Software:FlexBook
 | This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
(Learn how and when to remove this template message)No issues specified. Please specify issues, or remove this template. |
FlexBook is a textbook authoring platform developed by the CK-12 Foundation launched in 2008, focused on textbooks for the K-12 market. Derived from the words "flexibility" and "textbook," a FlexBook allows users to produce and customize content by re-purposing educational content using different modules. FlexBooks can be designed to suit a learner's learning style, region, language, or level of skill, while adhering to the local education standards.[1]
Features
FlexBooks are designed to overcome some of the limitations of traditional textbooks. Anyone – including teachers, students, and parents – can adapt, create, and configure a FlexBook.[2]
Some FlexBooks features include:
- Web-based collaborative model, where the user can create and edit content to produce a custom textbook[3]
- Open Educational Resource(OER) which allows for remixing of content
- Available in PDF, HTML, ePub (for iPad) and AZW (for Kindle)
Licensing
Each CK-12 FlexBook is created under Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC 3.0) License,[4] giving its author/user a right to share (i.e., right to copy, distribute and transmit the work) a right to remix (i.e., right to adapt the work). However, conditions of Attribution and Non-commercial apply.
Examples of use and collaboration
In March 2009, FlexBook was acknowledged as “an adaptive, web-based set of instructional materials” by Virginia officials when members from Virginia's K-12 physics community along with university and industry volunteers developed an eleven chapter FlexBook titled “21st Century Physics FlexBook: A Compilation of Contemporary and Modern Technologies” in just 4 months.[5] In September 2010, NASA teamed up with CK-12 to add a chapter on “modeling and simulation” to the existing Physics FlexBook created earlier.[6] In November 2011, teachers from a school district, Anoka-Hennepin, Minnesota, reportedly, saved the district $175,000 by writing their own online textbook instead of buying $65 textbooks – earlier, costing the district to the tune of $200,000.[7] Wolfram has teamed up with CK-12 to produce interactive FlexBooks with Wolfram demonstrations embedded into the FlexBooks.[citation needed]
See also
- OpenCourseWare
- Open educational resources
- Open textbook
- Bookboon
- China Open Resources for Education
- Connexions
- Curriki
- Flat World Knowledge
- Free High School Science Texts South Africa
- Khan Academy
- MIT OpenCourseWare
- National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning India
- Open.Michigan
- Tufts OpenCourseWare
References
External links
 |  |
