Re: [Foundation-l] Rethinking brands

"The SRA materials are wonderful, but not even one state education
curriculum committee (most states have these) will pass them through peer
review for serious consideration by districts as _required_ books."

I suspect that the reading, math, and spelling curriculum are somewhat dry
and boring and need teacher imagination to "punch them up."  What if
curriculum were designed in such a way that it could be outlined with key
words to ensure teachers could teaching "in their own way" but also switched
to full script for teachers that want to use the script.  Add in some more
cartoons, images, video, and some funny lines or inquiry/Socratic methods to
change it up.

The Reasoning and Writing program by SRA is most certainly more entertaining
(at least the first 3 years) than the other curriculum.

BTW, your resume is very impressive.

-Kathy 

-----Original Message-----
From: Sanford Forte [mailto:[email protected]] 
Sent: Friday, May 11, 2007 11:59 AM
To: Wikimedia textbook discussion
Subject: Re: [Textbook-l] [Foundation-l] Rethinking brands

Kathy, At long week's end, we are all a bit muddled. :) That said, my point
is that _any_ textbook written to a state curriculum standard would have the
same open access for revision, by whomever wished to do so. The advantage is
creating a book that strictly adheres to a state curriculum standard (pick a
large state, like California, Texas, Florida, or New York) is that it will
pass muster in that one state, and inspire similar projects by others who
want to write for other states.

The SRA materials are wonderful, but not even one state education curriculum
committee (most states have these) will pass them through peer review for
serious consideration by districts as _required_ books.

Andrew's point is well-taken, but the assumption that Wikibooks would have
to do different materials for every state is unfounded.  All we need do is
construct _one_ book that follows the standard, as a placeholder and proof
of concept. Once that's done, there would be a definite viral effect in the
market, because although the K-12 education community is massive, word
travels fast.

Currently, one fo the weaknesses of Wikibooks in regard to K-12 textbook
production is lack of a seamless way to get all WYSIWYG to print, and
garnering a focus on one project, to prove it can be done.

In fact, _most_ of the hard work in curriculum construction has been done by
the state's curriculum standards committees. Go to my website
www.opensourcetext.org  and link to the California State standards, just to
get an idea about how comprehensive those standards are. byw, I have
migrated the purpose of COSTP to one where I am helping to spread the word
about the necessary strategic and tactical actions that are necessary to get
a truly open and well-distributed K-12 textbook databank accomplished. We're
all working toward the same goal[

Cheers,
Sanford


***************************************
Sanford Forte, Director
California Open Source Texbook Project
Palo Alto, CA
[email protected]
650-321-9152 (Office)
650-888-0077 (Mobile)




On May 11, 2007, at 11:24 AM, KH wrote:

