Text + animations + learning-questions
Animations: Figures often try to teach a dynamic concept: Programs execute one statement at a time; a graph is plotted point by point; electrons flow across a resistor. Numerous figures with lengthy explanations can be replaced by one animation. If a picture is worth a thousand words, an animation is worth five thousand.
Learning questions: A page of text is like a lecture. A paragraph plus interactive questions is like a dialogue. Most teachers prefer the latter. One student said, "I feel like the zyBook is working with me rather than talking to me." After defining a concept with brief text, a zyBook author uses questions to provide examples, expound, and more.
Minimized text
Beyond the above, we agree that “It’s not done when you can add no more. It’s done when you can remove no more.” As such, we aggressively minimize text.
Explanation:
Textbooks were written when only paper as available, so authors did the best they could using text and figures. But imagine teaching how to tie a shoe, or play piano, using just text and figures. That’s the state of textbooks today. Better than nothing, but not the most effective.
Today, the web supports animations, interactive questions, videos, and more. The author’s palette is richer.
In the web era, porting textbooks from paper to the web is, well, a bit silly. It's akin to porting radio programs to the TV. Even with a few add-ons, such porting still falls short. Instead, TVs enabled entirely new ways of communicating. Likewise, the web enables entirely new ways of teaching. If the web is a superhighway, porting textbooks to the web is like putting horses on that highway.
So, most zyBooks are written from scratch for the web. So they look very different from a textbook. zyBook authors use some text, but then make extensive use of:
Animations: Figures often try to teach a dynamic concept: Programs execute one statement at a time; a graph is plotted point by point; electrons flow across a resistor. Numerous figures with lengthy explanations can be replaced by one animation. If a picture is worth a thousand words, an animation is worth five thousand.
Learning questions: A page of text is like a lecture. A paragraph plus interactive questions is like a dialogue. Most teachers prefer the latter. One student said, "I feel like the zyBook is working with me rather than talking to me." After defining a concept with brief text, a zyBook author uses questions to provide examples, expound, and more.
Minimized text
Beyond the above, we agree that “It’s not done when you can add no more. It’s done when you can remove no more.” As such, we aggressively minimize text.
