My son (now in the seventh grade) carries a laptop to school every day. His assignments are assigned in his electronic Calendar and he submits homework by copying files to the instructor’s share when they’re complete. Here are two odd facts:
- Most textbooks are not available on his system; he must carry books in addition to the laptop.
- His class doesn’t have enough social studies textbooks to send a book home with students to do homework.
I am all for a no-textbook educational process; I think the publishers need to get their heads around a DRM plan, and provide the books in binary format to the students. As it turns out, Wikibooks is moving in this direction, reported by News.com: “Wikibooks takes on textbook industry”. This project aims to create an open-ended curriculum that will offer a licensable alternative to traditional textbooks.