Back in July, I wrote about an experiment I was planning in my two Political Issues sections. I’d opted to try this for a number of reasons: (1) I was dissatisfied with the standard readers available, as they tend to present issues in binary fashion, and real-world issues are seldom that simple. (2) I wanted to be able to take up much more recent issues than I could if I relied on textbooks (it takes too long for things to get into print). (3) I wanted students to help determine the topics for the course, and to develop their skills in locating good sources to help them develop their thinking on issues of interest to them. (4) I wanted to reduce costs for students.
So, last semester, I used only one primary textbook: Glenn Tinder’s Political Thinking: The Perennial Questions (the writing-intensive section also made use of Muriel G. Harris’ Prentice Hall Reference Guide). I’ve yet to find a good substitute for that particular book; it frames the underlying questions of politics nicely, and I wanted my students to have that background as they thought about contemporary issues.
For the contemporary issues themselves, though, I started off by selecting a few myself (e.g., technology and privacy, technology and civic discourse, immigration), and showing students the kinds of resources they might be able to find. Then, for the latter part of the course, they chose the issues, found sources, and shared them in the class Zotero library. Working in teams or as individuals (depending on which section they were in), they were then responsible for running a class session and assigning readings for that session.
So, how did it work out? Well, I’ve got some tweaking to do. In the future, I need to provide more guidance on evaluating and using sources (bearing in mind that the overwhelming majority of students in Political Issues are first-years). To accomplish that I may need to drop some of my own topic selections and make space for some additional workshop/consultation days, but it will be worth it.
That said, overall, the experiment was a great success. Students did indeed develop some skill in finding and using sources, and they put great effort into learning about their chosen topics. They also did a wonderful job of running class discussions focused around those topics.
With the above-mentioned tweaks, I’ll definitely be repeating this experiment when I teach Political Issues again next fall.
Have you tried ditching a textbook and/or having students contribute to determining both course content and materials? Feel free to share your thoughts and experiences with us in the comments!
[Image by Flickr user cavenderamy / Creative Commons licensed]
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17 Responses to Ditching a Textbook: An Update
jason_b_jones - January 10, 2011 at 1:40 pm
Amy–thanks for this update. I wonder whether you had separate assignments to measure “finding & using sources,” or whether you were gauging that as part of their work on other assignments (e.g., research paper)?
alesiam - January 10, 2011 at 4:06 pm
I was curious if you worked with the library?
acavender - January 10, 2011 at 4:41 pm
Jason–I had students submit a bibliography, but that was more to get them familiar with Zotero than to measure “finding & using sources.” For that, I relied primarily on a short research paper (or, as I called it, a “sourced essay”). I plan to change that next time around, as I think splitting things up will make more sense.
@alesiam–Not directly, though I certainly introduced students to our online catalog and databases, and sang the praises of our reference librarians.
worstprofever - January 10, 2011 at 5:38 pm
Yes, yes, a thousand times yes! I hate textbooks with a fiery passion (did I mention I live in Texas?) They only serve to tertia-fy the material, make money for the publishers, and encourage students to absorb superficial, pre-digested opinions.I became a huge fan of sourcebooks of primary material, which were thankfully available for most of my classes.
As for letting them determine the material, I did let them choose research topics. But yes, they needed pretty stringent guidelines, and evaluating reliable sources became the almost the main topic of the classes at some points. Frustrating, on the one hand, but necessary on the other; media literacy is ridiculously low these days.
profhanley - January 10, 2011 at 11:12 pm
I’ve been doing a bit of thinking about textbooks (in the literature/writing class) – - why we use them, what they do/don’t do, etc. This semester, my students and are going to try to co-create a digital textbook. Some details etc. here: http://www.babylonisburning.net/?p=241
charlesr - January 11, 2011 at 9:33 am
I ditched the textbook in my US History surveys a few years back. I cover a basic outline of events and concepts in lecture, and I assign several primary source books (usually 6-8 books or portions of books–mostly first-person accounts like Frederick Douglass’s narrative or sometimes a Bedford reader) as well as a handful of one or two page documents. The students prefer it. Some semesters it works better than others, depending on my students’ note-taking skills. But in comparing final exam scores from the textbook days with those of the post-textbook days, I find they do about the same.
