Many school textbooks woefully outdated - Deep cuts in funding shackle teachers

Houston Chronicle ^ | September 2, 2003 | APRIL CASTRO, AP

[Cincinatus' Wife]

AUSTIN -- Texas history teachers this year won't have to use antiquated textbooks that name Dan Morales as attorney general. After all, the state's former top legal official is headed to federal prison after pleading guilty to mail fraud and tax evasion charges. Other textbooks won't be as current.

Despite pleas from the state Board of Education, the Legislature cut textbook funding by $182 million this year. As the school year begins, some books are 14 years old, and gaffes in accuracy are inevitable.

For example: The Food and Drug Administration now recommends two to three servings of dairy a day, but outdated health books still recommend four daily dairy servings.

Jim Hutchinson, a high school health teacher in Bastrop, said recent strides in research and health care have turned numerous truths into fallacies.

"In the AIDS and HIV chapter, treatments were so limited at the time the book was written there were just three possible treatments. Now there are probably hundreds," Hutchinson said. "Also, it's so limited with symptoms simply because of the time it was published."

Health books used in all grade levels were published in 1989 and were implemented in the 1990-91 school year.

Education officials weren't planning to renew those books until the 2005-06 school year anyway, largely because priorities were placed on other subjects after a 1995 curriculum overhaul, according to Robert Leos, director of textbook administration for the Texas Education Agency.

Most of the books scheduled to be adopted in November weren't funded. But money for those books likely won't come until after the next regular legislative session -- in 2005. Until then, teachers will have to rely on outdated books, most of them about 10 years old.

Of the books scheduled for adoption this year by the State Board of Education, biology will be the only textbook to be renewed. New biology books are scheduled to be adopted in November.

Books used to teach English to Spanish-speaking students were among those forced into extended lifespans.

Others include agricultural science and technology education, business education, home economics education, technical education/industrial technology education, marketing education, trade and industrial education, technology applications, career orientation and health science technology education.

New social studies textbooks, with the Morales reference, were replaced earlier this year -- helping to bring books up to date with newer curriculum mandates.

"The new books are aligned with Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills and assessment," said Rosemary Morrow, administrative superintendent for social studies for the Austin school district. "The outdated textbooks just meant we didn't have things aligned to our state standards."

The new books, Morrow said, have extra software and support tools that were not available before.

Hutchinson, who's also a high school football coach, said keeping books current could go a long way to improving students' lagging enthusiasm.

"It's just so outdated, but luckily we have the Internet so we can supplement a lot of the outdated stuff," he said. "It's just not an adequate learning tool right now."

[Cincinatus' Wife]

***Despite pleas from the state Board of Education, the Legislature cut textbook funding by $182 million this year. As the school year begins, some books are 14 years old, and gaffes in accuracy are inevitable. ***

Maybe they should have bought books instead of spending in other areas.

Another school on a "tight" budget:

Board scrubs $1,750 a day school speaker***"It's paid by a federal grant," School Board member Dennis Reid said, dismissing concern over how the money is used.***

[ODDITHER]

You know, if I was a teacher, I would use the outdated books as a learning tool. Just like finding the hidden picture in magazines is used as an advertising tool, so could be the text books.

Of course this would take the teacher reading the book also .... hmmmm what a novel concept.


I will never forget the year that it took all year to get our English literaature books. We were forced to read Shakespeare out loud in class - passing the books back and forth when it was our turn to read. We also were made to learn the meaning of all the prefixes, suffixes, and many root words so that we could find the definitions of many words.

Oh thank God we didn't have text books that year.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Your solution is so obvious but these aren't the schools we remember.

To solve students' math problems, eucators go to school - Boosting teacher skills seen as key*** The report also recommends that colleges and universities boost their math requirements for education majors. Many schools require no more than a single math course for future teachers. ``It's a vicious cycle,'' Fortmann said. ``People don't learn math very well in school, they avoid math in college, and the cycle continues. What we're hoping to do here is break the cycle.'' ***

Pasadena teacher who assigned politically charged letter writing to resign*** Williams, a member of the teachers association and president of the Pasadena Educators Association, took the letters to Austin in March. Many of the students pleaded for legislators to spare field trips, textbooks and teacher salaries from the budget ax.***

"persistently dangerous" - School-safety rankings - or just black marks?*** At the heart of the discrepancy may well be a reluctance on the part of educators to report campus crime fully. A survey by the National Association of School Resource Officers found that 89 percent of school police believe crime is already underreported. "It's the scarlet letter in education today," says Mr. Trump. "Administrators have said to me privately that they would rather be academically failing than be a dangerous school."***

3 F's, they're out: Edison sees teacher shake-up*** While the district does not have access to the standardized test scores of individual teachers' students, it can review results by subject and grade, she said. Since reading scores fell at Edison -- only 3 percent of freshmen and 4 percent of seniors were classified at least proficient in 2003 -- they decided to shake up the English department.***

[Thebaddog]

Maybe they should write text books with longer life spans instead of being topical to the minute like Newsweek. And I do think that the books are available by the publishers if they tried to look for them.

[sharkhawk]

I agree totally. Why would the current attorney general of Texas be in a HISTORY book?

[samtheman]

Each year the textbooks get more dumbed down and PC'd-up. It's a waste of money to buy new ones.

[raybbr]

Why should I have to buy textbooks for Houston?

