Two-dimensional framework for science textbook and journal publishing

Authors review the types of books used in the science learning process and argue that due to the nature of conventional media, important relationships existing among the science books are lost as each book is published as a separate linear entity. Textbooks lack the ability to present the material in a simplified or in depth manner, and monographs usually lack the ability to supply the supporting material for a given concept. A two dimensional framework is proposed for implementation in the electronic media. The framework is represented by a two dimensional lattice of nodes connected via bidirectional links. For illustration purposes each node can be viewed as a chapter of a science textbook or monograph. Traversing the two dimensional structure horizontally left to right is similar to sequentially reading chapters of a textbook. The relationship between the adjacent horizontal layers is similar to the relationship between a high school and college textbooks on a given subject, or between a college level textbook and a graduate level research oriented textbook. It is argued that while in the conventional publishing media the above relationships are weak, the proposed two dimensional framework captures them by the means of the vertical links. Vertical links connect the corresponding chapters of the adjacent horizontal layers. Traversing the proposed two dimensional structure vertically top to bottom is equivalent to reading sequentially through a monograph on a given subject. Examples of constructing the two dimensional framework for several scientific disciplines are given