I teach a First Year Seminar class at a community college. Someone else picked the textbook, but I think it's actually pretty good and we get a cheap custom edition.
I also teach a developmental version of a gateway science course at a residential college. We tossed around the idea of assigning a similar book and asking the freshman in the science course to do some assignments pertaining to study habits and meta-cognition, and self-authorship.
So I set about researching the options. There is a book called "Focus on College Success" The pages have lots of side bars, and it's full of pictures. It actually looks pretty good in that the readings wouldn't be so arduous that it would do more harm than good.
But here's what blows me away. There's not one, but (at least) TWO, independently produced, "guides". You know, in case the 20 pages that included 20 pictures and 30 side bars are too much to get through.
I looked into both of those guides. The CTI Reviews one is 136 pages, the Cram101 is 36. Those are pretty long. I think we'd better write a guide for each of them, two each to be safe.
ReplyDeleteNot that this should detract from the point of the post, but you can get the text as a "concise edition" of the 2nd edition, 320 pages. The full length 4th edition is 496 pages, the upcoming 5th is 464.
ReplyDeleteI've been noticing more and more of those "outline" books on Amazon. I guess they're the new Cliffs Notes (and probably about as good).
ReplyDeleteI have to admit that one of my thoughts is "there's something I might be able to do if my job disappeared." It may not be the most ethical enterprise, but it beats writing "sample research papers" by a bit.