Balancing the books: on the importance of textbooks in a digital world

The Nordic Conference for Educational Publishers, held on Thursday 4 September and Friday 5 September in Reykjavík, Iceland, sought to shed further light on the importance of high-quality textbooks in our changing and increasingly digital world. 

Tim Oates, Group Director of the Assessment Research Division at Cambridge, who has collaborated with key stakeholders in many Nordic countries on high-quality learning materials, was a keynote speaker at the event. He also chaired a panel discussion on best practice in educational publishing, and what research can tell us about this. 

In his keynote speech, entitled ‘Things are changing fast – what research tells us about the trends in educational publishing’, Tim drew on over a decade of research into the role of textbooks in high-quality education to offer a set of key insights.

Tim said: “My work so far has shown the importance of textbooks and the many functions that they serve in supporting national aims of education, supporting learners and teachers, and helping to achieve high equity and attainment. 

“In my research, I have traced not only the features of high-quality materials but also the national arrangements which ensure a sustained supply of high-quality materials. I have looked at case studies such as Hong Kong, Finland and Singapore in which state-publisher relations have been carefully managed to deliver quality.”

This research – which includes research published by Cambridge’s Assessment Research Division – has already supported new policy on textbooks in countries as wide-ranging as Thailand, England and Sweden.

Textbooks are valuable education materials; they expose students to ideas and help them to understand content; they support moving backwards and forwards throughout a curriculum, rehearsing and revising and anticipating; they reduce teacher workload; they disseminate good practice; and they encourage wider reading, research, and analysis. 

 Tim noted in his speech: “Just as we began to understand the complexity of textbooks as ‘learning objects’, digital developments took off – and changed not only the nature of materials but also their patterns of use, impact and the form of economic and market arrangements.” 

Digital learning materials can be incredibly useful in that they may be more affordable and more accessible than paper textbooks, and easier to update. However, their uptake and quality can vary.

In his speech, Tim argued that the education and policy sectors need to understand the characteristics of both paper-based and digital materials better, as well as the arrangements of production and the form of markets, in order to ensure sustainable supply of high-quality materials to students and classrooms.

He recognised the value of initiatives such as ‘Swedish Edtest’ as an example of supporting relations between publishers, the state and schools.

As an organisation that conducts independent research, develops learning materials, and supports millions of learners around the world, Cambridge is committed to contributing to these conversations.

Learn more about the work of Cambridge’s Assessment Research Division.