[David Isaac]

The author of the article zeroed in on the problem (like a laser beam), kids may be setting their goals towards one too many servings of dairy products per day. But at least she was as perceptive as the administrator and the teacher cited in the article. They also seem clueless as to where the real problems in education lay.

If it we up to me, as a teacher of Social Studies (not quite certified), I would choose a text at least 35 years old, because of the ratio of facts to propaganda and just plain B.S..

[tiamat]

What they need to be doing is teach HISTORY , period. Getting off of the Social Studies crap would help a lot.

My daughter had Early American History last year for fifth grade and the teacher used a textbook from the early 70s. Big thick thing with lots of dense text. Covered all sorts of stuff that would be considered controversial now, like the "Three Fifths Compromise". Actual HISTORY of what happened around the time of the Revolution and not a lot of PC feel-good crap.

The kids spent a couple of weeks decontructing the Constituion and the Bill of Rights and the teacher made SURE that they knew what it all meant.

There are some good teachers out there who mean it.

Tia

[meyer]

I doubt if math, English, and basic science has changed that much in 14 years that they need "updated" books - that is, unless they want the newer PC versions of those subjects. Perhaps in the higher levels of science, you'll find some interesting developments, but the basic stuff for the lower grade levels hasn't changed. Water is still a liquid, ice a solid, and steam a gas. 2+2 still equals 4, and sentances still contain a noun.

[G.Mason]

Correct amount of dairy servings per day?

Aids cures?

I'm surprised they aren't complaining about that old, antiquated document given us by our Founding Fathers, the Constitution.

But then there's no sense in "up-dating" something they don't teach.

[Behind Liberal Lines]

A few months I was talking to a retired HS principal from my old home town.

He pointed out that, when he was there, there were only three principals in the entire school district: himself (HS), the elementary school and middle school principals, and no assistant principals.

Now, there are EIGHT principals. Which, he pointed out, cost the school district nearly a million dollars a year in salary and benefits.

And, at the same time, the district has LOST population.

Of course, when taxpayers voted down the last school budget, what did the school cut? Positions? Of course not: football and band.

[BushCountry]

Textbooks by definition are outdated the moment they go to press and seldom are worth the paper they are printed on. Too long have teachers relied on textbooks as a means of getting out to work and doing their job correctly, teaching. Read chapter 3 and write a synopsis, blah, blah, blah...

By far, the best teachers are the ones would ignore the textbooks, stands in front of the class and make their lectures fun, informative and demands improvement from their students by challenging them.

[At _War_With_Liberals]

For the entire Clinton Presidency, the outdated books were not a problem. In 2003, now its a disaster. Puhhlease...

[anobjectivist]

It's too bad that my history teacher in college thought the book was the greatest thing (at least that's how he acted). I took the class to be a challenge, because I thought it would be more rigorous than a highschool class.

I was mistaken.

The teacher took notes on the book in powerpoint form and presented them to the class every day. If he ever got to the point that he felt he was being boring or he got bored himself, he would try to use a synonym when reciting verbatim the powerpoint presentation that was behind his head (he was facing the class, clicker in hand, reading off the presentation line by line by looking over his shoulder). He would, inevitably, stumble on that synonym he never could find, and waste time trying to find that perfect little word that existed only in his mind.


That was just last semester. It's a good thing I'm an engineering major, or I would go nuts with all of the crap the liberal arts professors try to pull. 17 hours ( maximum allowed without going to a hand-holding advisor) seems to be on the easy side.

I'm beginning to wonder how much money we'll continue to waste on an education that could be had for $1.50 in overdue fees at the library, as Good Will Hunting put it.

[At _War_With_Liberals]

Really. The older textbooks may have offensive non 2003 PC content. The results on innocents will be horrible.

New books mean latest leftist agendas.

[Ff--150]

Folks, are we missing the point here--OUR CHILDREN NEED TAXES TO BE RAISED, NOW!!!!

[At _War_With_Liberals]

No one knows 'the 100's of AIDS symptoms'. Why would a child have to know them. Aids education should focus on abstinence for children. Instead, they minimize its deadliness with PC aids indoctrination.

[dawn53]

I homeschooled my son and used Saxon Math, but from what my sister (whose kids are in public school) tells me, math has changed.

Now there is a great emphasis placed on "estimating" and parents are told that they won't be able to help their kids with their homework because they (the parents) won't understand the way math is now done. Huh???? That would send up red flags for me if my kid was in the class, I'd pull them out fast.

I still don't understand why the public schools don't use a program like Saxon. A 50 buck textbook could be used for years and years, the method is tried and true, the results for the student are outstanding.

My 15 year old finished Saxon Alg II, took the College Placement, qualified and is now in College Alg. at a local college. I'm glad because I don't think I could have taught him Trig and Calculus. I give all the credit to Saxon, repetition, repetition, repetition, and solid basic math.

[Lil'freeper]

I question just how outdated these books are (other than falling apart at the seams) and suspect it's more an exercise in updating 'spin' and dumbing down content. Literature and history texts don't need changing- unless there are too many white guys cited.

The phenomenon in math and science is to dumb down the content and add more pictures. Compare a chemistry text of 20 years ago with an 'updated' one and you'll be shocked. The topics are treated with less depth and detail today and somehow schools can't 'cover' as many of them in a school year. I know of one district in MD that offers two years of chemistry to deal with the topics that used to be covered in one.

Biology texts may be the exception. That field changes very rapidly and the trend in the texts is toward molecular biology and away from phylogeny. These days, you almost need to take chemistry first in order to better understand the biology texts.