What do you want in a Textbook

I’ve been thinking a lot about textbooks lately. Do students really read/use them? What is the difference between a textbook and a reference book and what are the pros and cons of each in education? What about books designed for professionals rather than for teaching? They seem to be half way between a reference book and a textbook. And is larger always better or are shorter textbooks as useful as large ones? Ultimately it boils down to what is a great textbook like? I’m still working on questions and looking for answers.

Recently I have found links to a couple of free books. Or parts of books. For example, There is a new edition of Rob Miles (@robmiles) C# Yellow book text available. That’s a textbook designed from the ground up to be used in Rob’s courses at the University of Hull. No doubt the text and course fit like hand in glove.  From Microsoft  Press there is a second draft preview ebook of Charles Petzold’s upcoming Programming Windows Phone 7! Download the PDF here. Download the XPS here. And download the sample code here. )

This is a book designed for people who already know some programming, from what I can tell, but who are interested in learning programming for the Windows Phone. This preview has 6 chapters and about 256 pages. This compares to Rob Miles book which is complete at 197 pages. Of course I have copies of some textbooks that are 600+ pages as well.

I have this love/hate thing with large books though. For a novel I see value in part as volume. I read quickly so a 900 page novel that is well written and tells a good story is gold to me. A 200 page book is read and gone too quickly. On the other hand many a student sees a huge textbook (or any book some times) as intimidating, as too much to handle and as something to avoid. So I tend to favor shorter textbooks for classroom use.

Ah, but a shorter book can only cover so much material. What about stretch learning? I tend to think that a reference book is better for the “extra” stuff.  It’s too much to have students buy reference books or even to buy a classroom set. I like to have a couple of reference books on the shelf though. That allows me to occasionally point a student in a direction and get mostly out of there way. Sure it’s all there in the online documentation and some will make do with that. I guess I’m old fashioned but I don’t find online help or ebooks to be the same as a paper book.

So how do you see the textbook situation? Do you have textbooks you like and if so what makes them great? Do you like the huge books, short books or something in between? What works for you?

Comments

• Anonymous
  August 03, 2010
  If reference material was online, there'd be greater search options and you could view it on multiple platforms, as opposed to carrying a potentially large book. There's also the question of price. For example, there are many university courses that require a student to purchase a lot of books. Some of them can be very expensive and as we all know, students have finite financial resources. Making material available online could reduce costs.

• Anonymous
  August 03, 2010
  Thanks for the shout out about my yellow book. The course does fit the book quite well (in fact I'm thinking of making my slide available to anyone that wants them) but the idea is that the text can be read straight through without any external input and also used as a reference work thereafter. In terms of what I want from a textbook (aside from a Fifty Dollar bill inside the front cover) I reckon that I'm going for: Accuracy: It must be right. All the examples must work. No excuses. I remember "Java in 24 Hours" had a typo on pretty much the first example. That completely threw me for ages as I assumed my code didn't work because I'd done something stupid. When I found out it was the book I stopped reading because I had no confidence in the text any more. Didn't get my money back though... No Assumed Knowledge: The book must not assume you know stuff. If it makes any assumptions about the reader these should be right up front in the cover in big letters. No "Magic": This goes with no assumed knowledge. A writer should not make use of custom bits and bobs to hide tricky bits from the reader. Even if you plan to reveal them later. Some readers don't get that far and assume your magic bits are part of the implementation. I've seen students graduating who still think that the Text class that used to be provided by Java Gently is part of the language. Short sentences and plain english: It should be readable. Plenty of strong context: There is no point in talking about something unless you have a big chunk of common ground between you and the reader. In programming terms this means that the conversation should be rooted in something that the reader might want to use from the subject in hand, and is easy to relate to. The reader should also see how the elements you are talking about fit together, and how they can take bits of what you are describing and use them in projects of their own. A light tone: Having to read a text book is bad enough, but if the writer doesn’t really address you and make efforts to engage you with the subject it is even worse. This is not to say there should be a joke on every page, but the writer should not be afraid to address you directly and avoid third person writing styles.

• Anonymous
  August 09, 2010
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  August 09, 2010
  Authors get a very small share of the sales price of a textbook. Sometimes I wonder if it is the smallest piece completely. We do need to rethink textbooks though. And ebooks can' tbe just a static book that offers nothing that paper doesn't.