Alternative Textbook Information Session.
In this session, we learned about a program that gives grants to OU professors to have free textbooks for their classroom. These textbooks are written by professors to directly address the information taught in their class so that there is not unnecessary information that the students are reading. This program also offers grants from $250-$2,500 so that the professor and students do not have to pay any money. He told us about one Chemistry class he helped where the books cost $300, but through this program, they were able to get their classroom textbooks for free. Also, these books are written in a way where copyright rules are very loose so that other professors can edit the text to fit their classroom. When they do this, they are not violating any copyright laws which I found very interesting. Personally, I would not be comfortable with someone taking my text and making it their own, but I do like the general idea of this program. As a future educator, it is beneficial for me to learn about programs such as this. If I am in a Title 1 school, I could look into programs like this for my classroom if we are short on books. It reminded me of Donor’s Choice. It is good to know about different grant opportunities as a teacher because we are so limited on classroom recourses as it is. Knowing about programs where we can get textbooks for free can open many learning opportunities to our students.
In this session, we learned about a program that gives grants to OU professors to have free textbooks for their classroom. These textbooks are written by professors to directly address the information taught in their class so that there is not unnecessary information that the students are reading. This program also offers grants from $250-$2,500 so that the professor and students do not have to pay any money. He told us about one Chemistry class he helped where the books cost $300, but through this program, they were able to get their classroom textbooks for free. Also, these books are written in a way where copyright rules are very loose so that other professors can edit the text to fit their classroom. When they do this, they are not violating any copyright laws which I found very interesting. Personally, I would not be comfortable with someone taking my text and making it their own, but I do like the general idea of this program. As a future educator, it is beneficial for me to learn about programs such as this. If I am in a Title 1 school, I could look into programs like this for my classroom if we are short on books. It reminded me of Donor’s Choice. It is good to know about different grant opportunities as a teacher because we are so limited on classroom recourses as it is. Knowing about programs where we can get textbooks for free can open many learning opportunities to our students.