight out of the book or c) if I wanted to keep the book as a reference source for future reference.

Before college, I never opened a textbook if I could help it. I had bad grades and great test scores and of all the things teachers said to me over the years, not one ever accused me of not learning anything.

I am not a fan of textbooks . While there are some classes where they are necessary, I think that they are often redundant and sometimes even discourage learning.

 

[Sarah]

Hmm, well. There were a couple of years of college where I was too poor to buy textbooks. I made dean's list every quarter anyway. Even when I could afford books, I hardly ever bought them after that experience, because I didn't see the point. The only time I would buy a textbook was a) if I had to study questions or problems out of the book for homework and the textbook wasn't on reserve; b) if the professor took all the tests straight out of the book or c) if I wanted to keep the book as a reference source for future reference.

Before college, I never opened a textbook if I could help it. I had bad grades and great test scores and of all the things teachers said to me over the years, not one ever accused me of not learning anything.

I am not a fan of textbooks . While there are some classes where they are necessary, I think that they are often redundant and sometimes even discourage learning.

I think this works for some students but not for all and can only work for those where textbooks are on reserve. For many of our science students, 90% of the readings come from textbooks and unless the professors put a personal copy on reserve, students are out of luck as the library doesn’t purchase or ILL anything textbook related. I’ll encourage students to attend office hours and talk to their professors, or even see if they can use a professors copy during office hours, but as a librarian, I’m out of options beyond suggesting they borrow a copy. In the past, I’d try and buy certain books, but thanks to major budget cuts, things are even worse.

We have so many students that spend everything to get to college and the it’s the textbooks that push them over the edge. Having said all of this, I hate textbooks!!! I’d much rather read journal articles or random book chapters than anything from a textbook.

 

[Anemone]

I have nieces & nephews in the local public school, and they don't have textbooks for anything. It drives their parents crazy, particularly with math. They come home with these worksheets with no instructions, no examples, no sample problems, nothing. Their father is an engineer, and knows his math, and he will try to show them how to work the problems. And then the kids end in tears, because the way he is showing them is not how they were shown to work them in class and won't get full marks if they haven't shown their work in the way they are supposed to. But when they are having problems with a concept and they can't explain how they were shown, and there is no sample for him to see to help them work them the way the teacher expects - it makes it very difficult. And when they need to study for a test, no way for them to go back and review the sample problems, re-work problems they got wrong, etc. I don't think they are too bothered by no textbooks in a lot of other subjects, but the math has really been a problem for their kids.

 

[Prancer]

I think this works for some students but not for all

Nothing works for all students. Including textbooks. Can anyone offer me substantive evidence to show that textbooks are effective for learning? Because I can show you evidence that says they aren't.

and can only work for those where textbooks are on reserve.

Not if you never look at said textbooks, which was the case for most of my classes. I think the only book I ever got off reserve on a regular basis was an accounting textbook.

Having said all of this, I hate textbooks!!! I’d much rather read journal articles or random book chapters than anything from a textbook.

Exactly. Textbooks suck.

 

[rfisher]

Hmm, well. There were a couple of years of college where I was too poor to buy textbooks. I made dean's list every quarter anyway. Even when I could afford books, I hardly ever bought them after that experience, because I didn't see the point. The only time I would buy a textbook was a) if I had to study questions or problems out of the book for homework and the textbook wasn't on reserve; b) if the professor took all the tests straight out of the book or c) if I wanted to keep the book as a reference source for future reference.

Before college, I never opened a textbook if I could help it. I had bad grades and great test scores and of all the things teachers said to me over the years, not one ever accused me of not learning anything.

I am not a fan of textbooks . While there are some classes where they are necessary, I think that they are often redundant and sometimes even discourage learning.

That depends on the major. As a biology undergrad, I always had to have the textbooks for all science and math classes. I didn't need them for gen ed. Our students have to have them and they are expensive which is why evolve pushes the digital version, but none of my students will buy them. They all buy the hardcopy. The students who try to not buy usually fail out by the second exam. I always ask for an additional desk copy from the publisher and give it to the library so they have one on reserve.

 

[once_upon]

After the first semester in my Masters program, I quit buying textbooks because the real meat of the course was in assigned journal articles.

I wished I'd discovered that much earlier or felt brave enough to not buy textbooks.

Now my son in his technical work - used you tube to learn the how to's of his classes/applications

 

[Prancer]

That depends on the major.

I thought I more or less addressed that, but I guess not.

