Outrageous Textbook Prices

I've already signed up for next semester's classes and I'm checking out the book lists on the NMSU B&N site. For just my EDUC 604 class (which has something to do with social justice and pedagogy) there are six required texts. I'd heard B&N had this NookStudy thing going on and for texts that have that option, there is a price listed. Here's the one that caught me:

Now, I'm all about convenience, but if I'm looking at the cheapest to drop $200 on textbooks (not even the fun YA lit that I like to read) and I can get a used paperback copy for $20, then I'm not about to drop that much more to have it on my mobile device.

I did a little more digging and found something different. I wandered over to Amazon.com to see if the used copies through other resellers were cheaper than what B&N was advertising. Here is what I found:

Um, huge discrepancy anyone? With Amazon providing all Kindle apps for free, I'm not sure why anyone would pay the $135 for a nookStudy version. I think I'll use the rest of that $119 to pick up the rest of my books.

Unfortunately, there are no books currently posted for my other class. I guess we'll have to wait and see how much damage is done then.

Using Comic Life

For my RDG 621 class we are required to complete a collaborative project. In terms of the other students in my class, that means that they work with another student and the kids they're tutoring to present whatever they created together.

For me, because I didn't have a student, it was a little different. I teamed up with a master's student to create a comic. The two boys that she worked with wrote a story about superheroes and we used Comic Life to put together the story.

I think the master's student with whom I was working was more excited about the project than the two fourth graders. And that's okay. I wanted to design an activity that got the kids out of their chairs -- something I noticed as lacking throughout the semester in my observations. I wish I could include pictures from the comic we created but I can't put photos of children online.

What I really liked about the project was that it hit multiple types of literacy. Not only did the children write the story, but they had to use their understanding of the story they created to come up with the pictures they were going to take to illustrate that story. Talk about the highest level of Bloom's Taxonomy. I'm excited about presenting this project in two weeks. I wish I could get my students this excited about a project.

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In the interest of time

I never thought the logistics of trying to get a simple survey approved would cause so much annoyance. But it feels like while the higher ups profess to want highly qualified teachers, they can't take out five minutes to let me know whether I can ask students questions. Hmm...set anyone up for failure? I'm just frustrated. I'm going to sleep and hope that things look brighter in the morning.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone