I was at a place named Sirhind in Punjab on 16 th. and 17th Dec. There was a seminar about the role of regulatory bodies in higher education. That is a significant issue. I presented a paper on " Technological Changes Impacting Teaching-learning processes". This talked about some significant changes happening in technology related to education. To me, the most significant thing is the changes now possible with text books.
From the time text books were created as printed material, since the time of Gutenberg, text books have been quite static.By the time it is published and start to get used in classrooms, the material is already behind times. One of the criticisms about text books have been that text books are out of date compared to what is happening in industry. Even when newer editions come out, they take 2/3 years and thus never in sync. If you create a ebook now, it is possible to be absolutely current. Even if the text book were to be updated, it can be done very frequently and distributed easily.
Text books can be customized for a course being run on different colleges, different course and for different instructors. A student can add material to it and customize it further. It can be updated as he learns, researches the material, the book can be a living document. For professional courses this can keep being updated through the students' working life too!
Would it not be nice if the book could keep updating itself!
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