Inkling has teamed up with The Culinary Institute of America to rethink the classic cooking textbook, The Professional Chef, for the digital age. Their version is more than just a simple ebook... it incorporates videos, search, bookmarks, intelligent navigation, and stunning photos. It even adds social networking, that allows you to view and share notes written into the margins.
The social networking aspect of some of these textbooks is what will really extend the learning outside the classroom. The Professional Chef not only allow you to record your own notes but allows you to view the notes of others - this would be a great way to connect with professionals in the industry. We already see hundreds of talented and enthusiastic experts connecting with classrooms all round the world. This is a simple way to link the conversations back to the syllabus - meeting specific outcomes.
This concept is one that is also very easy to transfer to other subject areas. In a way every time one of these eTextbooks is published it means the next one is easier. As an Art Teacher I can see the possibilities of similar coding being used for Visual Arts, Maths, Science, English the whole range of subjects - each with videos, interactive graphs and manipulative interactives.