This study employs textbooks and legitimacy theories to examine the complexity of legitimizing China's textbook reform, planned since 2012, for three ideologically-laden subjects (Chinese language, History, and Morality and Law). Specifically, it explores why, to whom, and how China's Ministry of Education legitimized this textbook reform, which…

As a component of the ongoing development of the mathematics curriculum in China, we compare the country's high school mathematics textbooks with those of several other countries. We base our analysis on the assumption that textbooks, as primary printed teaching resources, are key tools for interpreting educational policy. In this paper, we…

Technological innovation is driving fundamental changes in all aspects of our lives. This is especially true of digital content, as our use of e-books, downloadable music, streaming television and movies, and online social networks has exploded. However, the explosive growth in our use of digital content seems so far to have eluded many of the 50…

Presents a fictionalized account illustrating the process by which willful states, misguided experts, cunning marketeers, and overworked teachers and administrators produce textbooks that are ill-written, confusing, misleading, and boring. (BJV)

The author examines reasons why, historically and currently, a great deal of controversy in Italian education focuses on the provision of textbooks. He discusses such issues as single national textbooks, participation in selection, effects on teaching methods, provision of class libraries, and the requirement that parents pay for textbooks. (SJL)

Publishers are compelled by public policies and practices to produce textbooks that confuse students with non sequiturs, mislead them with misinformation, and bore them with pointlessly arid writing. Recommendations for textbook policy are proposed. (BJV)

Discusses the California History-Social Science Framework (1988), in which history is at the center of the social sciences. Traces the sequencing of history courses from the elementary grades through high school, highlighting the interplay between world and United States history which provides a global context for learning. Examines the…

Discusses the recent controversy emerging over California's first serious attempt at rewriting traditional history texts from a more multicultural perspective. Analyzes the opposition to the idea of a common U.S. history and the solutions offered in its place. (CJS)