> Sorry Sanford, I think too much coffee has muddled my brain.  I'm not 
> sure what you mean but I'm very, very interested in getting your 
> point.
>
> -Kathy
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Sanford Forte [mailto:[email protected]]
> Sent: Friday, May 11, 2007 11:21 AM
> To: Wikimedia textbook discussion
> Subject: Re: [Textbook-l] [Foundation-l] Rethinking brands
>
> Hi, Kathy,
>
> The irony here is that materials that are created in a way that meshes 
> with already-approved state curriculum frameworks are _also_ available 
> to "a teacher, parent, school, district, or state can take it, leave 
> it, or adapt it for their needs".
>
> Cheers,
> Sanford
>
>
> ***************************************
> Sanford Forte, Director
> California Open Source Texbook Project Palo Alto, CA 
> [email protected]
> 650-321-9152 (Office)
> 650-888-0077 (Mobile)
>
> On May 11, 2007, at 11:16 AM, KH wrote:
>
>> Although I agree with you, Sanford, with wikibooks, a teacher, 
>> parent, school, district, or state can take it, leave it, or adapt it 
>> for their needs.
>>
>> I'm  looking for open curriculum or anything like that out on the web 
>> and there really isn't anything right now.  The South African stuff 
>> is a structure but there isn't anything there for a teacher to use, 
>> let alone adapt.
>>
>> -kathy
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Sanford Forte [mailto:[email protected]]
>> Sent: Friday, May 11, 2007 11:07 AM
>> To: Wikimedia textbook discussion
>> Subject: Re: [Textbook-l] [Foundation-l] Rethinking brands
>>
>> The essential challenge is to get end product into the K-12 education 
>> channel, in a way that 1) meshes with the requirements set by state 
>> education departments to strictly adhere to curriculum frameworks;
>> 2) devise
>> effective means to inform the established K-12 education community 
>> that #1 has been completed (on a subject by subject basis); and, 3) 
>> establish a means to distribution of materials *in print* that is 
>> easy to access.
>>
>> Content is decidedly _not_ the problem. The real problems are 
>> logistics and effective project management toward a goal of 
>> completing the above,
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Sanford
>>
>> ***************************************
>> Sanford Forte, Director
>> California Open Source Texbook Project Palo Alto, CA 
>> [email protected]
>> 650-321-9152 (Office)
>> 650-888-0077 (Mobile)
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On May 11, 2007, at 10:28 AM, KH wrote:
>>
>>> I was under the impression that wikibooks would also include 
>>> textbooks for k-12.  Normally, k-3 don't have traditional texts 
>>> because many are still learning to read.  Later, they read to learn.
>>> So much of the "textbook" is really worksheets, pictures, and 
>>> planned lectures and activities.
>>> Actually,
>>> a better word to use for k-3 is curriculum, not textbooks. But I've 
>>> read we are not supposed to do curriculum.
>>>
>>> Soooo, I'm not sure what wikibooks really is.  Here is where I got 
>>> my
>>> info:
>>>
>>> http://www.lessig.org/blog/archives/003069.shtml
>>>
>>> Although dated 8/05, it seems Mr. Wales had a definite vision:
>>>
>>> "The second thing that will be free is a complete curriculum (in all
>>> languages) from Kindergarten through the University level. There are 
>>> several projects underway to make this a reality, including our own 
>>> Wikibooks project, but of course this is a much bigger job than the 
>>> encyclopedia, and it will take much longer."
>>>
>>> Curriculum, by definition, is a package.  It can include textbooks 
>>> but certain goes beyond that to worksheets, teacher planning, 
>>> activities, etc.
>>> I would love to redo the SRA Direct Instruction curriculum in 
>>> wikibooks so that parents AND teachers have an option for 
>>> scientificially based curriculum.  But according to new definitions, 
>>> I'm not sure wikibooks is an appropriate place.  Under the old 
>>> definition from the website listed above, it is.
>>>
>>>
>>> -Kathy
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> Florence Devouard wrote:
>>>> I, for one, think it is great to work on better defining the 
>>>> mission of Wikibooks. I have one question though, do you know if 
>>>> the definition worked upon is generally shared with other wikibooks 
>>>> people ? Are they other wikibooks that have worked on such a 
>>>> definition, and where the outcome differs widely from yours ?
>>>>
>>>> ant
>>>
>>> At last count 18 people supported it and 7 people objected to it.
>>> As others
>>> have already said, some disagree on limiting English Wikibooks to 
>>> just textbooks, how much emphases on textbooks be be given, whether 
>>> or not it should be a policy or guideline and some have concerns on 
>>> the clarity of the proposal.
>>>
>>> There is quite a difference from English Wikibooks' current version 
>>> and the German version. Google's German to English translation of 
>>> the German Wikibooks version:
>>> http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%
>>> 2Fde.wikibooks.org%2Fwiki
>>> %2FHilfe%3AWas_Wikibooks_ist&langpair=de%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8
>>>
>>> There have been previous proposals on English Wikibooks to redefine 
>>> the current policy as well, before they were merged together:
>>> http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?
>>> title=Wikibooks:What_is_Wikibooks/Unstab
>>> le&oldid=600961
>>> http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?
>>> title=Wikibooks:What_is_Wikibooks/Unstab
>>> le&oldid=665481
>>> http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?
>>> title=Wikibooks:What_is_Wikibooks/Unstab
>>> le&oldid=665488
>>>
>>> that AFAIK, were abandoned before ever getting to the point of 
>>> seeking input from the community to accept or reject them.
>>>
>>> --darklama
>>>
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