"The State of Maine, Department of Education is seeking proposals for the development of an open digital textbook to support the integration of technology in teaching and learning. The open digital textbook must be comprehensive enough to serve as a content area's primary subject matter and redefine the traditional textbook for that subject matter at the identified grade level. This resource will leverage available and supported technology, through the Maine Learning Technology Initiative. In this context, an "open digital textbook" is a collection of digital educational content that is openly available over the Internet. It is licensed to allow duplication and distribution, in addition to modification of the content. It will include the necessary elements for successful implementation at the classroom level including alignment to standards, learning opportunities, instructional guidance, supporting materials, accessibility to all learners, and integration of technology."
“Eight years ago, if we did this, we would have lost substantial amounts of money,” Ms. Pope says. “But our costs have come down a lot, and our institution says they will stand behind us even if we do lose money.”
"Today the National Academies Press announced it would offer its entire PDF catalog of books for free, as files that can be downloaded by anyone. The press is the publishing arm of the National Academies of Sciences and Engineering, the Institute of Medicine, and the National Research Council, and publishes books and reports that scientists, educators, and policy makers rely on."
Funded by The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, College Open Textbooks is a collection of colleges, governmental agencies, education non-profits, and other education-related organizations that are focused on the mission of driving the awareness and advocacy for open textbooks.
Created and narrated by physics Professor Erik Christensen of South Florida Community College.
A collegeopentextbook.org advocate and trainer, Professor Christensen discusses the benefits to himself and his students of adopting an open physics textbook. The customization of the open textbook with his own teaching materials, he believes, enabled him to make physics "more fun and interesting" for his students, with some choosing to major in physics at the universities. Also, costs to students dropped from $178.00 to $13.00.
"YouTube + Creative Commons = awesome. Starting tomorrow at 9am Pacific time, YouTube will offer the option to license videos with the Creative Commons CC-By-3.0 license, and will introduce new remixing options in YouTube's cloud-based video editor. "