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“Cyberschool educators say they would prefer to see more support from traditional textbook publishers, although they don’t expect that to happen anytime soon,” says BookTech Magazine. “They also want the electronic versatility that paper-based books can’t have.”

BookTech warns the e-book industry to catch up with the times, given all the competition possible from teachers themselves. The magazine says:

At CoolSchool (Cyber Oregon Online School), in Eugene, Ore., instructors electronically author their own courseware, which can run 400 pages or more. Teachers at Florida’s Virtual School are also developing their own multimedia courseware.

One reason teachers are authoring their own content is the dearth of quality electronic materials available from the major textbook publishers. E-books in general proved to be a false start.

E-books from major publishers often require proprietary readers, and have digital rights restrictions that encumber their use, such as limits on how many copies can be printed or shared.

That maintains the status quo among textbook publishers, but doesn’t sit well with cyberschool administrators and educators.

“E-books didn’t seem to change [the publisher's] operations or delivery as much as people thought it would,” [Class.com CEO Katherine] Endacott says. “There’s a vested interest in keeping things the way they are.”

The news is far from entirely bad, however. The magazine reports:

Not all traditional textbook publishers are sitting on the sidelines. Some are getting the religion. At a recent meeting of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), every publisher offered some form of online resource to accompany their books.

“Instead of textbooks with static information, they were, in some cases, multimedia-enriched,” says [Phyllis Lentz at Florida Virtual School].

Harcourt Interactive Technology, a subsidiary of Harcourt Inc., Roslyn Heights, N.Y., is among those offering augmentative electronic products tied to traditional textbooks. The publisher unveiled iLearningOnline Interactive, an Internet-based reading assessment system aligned with state standards.

The Web-based software provides a diagnostic tool that measures students’ reading comprehension. Teachers can also assess their educational effectiveness on the site.

Pearson Prentice Hall in Upper Saddle River, N.J., recently launched a pilot program with the state of Florida to help students in grades seven, nine, and 11 improve their reading comprehension. Students used Pearson’s iText, a computer-based interactive textbook, to improve their reading comprehension and grammar skills.

 
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