But my post was in reply to an assertion that students who don't buy textbooks aren't going to learn. I don't think that's true in any major, or else no student anywhere would be able to learn without textbooks--and yet students do.

 

[Theatregirl1122]

The majority of our math department doesn't use text books. The text books don't teach in the easiest way for the kids to understand and there's a lot of density to them, plus the kids kept losing them. When I came in, most teachers already weren't using them.

For my AP course, for which I developed the curriculum, a textbook was ordered by the previous teacher. I handed it out my first year and used it extensively. After my first year, I found that the book questions did not have the appropriate level of rigor to meet the level of the AP test. So the next year, I stopped using the book for questions but I still distributed the text book so the students would still have it as a reference. None of them ever opened it or used it. Most of them had to dig it up when I finally wanted it back and a couple couldn't find it and then got charged $80. It didn't seem worth it. They tend to like youtube videos better for reference, so now I send those.

We do extensive examples with guided notes for students to learn the material. If the students have questions on the material, they can reference the guided notes that we did in class. They have instructions, sample problems, and examples. If they didn't write down the notes, then yeah, they don't have anything, but there's not much I can do on that front.

Before this year, most of this was paper. This year it's all in their One Note notebooks.

 

[MacMadame]

I can see that working for HS and College.

Now I went to school in the dark ages when there were no personal computers so we used textbooks pretty extensively if there was one. For English and History in HS and college, we just read books. Novels for English and History books for History. But for science, there was a textbook and the profs used it.

But for Elementary level, there has to be something the parents can reference so they can help with homework. I remember those days fighting over math homework in Elementary quite well even though they were very long ago. That's how traumatic they were.

 

[Prancer]

But for Elementary level, there has to be something the parents can reference so they can help with homework.

The idea that math curriculum in elementary school should be designed with parents in mind just baffles me. I see this all the time in arguments against Chicago math and Common Core.

 

[MacMadame]

The idea that math curriculum in elementary school should be designed with parents in mind just baffles me. I see this all the time in arguments against Chicago math and Common Core.

I didn't say they should target parents. I said they need to have materials parents can use to help their kids do their homework. It could be as simple as sending an example home that parents could follow.

 

[once_upon]

I could never figure out they way they started teaching math. Kids were and grandkids are on their own with that subject.

I figure it is sort of like chemistry in nursing school. I barely passed it in 1974. But 18 years later when I took it again for BSN, it made more sense. Having had more experience with patient lab results, administering drugs to correct defiencies, etc I can understand the book learning.

If I spent more time with actual application, I would get it enough to help. But thankfully I dont need to help grandkids.

 

[MacMadame]

I could never figure out they way they started teaching math.

I actually like the new way because it's more like I how I think about math but the stuff my kids sent home was sometimes very mystifying. And even the stuff my friends share on FB that has a way of doing it that I "get" can still be confusing because of how the problems are stated.

 

[Prancer]

I didn't say they should target parents. I said they need to have materials parents can use to help their kids do their homework. It could be as simple as sending an example home that parents could follow.

I read what you said.

It's the idea that some sort structure must be in place for parents to help kids with their homework that I find baffling. Also rather terrible for all the kids whose parents can't or won't help them, given that the provision of parental guidance assumes parental guidance will be given.

Of course, I don't think elementary school kids should have homework, either. And if someone wants to argue with me about that, show me the research.

 

[MacMadame]

Also rather terrible for all the kids whose parents can't or won't help them, given that the provision of parental guidance assumes parental guidance will be given.

It is terrible. It definitely exacerbates inequality. But even just giving homework in Elementary does that. Homework at that level is more about what parents do than what kids do.

Of course, I don't think elementary school kids should have homework, either. And if someone wants to argue with me about that, show me the research.

I am absolutely not going to argue about that.

 

[Dobre]

But for Elementary level, there has to be something the parents can reference so they can help with homework.

It's a nice idea & sometimes it's helpful, but . . .

One of my biggest learning-curve moments as a first year teacher was a math lesson on skip-counting. Per the textbook, it was a one-day lesson on how to count by ones, twos, threes, fives, tens, twenty-fives, etc.

Took my third graders a week--a week--to finish that stupid assignment, and all they achieved was the sense that they had no idea how to skip count.

The following year, I redesigned the lesson. (It's a good skill for 8-year-olds to know). We did about 8 different lessons & spent 8 days learning all the different patterns. How to look at the tens place when counting by tens. How the ones place alternated between 5 & 0 when counting by 5s, etc. Ultimately culminating in how to count up with your fingers for complex patterns like counting by 7s. The kids totally got it. They learned how to skip count, and they were confident.

