In your last paragraph you cite "serious feasibility concerns" if there were more free textbooks and lesson plans, and then conclude that the NCLB act makes it difficult for administrators to choose from competing free choices. I think that this conclusion is founded on an incorrect assumption: that "free" implies that is made in spare time by people who are uncoordinated.

I think that although allowing teachers to contribute to, remix, and share textbooks is important, a free textbook does not need to be written by people who do not receive compensation, and who are uncoordinated. Somebody currently gets paid to write text-books. I don't think its too much of a stretch from the lessons free software to imagine an educational non-profit (or governmental agency) paying some experts to write a series of textbooks under a free license geared towards the NCLB tests. Once the book exists, updating it would not be too hard, it could be modified to fit local needs and it could be printed on demand at low cost. If that non-profit or agency developed a trademark that signaled that they approved of the particular distribution, but required that it be removed from distributions that they did not approve of, then I think that your concerns of school boards and administrators separating the wheat from the chaff disappear. Indeed, this is how many free software projects, parts of which are as arduous and tedious as textbook writing (in my experience, implementing a system to store files in a computer is quite boring), currently operate.

I think that acknowledging and addressing that coordination is feasible in free educational tools, and then looking at what this means in the current education system would do much to bolster this paper.

-- JustinColannino - 25 Nov 2009

Jonathan, Thanks for taking time to respond to all of my comments in such depth (and thanks to Brian for fixing the formatting after I commented - I likely did something before that messed it up). I think you're right that we generally agree on most, if not all, of the big issues that you address in your paper. I'll share just one more thought on your first arguments about textbooks and NCLB. Do you think it is possible that if there were suddenly good textbooks (whatever that means) freely available to all teachers, then there would be a possibility of less teaching to the test? In other words, if teachers could provide better educations to students through the use of better textbooks, might more public schools be able to get to the point at which the best public schools have already arrived - where nearly every child easily meets NCLB standards, and the testing is seen merely as a nuisance taking away from educational time? I don't know what I think on that issue, and I don't think heavy teacher reliance on textbooks is good. Still, I the argument can be made that rather than NCLB requirements limiting the usefulness of free textbooks, maybe free textbooks could help schools move beyond NCLB as the point of teaching. Anyway, that's just a thought. There are likely too many "what ifs" in the alternate argument I've suggested.

I look forward to reading the final version; you've written a really interesting paper!

-- HeatherStevenson - 25 Nov 2009

1.Within your first argument about textbooks, you seem to assume that American teachers’ dependence on textbooks is good, or even acceptable.Whether that is the case is, at the very least, debatable. I mention this point only so that you can incorporate it if you so choose; it does not really change your argument about free textbooks generally, but you may want to consider the other ways in which free books, magazines and newspapers (in addition to textbooks) could work within the U.S. education system. The debate over whether teaching from a textbook is a good idea exists even among those who must teach to standardized tests because there are multiple ways to teach similar content.

2. I think many people would argue that the creation of a textbook actually has the potential for a great deal of creativity and differentiation. The focus, organization, pictures choice, textboxes, incorporated activities, etc. all change the textbook a great deal and can be used in order to tailor a textbook to a particular group of students (for example, a textbook for elementary school children who grew up in the city may need to explain “fireplaces” or “driveways,” while a textbook for children in the country may need to explain the “subway”). Books intended to teach literacy are particularly appropriate for adapting to meet the needs of particular students, as children’s reading levels go up the more background knowledge they have about the topic on which they’re reading. See this article about content knowledge and reading. Or this more in depth article.

I hope these comments are helpful, and that you don't mind my disagreements too much!

Great stuff - thanks! I will digest this more over the coming week, but here are a few quick responses to the enumerated comments below:

1) Personally, I don't think teacher dependence on textbooks and rigid lesson plans is good, but, whatever my ideas are for an ideal education system, that is beyond what I wanted to tackle here. Specifically, I was just hoping to point out systemic realities that aren't likely to change anytime soon and then envision what challenges might arise if all of these educational materials were suddenly free. There is a lot to criticize about NCLB, certainly, but to my knowledge every state attempts to play by its rules for funding purposes. When standardized tests, on which funding depends, are linked to very specific learning objectives, educators are extremely constrained to teach things by the book. That's the reality of it. Having specific, universal learning objectives makes it easier to collect data on a large-scale and then evaluate national educational progress. That's what goes on in this country: the fed has created an omni-present aura of accountability, and this kind of surveillance is supposed to be the spur educators need. If teachers were suddenly allowed to take advantage of a free textbook/curriculum market, it would become much more difficult to match so many new varieties of methodologies with measurable learning objectives.

2. Great point, which I imagine is a better depiction of the K-3 context than, say, the 9-12 context. There is certainly creative potential there, but textbook writing is notoriously arduous, and I would be surprised if many people write high school textbooks to express their artistic side. I could be wrong.

3. Of course, there are a variety of reasons -- cognitive, social, emotional, behavioral, etc., etc. -- why some students might be better primed to learn than others, and your point is well taken. I would point out, though, that there are actually many "achievement gaps" monitored by the fed through NCLB, and many of these involve socioeconomic and racial groups who score lower on both cognitive tests and educational achievement tests, so it's not all about ability-achievement gaps. [The fact that better educational achievement in school is correlated with increased cognitive "ability" scores is a whole separate mega-issue of test validity, so I won't go there]. It is also true that NCLB looks at how special education students are fairing relative to other sub-groups, so better educating those with cognitive "disabilities" is certainly within the scope of closing achievement gaps. I agree with you about the beauty and potential of educational software, though.

4. I think we agree on just about everything here. The "baby-step" concept certainly isn't a science, so I won't debate too much about exactly how big it would be. Above all, again, I'm just hoping to point out shortcomings and potential challenges based on the current legal/political structure of education in the U.S. today.

-- JonathanBoyer - 24 Nov 2009