Members from Pearson, Discovery Education, Oxford Learning, Desire2Learn, and Hamilton-Wentworth DSB’s Director of Education John Malloy will share their vision for the future of the textbook. Are paper textbooks a dying commodity? Will every student have access to what we traditionally think of a textbook on an electronic device? Will we embrace blended and online learning and access textbooks through an LMS? Or is the future going to be a blend of things? Watch this lively discussion and meet some of the leaders in Ontario Education and listen to their thoughts.

summary of panel discussion:

Is the print textbook dead?

Moving from format to output.  How do we make our content more social?

information is now at our fingertips – this is a little more daunting than the textbook – how do you organize information now?

We need to help students understand the potential of digital.  The range of solutions that the textbook offers is now limited.  But, we need to develop a new set of teaching and learning tools, textbooks will have a lesser role.

The textbook is deeply embedded, it is a challenge to move people away from that.

Kids today would never buy a whole album – they choose exactly what they want.  It is the same with the textbook – more important – how do we take information and turn it into intelligence.

There is much more of a collective form of information where one can choose and share information.

We still want this printed word.  Are we teaching our kids how to communicate with visuals, create video, etc

How do you manage the digital rights when students and teachers are generating content?

It is increasingly difficult to make money on intellectual property.

Part of the challenge is cost which relates to intellectual property.

What we really need to do is help teachers need to move to the new world.  We can’t stay in the old one of the textbook and photocopies.

One thing the textbook does is curate content.  However, there are great curation tools on the web.  Who does this, the publisher?  The teacher?

Math – teachers do not have a deep understanding of math – build that into the lesson.  Content was one piece, but the bigger question how to we develop a deep understanding of that content.

Big question Why School (Will Richardson) when you can get any content why school? How do we help students own learning and take responsibility for it?  That is the future.

The future is life-long learners.  Start what problem are you interested in?  That is where we need to start with students (Inquiry).

We need to use technology to extend the joy of learning and inquiry.

 

Great session!