He began with a bunch of old notes inherited from a previous professor and from his research experience.
But when Richard Turco, professor of atmospheric sciences at UCLA, decided to write a textbook for his air pollution class in the early 1990s, he soon found out just how difficult it was to incorporate vast amounts of information into one coherent 500-page text.
Now, more than a decade after his book, “Earth Under Siege,” was first published, Turco continues to use the textbook in his classes.
The experience of having a professor who is the author of their textbook as well as an expert on the subject is a common experience for UCLA students, as professors in almost every department have published texts they use in class.
Professors must research their topics thoroughly for years before compiling a textbook, so by the time it is published, they have a vast and well-rounded knowledge of their subject of study.
“When you sit down and write a textbook, it’s like 500 pages of sweat and tears. You put a lot of heart into it, and most people don’t realize how hard it is to write a textbook,” Turco said.
Overall, Turco said being the writer of the textbook for his own class has a positive effect, since the structure of the course is built around the textbook and he is very comfortable discussing any of the topics included in it.
The situation also makes it easier for him to keep tables, graphs and charts up to date in his lectures, since he has access to them, a luxury he would not have if he used another person’s textbook.
For Patrick Geary, a history professor who uses his own textbook in his History 1A course on Western Civilization, using his own textbook is helpful because it presents students with a sense of what he feels is most important in the course and gives backgrounds on subjects he discusses in lecture. Yet Geary finds a problem with using his own texts in smaller classes, as he has found that in smaller discussions, many students have difficulty approaching the professor’s book critically, hesitating out of fear or courtesy.
Rather than shy away from discussion of his text and the way he presents history, though, Geary said he actually appreciates and encourages the critique.
“It helps when students feel free to take exception to the textbook. In fact, I have had very interesting exchanges with students that will help me revise the book for future editions,” Geary said.
But while the fact that the professor of a course is also the author of its textbooks may be intimidating to some students, others are pleased to have their professor as another resource.
For Geary, some terms even end with students asking him to sign their textbooks. Geary gives his students the liberty to take “pot shots” at the book and allows his teaching assistants to use the textbook at their own discretion, even criticizing it if they like. It is all part of his plan to get students to draw on the ideas given in the book, lectures, and other readings he assigns in order to form their own opinions.
Jon Rogawski, a professor of mathematics who also wrote his own textbook, takes a similar approach in his introductory calculus classes.
“The curriculum in calculus is fairly standard; what really differs is how you present it to the students, how you try to get them over the hurdle,” Rogawski said.
Rogawski tends to look at his own textbook critically and said that, at times, the fact that he has written the book seems almost incidental, since he often does problems differently in class than he shows in the book.
Rogawski is not the only one who seems to forget that he is the writer of a book.
“Sometimes interestingly, students will come up and ask me about an exercise in the book and refer to the author of the book as “˜they’ when the author is actually me. I think sometimes they put it out of their mind,” he said.
And although he has not detected the sense of intimidation that Geary has encountered from some of his students, Rogawski said students are pleased to have a professor who wrote their textbook, because it shows that he is dedicated to his subject and spends a lot of time thinking about it.
Edwin Gonzalez, a second-year anthropology student who has taken multiple classes with professors who have written their own textbooks, said it is an amazing experience to learn from an expert so passionate about the field.
Yet while studying with the author of the textbook may be a helpful resource and even an enjoyable experience for some students, Rogawski said that as a whole, teaching out of his own book is not much different from teaching out of any other textbook, except for one important detail.
“I think the main impact is that the text has the same point of view as the teacher; sometimes you battle with textbooks which have a different approach,” he said. “So in that sense it is easier for me to teach out of my own book.”