Since then, I always rewrote math textbooks. I used a lot of the same problems, but I rewrote them onto worksheets that saved us 50% of the time because kids didn't have to copy the problems & then mess up because they had copied them wrong. (Thereby, we completed twice as many lessons & learned twice as many math skills during a year). I removed problems that were above students' developmental level. I made certain there weren't any trick questions that hadn't been explained in the lesson. I cut out a lot of excess busy work. I made sure students had enough practice time on each skill before throwing in something new. I wrote problems large enough so that students wouldn't make dumb, frustrating mistakes because there wasn't enough space. I wrote problems onto graph paper so numbers were lined up for carrying & borrowing correctly, etc. I designed full lessons on story problems so that students could learn how to solve them step-by-step.

This did sometimes make it harder for parents trying to help with homework. I always explained to parents that if they ran into this problem, they could write me a note & I would find a way to give their child extra help with the assignment. On average, only one or two students per class ever had parents that actually helped with homework of any kind. Over a number of years, I maybe received two notes from parents asking for their child to have help on a particular math assignment.

Rewriting a textbook takes a great deal of time; and, no, I did not have enough time to write or type out detailed directions for parents on worksheets for 9 months of the school year. But it was totally worth rewriting the lessons because my kids learned the math & had the confidence that they could do math.


Having said all that, the Engage NY curriculum that a lot of schools used here for @5 years because it was free & just printed off via an online program was totally detestable. Schools used it because it was free & the company had an oar in creating new state tests (Um, conflict-of-interest, hello?). And because it was free, many school districts overrode traditional teacher-led textbook committees in order to adopt the curriculum. It was a nightmare, and I think every local district has finally chucked it out the window after about 5 years of frustrating students, teachers, and parents.

Generally speaking, I think it is best to think of textbooks and online curriculum both as resources.

 

[Prancer]

Since then, I always rewrote math textbooks.

Which is what every effective teacher I know does with textbooks--they take existing material from them and repackage it for their students and supplement it with assignments or explanations from the web or other sources. They ignore most of the material in the books because it's filler or not something that applies to their curriculum requirements or it's poorly written or whatever.

So why have the kids get the textbooks?

 

[MacMadame]

So why have the kids get the textbooks?

Because baby needs a new pair of shoes? [The textbook publisher's baby in this case]

For a serious answer: I assume it's because we've always had them. In the past, pre-internet, they were more useful in more situations. But over time they have become less useful in more situations and not everyone has adjusted.

 

[AxelAnnie]

The idea that math curriculum in elementary school should be designed with parents in mind just baffles me. I see this all the time in arguments against Chicago math and Common Core.

This sent me back to a panic attack. When my children's school (which was K-8) introduced New Math. It was a mess. The parents could not help.
They dropped that in three years.
I think the K-8 group should have textbooks.
They are tangible, and little kids need that. There is so much screentime.

And think of the logistics of it all. If you have 3 kids you need three computers.....not counting yours.
And it is so easy to hit the wrong button, like delete.

And kids know how to open multiple windows, and you then have copy/paste, and there you are.

As an aside, my daughter did not buy a single textbook during her master's program at Colombia.

 

[sk8pics]

Pretty much all my math textbooks were worthless, especially the calc and linear algebra books in college. Fortunately I had an excellent teacher for 3 out of 4 semesters, and only used the textbook for the homework problems.

I finally got rid of a bunch of old textbooks last year. My chemistry texts were usually pretty helpful, the physics ones were just okay, and psych ones were helpful. In grad school, we didn’t have too many textbooks, but there were a few, and then many of us bought classic texts in our field.

 

[JasperBoy]

I worked as a humanities textbook buyer at a major Canadian university. It amused me every term when students would come in the day before the final exam and buy the textbook. What did they think they would learn overnight that they didn't learn all term? I often asked if they planned to put it under their pillow and learn by osmosis.
In any case, they would not be able to return the book by the end of term so that was out.
Often the unsold textbooks had been returned to the publisher after the first month of classes, Too Bad.

Mr JB and I, OTOH, always bought our textbooks. He kept his first year books (from 1961!), through 3 trans-continental moves. No matter how much I argued that the books were now into their 30th edition, or that he could now write the material himself, he still clung to those dusty old introductory texts as "reference material".