The move comes as a nod to individual and differentiated learning, and foundation representatives said the CK-12 curricula should be customizable for students’ preferred learning methods to help them absorb as much information as possible.
“We believe that students have different interests, goals, styles and pace of learning,” said Neeru Khosla, founding executive director for CK-12 Foundation, in a statement. “Learning is a personal process and requires individualization of style and level of learning, as well as customization of content in a world that has increasing administrative rules and limitations on teachers and declining resources.”
CK-12 also offers ways to crowd-source or locally source additional content, follow or customize paths of learning (concept maps) through concepts to be learned, and add external technology resources, such as learning management systems. Over time, CK-12 expects to expand its range of offerings to include assessment tools and adaptive learning algorithms to help guide learning.
Kno
Kno, which features more than 200,000 digital titles and recently expanded from higher education into K-12, is compatible on the iPad, Android devices, Windows 7 and 8, and a web browser.
In January, the company launched Kno Me, a personal study dashboard that helps students measure their engagement with each Kno eTextbook they use. They can view near real-time stats on their study behavior, interaction levels, time management, and progress. The dashboard also offers opt-in social functions that let students share their results with peers and follow the engagement levels of other classmates.
For digital textbooks to be used in the classroom in a significant way, Kno co-founder and CEO Osman Rashid said three things must happen:
• Students must have access to mobile devices such as tablets, as well as cloud computing that lets them study and be in sync anytime, anywhere.
• Digital texts and mobile devices must offer engaging learning experiences.
• Content must be available in a significant fashion—students and teachers can’t have access to only one out of five major titles.
“Unless these three are working in tandem, pilots will fail,” Rashid said.
He added: “We think engagement is a leading indicator of performance. If students never really understood a topic, of course their quiz [performance] will not be good. You cannot just have a flat PDF—that’s unacceptable and is a waste of money.”
Discovery Education
Long a player in education technology, Discovery Education launched its TechBooks about a year ago. These cloud-based digital textbooks include videos, embedded assessments, regularly updated content, and other interactive features.
The TechBooks cover K-12 science, including biology, chemistry, physics, and earth and space science. Four middle school social studies classes are currently in beta testing, with plans to launch them in time for the 2013-14 school year.
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