Textbooks

**TEXTBOOKS: THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY**   **You shouldn't drop textbooks all together. In fact most of us do not have that option. So what can we do? Here are some solutions.** 
 * Textbooks are a fact of life for students and teachers. Unfortunately, they are not enough when it comes to students' education. Daniels and Zemelman point out in //Subjects Matter why this is so. The trouble with textbooks are: //**
 * textbooks are superficial--they have too much material and so it only covers the surface
 * textbooks are hard to read--they are not written in a "kid-friendly" format
 * textbooks are badly designed--newer designs are confusing and overwhelming
 * textbooks are authoritarian--they accept only one view and there is no room for constructive arguments
 * textbooks are often inaccurate--many mistakes are found in these books and could end up hurting the students
 * textbooks are not written for students--textbook publishing is a business and the main concern is sales and profits
 * textbooks cost too much--the cost of these books can eat up a large part of the budget, which could go to alternate materials
 * Make sure you are covering the most important concepts in depth for the year instead of trying to cover the whole book.
 * Bring in other sources such as trade books, magazines, newspapers, journals, etc. to back up you textbook.
 * Make sure you provide texts that are at various reading levels in order to avoid students reading a text that is at their "frustration level." Providing culturally relevant texts will motivtate the students to read and not bore them with events that they can not make connections to.
 * The MOST important thing is to have a classroom library, no matter if you are a math, science, social studies, or language arts teacher.

You still can use your textbook, just use it wisely! <span style="color: #2817c4; display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 170%; text-align: center;">