This holiday weekend, I spent a considerable amount of time organizing our children’s books. We have five children, ages four to thirty; and we have early reader books to high school novels. By my estimate, we have over two hundred children’s books.
As an educator, and even as a parent, I am always trying to
use the tools of the day, the latest software and hardware, social media (full
disclosure, I hate Twitter), and the newest technological approaches to life
and learning. So as I organized the books, I wondered, are books still
pertinent?
Last week, I worked with a district to begin the process of writing
their English, mathematics, science, and social studies curricula. Each core
had to adopt new text source materials. And similar to my parent quandary
regarding books, the curriculum committees struggled with the same concerns. They
wondered if they should purchase textbooks or if they should go with online access.
We now live in Florida with our school-aged children. I was
concerned at first because I heard rumors of Flori’duh.’ However, that has not
been our experience. We love our children’s schools. They are filled with
caring educators and have well-organized curricula and instruction. Plus, my daughter
does not carry home heavy textbooks. Every night she logs into stimulating
websites where she can communicate directly with her instructor, complete
assignments, watch videos, and receive immediate assistance if she does not
understand a concept. The new online texts and systems really transform the
relationship between home and school.
In the end, the curriculum committees decided to buy online
texts for all their students, but they also purchased a class set of texts. The
reason for this is that school networks are not foolproof. They are often down
or very slow. And not every student has online access at home. By purchasing
one class set (plus a couple extra) students can be assured access to the text
in class (without worrying about the network), and also have a few texts to
give to students that do not have online access at home.
In my home, I am still not sure about books. I was a
professional organizer at one time. According to professional organizer
associations, unless you read the book recently, the book should be donated and
not take space and collect dust in your home. However, I thought about what the
books could mean to our children. If our young children see a lot of books,
then they know that we value reading. That was a good enough reason to keep
them. Yes, they could read the book online, but there is something wonderful
about having the boys seated on either side as we read Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, or Oh, the Places You’ll Go! or the Berenstain Bears.
What do you think? Are books still pertinent? Tell us what
you think in the comments below.
Victoria Pagonis
Founder and President
Standards Solution
Standards Solution