12058808 - January 11, 2011 at 9:37 am
The Department of Business at Ferrum College developed a textless introductory course for freshmen and sophomores several years ago. The students were responsible for writing and making presentations on six current topics over the course of a semester, and we held six hands-on information literacy sessions in the library computer lab to create a guided experience in locating reliable sources. This allowed the students to become familiar with library databases as well as web resources and the library’s print collection. It is remarkable how easily the younger students learned to use complex business resources.
mjw13 - January 11, 2011 at 9:46 am
I think you’ll find that if you leave room for workshop/consultation days and do AT LEAST one of those workshops jointly with a librarian, you’ll get improved results. Students respond better to joint presentations of librarians and faculty than they do to solo presentations by librarians or reference librarian referrals (no matter how high you may sing our praises).
Although students at my campus know they need to evaluate, and can even offer some important features to look at/for when evaluating, they tend to consider evaluation only necessary for “internet” sources!
Ultimately, however, what they really need to leave time for is thinking about their topic/project/search. They seem to want to accomplish all “searching” in one quick trip to the library, instead of making the process iterative. As I say in our Political Science classes: read, revise, repeat!
ashwinram - January 11, 2011 at 10:03 am
Very interesting. I teach my Artificial Intelligence courses with a similar philosophy, for similar reasons. Textbooks can’t keep up with the latest concepts, they are expensive, and I want students to understand how to find materials and discuss issues.
I have a syllabus of readings (some textbook chapters, mostly research articles). Each has two students assigned: one to present, one to critique. I provide guidelines on how to do this. Students do the readings before coming to class. Class time is spent in presentation, critique, and discussion.
We use OpenStudy to post questions, summaries, ideas, pointers. Students also post their term projects (in small groups) so they provide ideas and pointers to each other, and so they can learn from each other’s experiences. The groups are open, so students (and faculty) not in the class can participate.
I call this OPEN SOCIAL LEARNING (see links below). It works very nicely with upper-division advanced undergrad and graduate classes, which are more research-y in nature. I am working on a way to adapt this methodology for larger lower-division introductory classes. Would love your input and thoughts on this.
http://cognitivecomputing.wordpress.com/2010/04/26/massively-multiplayer-online—learning/
http://cognitivecomputing.wordpress.com/2010/09/15/openstudying-the-classics/
drbond7 - January 11, 2011 at 10:59 am
I’ve tried two experiments along these lines.
Option 1: Primary text for the first couple of weeks for “foundational” work. Then for about 1/3 of the semester we used a Reader to hit some of the major themes the students needed to know. For the final weeks and topics of the course students choose the topics and readings.
Option 2: No books. We spent the first three lectures building the syllabus and discussing possible topics trying to balance the requirements of the course (department and university) with the needs and interests of the students. The next week we spent in the library learning research skills in finding the material needed for the first couple of topics. Students were then assigned the task of picking new topics and readings which conformed to our initial agreement regarding the syllabus.
Option 1 was rather easy to implement, especially for someone who has taught a course before. Option 2 provided the most potential for student learning (or disaster), was very time consuming as a teacher, but ultimately a good experience.
Unfortunately the department I taught for became administrative/policy fanatic and began to demand that teachers had textbooks, as well as the entire semester mapped out and approved before classes started. Open-ended courses were anathema. Allowing students to actively participate in choosing the requirements of a course or the topics covered was blasphemy. Trying to come up with new or innovative ways to teach became a nightmare in this restrictive environment. Now the department has moved to a model where we are told what we have to teach…and usually how to teach it. Education “reform” at its finest.
s_purpuratus - January 11, 2011 at 1:03 pm
I teach comparative anatomy and physiology and developmental biology and have totally dropped textbooks. They were dry and tended to confuse students more than help them understand the material, especially when you want to narrow your focus on some key topics. Even in general biology, they have a textbook, but I tell them to use it for reference and for the pictures, not to actually read it. The students in my specialized courses have not missed the textbook at all.
smcdonald999 - January 11, 2011 at 4:01 pm
Now if we could just learn to ditch the lecture as well.
11223255 - January 11, 2011 at 4:37 pm
On the “finding and evaluating resources” aspect, please see the following two links about the online game BiblioBouts developed at the University of Michigan’s School of Information. The second link includes a sidebar with access to a demo.
http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/online-game-teaches-citation-skills/28837
http://www.ur.umich.edu/update/archives/110106/biblio
acavender - January 12, 2011 at 10:44 am
Thanks for all the comments! It sounds like there’s a lot of interesting stuff going on out there (and I’ve now got plenty of new links to check out).