Time for some summer reading?

There are many excellent books and materials freely available for educators, this post attempts to list a few of those that might be of interest.

This is a great time of year for educators to catch up on some reading. We have the opportunity to think about what we want to do in the year ahead and reflect on the past year. We may want to consider some new ideas or remind ourselves of old concepts we have lost touch with in the rush of everyday educational life.

Below I have attempted to assemble some resources for summer readings, mainly those available freely online.  It does not claim to be an exhaustive list and if you have some additional suggestions that you want to add in the comments section I would be grateful.

 

Something Old 

Neil Postman wrote a book with one of my favourite titles “Teaching as a subversive activity”.  There are several examples of his work available online.  His writing in “Amusing Ourselves to Death” actually seems to me to be more relevant today in the age of the internet and social media than it was when he wrote it about television.  In our world of social media, reality and junk TV, his writings resonate strongly.  This piece from the Higher Existence website does a great job of comparing Orwell's "1984" to Huxley's "Brave New World", all words by Postman.

Something New

Tony Bates has had a long and distinguished career in online and distance education. His most recent book is "Teaching in a Digital Age: Guidelines for designing teaching and learning in a digital age" and covers a broad range of issues for those of us working in an online, blended or distance learning environment.

Martin Weller, from the UK Open University has been examining the world of Open Education and his latest book "The Battle for Open: How Openness won and it doesn't feel like victory" gives an insight into four key areas of open education; open access, MOOCs, open education resources and open scholarship.  The book addresses the issue of ownership of the direction the open education takes.   Martin's previous book "The Digital Scholar: How Technology Is Transforming Scholarly Practice"  from 2011 is also worth exploring.

Curt Bonk of Indiana University is the 'TravelinEdMan', who is always on the road and yet a prolific writer.  His free book with Elaine Khoo on student engagment and motivation "Adding some TEC-Variety" has 100+ activities for motivating and retaining online learners.  Curt also has a brand new book out co-edited with Mimi Lee, Thomas Reeves and Thomas Reynolds, entitled "MOOCs and Open Education around the World".  Unlike TEC-Variety, this one is not free, although some materials from the book are available online.



Audrey Watters of the Hack Education website is working on a new book on the called Teaching Machines, but collated this collection of talks and presentations from 2014 into this entertaining and provocative collection "The Monsters of Education Technology".  I really enjoy the Hack Education website and Audrey's perspective and this is a really enjoyable and informative read.

I do not have something borrowed or something blue, but I have realized that there is enough out there for a least another blog post.  So come back in the next couple of weeks for some more ideas and links.

Please Pay it Forward

I have focused mainly on ‘free’ materials, although in some cases only sample chapters are free, although still worth reading, and a few are for sale.  Please remember that nothing is really free and the authors of open books can be reimbursed in many ways.  It you like a free ebook, why not buy the paper copy for reference, or recommend that you institutions library purchase it, or purchase it for a friend.  Why not share or recommend the book or write a public review, blog about it or share in your social media.  I think most authors appreciate acknowledgement and attribution, so why not take a few minutes to write an email or tweet them and tell them why you liked their work and how it helped you in your context.