5 ms·

Well, I'd love and welcome a good high-quality open source textbook movement that happens to also be high quality. It's the quality issue that's the major prob

Well, I'd love and welcome a good high-quality open source textbook movement that happens to also be high quality. It's the quality issue that's the major problem at the moment, I'd say. I've LOVE to see, for instance, Math textbooks written like they wrote "Real World Haskell" in wiki format with a single (or a small,finite set of) editor(s) ensuring that content and quality is up-to-snuff. I think that there really should be minimal educational infrastructure provided for free or very low cost.

ph0rque 16y ago
Have you heard of OERCommons (http://www.oercommons.org/ http://www.oercommons.org/)? They sound like what you describe.
- frak_your_couch 16y ago
  I have not, thanks for the tip. I looked at a book or so, but didn't see an easy away to comment on individual paragraphs like in "Real World Haskell", but maybe more of the interface opens up if you log in. ANyway, thanks for the tip!
  - pixcavator 16y ago
    My site is a wiki similar to what you describe, http://inperc.com/wiki/index.php?title=Category:Courses http://inperc.com/wiki/index.php?title=Category:Courses. I would like to allow comments but afraid of spam. Maybe one day.
yummyfajitas 16y ago
Quality isn't the issue for most subjects. There are plenty of free and cheap textbooks with perfectly fine quality. For example, when I took thermodynamics in college (in 2001), I used a thermo book from the early 70's which cost me $8 on eBay (as opposed to the modern version which cost $100). I also skipped purchasing many books entirely, and just used free materials online, including this newfangled site called wikipedia. Agency costs and are the issue. The people assigning books don't have to pay the cost of using them, so they have no incentive to select based on price. Further, it's very difficult for students to use substitutes - if the professor assigns problems 1-10 from the book, it doesn't matter how good the material in your cheaper substitute is. If you want to crack this nut, focus on problem sets, not textbooks.
- frak_your_couch 16y ago
  Well, I do disagree on the quality aspect. I'd like to see a high quality Calc I and II textbook that's free, coherent, and not aimed at MIT students. My wife is a faculty member and if you can find me one, I'll pass it along (they're constantly looking for one). It's just hard to not choose Stewart..it's a solid textbook for a broad range of students, but it's expensive as shit. A lot of professors are getting that this (if they don't, I make damned sure I mention it when we socialize with them) is a barrier for a lot of students. Anyway, you're absolutely 100% correct about problem sets. Good problem sets go a VERY long way to making a good textbook.
  - smanek 16y ago
    http://tutorial.math.lamar.edu/ http://tutorial.math.lamar.edu/ seems good (after 30 seconds of googling, and 5 minutes of skimming).
  - ghshephard 16y ago
    It's been 15 years since I took Calculus I and II, but looking over: http://www.khanacademy.org/#Calculus http://www.khanacademy.org/#Calculus Is there _anything_ in Stewart that isn't covered as well by Khan? You also get advantage of the video tutorial on the topic. I'm waiting for that point in time when we reach a tipping point and Higher Education Institutions don't just delegate everything to Khan for a lot of their topics. My Calculus Course (151) at SFU took place in Images Theater at 8:30 in the morning and had 450 Students listening to a lecture on Calculus. The ratio was approximately: 1/8 of the students were bored. 1/8 of the students were lost, 1/8 of the students were attentive, 1/8 of the students were asleep, and 1/2 of the students didn't show up. (8:30 AM!) I see little need for Stewart in the Face of Khan's Video Collection on Calculus + a bit of wikipedia (Seriously - check out their section on Derivatives and compare it to Stewart) I will agree with you on the Problem Sets - and perhaps that's the missing ingredient in Khan - He needs to more fully flesh out his test bank - but http://www.khanacademy.org/exercisedashboard http://www.khanacademy.org/exercisedashboard is moving ahead nicely. (And, in my mind, is far superior to any static test bank)
    - 16y ago

ph0rque 16y ago

Have you heard of OERCommons (http://www.oercommons.org/ http://www.oercommons.org/)? They sound like what you describe.

frak_your_couch 16y ago
I have not, thanks for the tip. I looked at a book or so, but didn't see an easy away to comment on individual paragraphs like in "Real World Haskell", but maybe more of the interface opens up if you log in. ANyway, thanks for the tip!
- pixcavator 16y ago
  My site is a wiki similar to what you describe, http://inperc.com/wiki/index.php?title=Category:Courses http://inperc.com/wiki/index.php?title=Category:Courses. I would like to allow comments but afraid of spam. Maybe one day.

yummyfajitas 16y ago

Quality isn't the issue for most subjects. There are plenty of free and cheap textbooks with perfectly fine quality. For example, when I took thermodynamics in college (in 2001), I used a thermo book from the early 70's which cost me $8 on eBay (as opposed to the modern version which cost $100). I also skipped purchasing many books entirely, and just used free materials online, including this newfangled site called wikipedia. Agency costs and are the issue. The people assigning books don't have to pay the cost of using them, so they have no incentive to select based on price. Further, it's very difficult for students to use substitutes - if the professor assigns problems 1-10 from the book, it doesn't matter how good the material in your cheaper substitute is. If you want to crack this nut, focus on problem sets, not textbooks.

frak_your_couch 16y ago
Well, I do disagree on the quality aspect. I'd like to see a high quality Calc I and II textbook that's free, coherent, and not aimed at MIT students. My wife is a faculty member and if you can find me one, I'll pass it along (they're constantly looking for one). It's just hard to not choose Stewart..it's a solid textbook for a broad range of students, but it's expensive as shit. A lot of professors are getting that this (if they don't, I make damned sure I mention it when we socialize with them) is a barrier for a lot of students. Anyway, you're absolutely 100% correct about problem sets. Good problem sets go a VERY long way to making a good textbook.
- smanek 16y ago
  http://tutorial.math.lamar.edu/ http://tutorial.math.lamar.edu/ seems good (after 30 seconds of googling, and 5 minutes of skimming).
- ghshephard 16y ago
  It's been 15 years since I took Calculus I and II, but looking over: http://www.khanacademy.org/#Calculus http://www.khanacademy.org/#Calculus Is there _anything_ in Stewart that isn't covered as well by Khan? You also get advantage of the video tutorial on the topic. I'm waiting for that point in time when we reach a tipping point and Higher Education Institutions don't just delegate everything to Khan for a lot of their topics. My Calculus Course (151) at SFU took place in Images Theater at 8:30 in the morning and had 450 Students listening to a lecture on Calculus. The ratio was approximately: 1/8 of the students were bored. 1/8 of the students were lost, 1/8 of the students were attentive, 1/8 of the students were asleep, and 1/2 of the students didn't show up. (8:30 AM!) I see little need for Stewart in the Face of Khan's Video Collection on Calculus + a bit of wikipedia (Seriously - check out their section on Derivatives and compare it to Stewart) I will agree with you on the Problem Sets - and perhaps that's the missing ingredient in Khan - He needs to more fully flesh out his test bank - but http://www.khanacademy.org/exercisedashboard http://www.khanacademy.org/exercisedashboard is moving ahead nicely. (And, in my mind, is far superior to any static test bank)
  - 16y ago