Pedagogy Corner: How speedbumps can accelerate student learning

As a textbook author, have you ever asked your students how they read your book? An inquiry into how your students read their textbooks may reveal much information that can help authors design textbooks with students in mind.

I recall when I was a college student―yes, a very long time ago―how I read a textbook chapter for a college course: I set aside at least 3 hours of undistracted time, read the entire chapter word-for-word, took copious notes, spent time examining and understanding all of the figures, and then systematically answered every single end-of-chapter question. Only after this procedure did I feel like I had a good understanding of the material.

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Copyright, Covid, and the virtual classroom

With the fall semester fast approaching, faculty are intensively preparing for the 2020-2021 academic year, in the face of continually changing information and circumstances. A number of our higher education clients have had questions about copyright issues relating to the transition of traditional in-person classes to online or hybrid formats. We have also been reviewing software agreements for various services that allow institutions to shift more of their offerings online. Here we discuss four common issues we have encountered. Although the answers are seldom black-and-white, we thought it would be useful to share some of the questions and possible approaches to them.

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TAA’s 2021 Conference Call for Proposals Is Open

TAA announces a Call for Proposals for its 34th Annual Textbook & Academic Authoring Conference which will be held June 18-19, 2021 in Indianapolis, IN. We invite the submission of presentations relevant to writing, publishing, and marketing textbooks and academic works (textbooks, academic books, journal articles, and monographs). Interactive, hands-on sessions are encouraged. The proposal deadline is October 7, 2020. 

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Digital is coming for your textbooks

While it has long been prophesied that the print textbook would disappear, it has actually taken quite a bit longer than people anticipated.

In the final session of TAA’s Summer Webinar Series, “Digital is Coming for Your Textbooks” at 2pm ET on July 30th, Christopher Kenneally, Director of Business Development, Copyright Clearance Center and Independent Publishing Industry Consultant, Michael Cairns, will review the latest developments in the creation, sourcing, and delivery of digital textbooks and will examine the looming fight for control of usage data.

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Increase your publishing success by understanding the metrics that matter

John Bond, Publishing Consultant at Riverwinds Consulting, brings more than 25 years experience in scholarly publishing to TAA’s Summer Webinar Series on Thursday, June 25th as he presents “Publishing Metrics: Understanding the Basics and Using Them to Your Advantage”.

Daily, Bond advises authors and publishers on creating and delivering great content. He is the author of 4 books and as a publisher has overseen the publishing of 20,000 journal articles and 500 scholarly books. In this 90-minute interactive discussion, he’ll give you a simple, approachable explanation of the common basic metrics and ways to use them to your advantage.

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Ask the Expert: What to look for in publisher-driven ‘new’ textbook contracts

Q: I’m a published author. I signed a textbook contract with a publisher 32 years ago and the first edition of my text was published 30 years ago. It’s since been revised 9 times, all under the original contract, and is due to be revised again soon. Recently, my publisher wrote and said they wanted to sign a new contract for the new edition because the industry had changed, their business model had changed, and the old contract was no longer in step with their current practices. Should I go along with this and sign the new contract?

A: Maybe. . . but not without doing a little homework first. Your original contract almost certainly contemplated that your text, if successful, would need periodically to be revised. What it probably said about this was that “if and when” the publisher thought a revision was warranted, the publisher would call upon you to prepare it. And if you were willing and able to do that, the revision would be prepared and published under the terms of your then existing agreement as if it were the work being published for the first time.

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