User:Sybilpriebe

Introduction
I'm an eccentric college teacher in the upper midwest who likes crazy ideas, nontraditional books, and general blasphemy.

Links

 * User:Sybilpriebe/OEP
 * NDSCS OER Textbooks: Composition and Creative Writing
 * My Campus' Web Site

OER Textbook Review
Name of OER text: Writing Spaces, Volumes I and II

Link to V1: https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/textbooks/45

Link to V2: http://writingspaces.org/volume2

Evaluation on a 4-point scale (4 = High; 1 = Low).

Accuracy of Content	4 - The essays in both volumes cover topics that affect students: the rhetorical situation, plagiarism, using Wikipedia as a source, etc. These essays are not "too old" in content as to not resonate with students' and their current culture, but they are written by professors, so the language can sometimes be lofty.

Alignment with Course Objectives 3 - None of the essays in either volume cover the basics of style (how to punctuate dialogue, grammar/punctuation/spelling/figures of speech), how to research, or give samples of certain genres.

Appropriate Reading Level 3 - As I stated above, the content/subject matter is there, but they are written by professors, so the language can sometimes be lofty.

Peer Reviewed 4 - These two textbooks are found through the Open Textbook Library at the U of M, and they state that "These books have been reviewed by faculty from a variety of colleges and universities to assess their quality."

Other (Images, Activities, etc.) 2 - The textbook we wrote/designed has student samples, brief chapter intros with our own teacherly voices that use language within students' grasp, a Nerd Unit for those style issues, a Research Unit with sample citations, and infographics throughout (Venn digrams, a hamburger diagram for explaining paragraphs, etc.).

Specifically, what did you like about this textbook? The Writing Spaces Volumes were useful in showing students how teachers think about writing and arguing and researching.

Specifically, what did you dislike about this textbook? It simply lacked a few items we needed, when we thought of our own specific student demographic: visuals, samples, and our own voices.