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Schoolbook Typography
Posted by typocrates in
22 Nov 2008 — 1:47pm
22 Nov 2008 — 1:47pm
You can download (in PDF) the books for elementary http://pi-schools.sch.gr/dimotiko/ and middle http://pi-schools.sch.gr/gymnasio/ school that are used in Greece (for students and teachers).
I am neither a type designer nor a typographer, but I think that the typography of almost every book there is horrible; a collage of bad advertising, Post-it notes and text "enriched" with some cacographic fonts bundled in book format. There are a few publishers responsible for the typesetting, so the quality is not uniform.
In Greece, sloppiness is the ruling phenomenon. What happens to other countries?
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22 Nov 2008 — 2:08pm
Τυποκράτης,
The downloads are slow from your link so it his hard to get a fair viewing, Children's books in the USA run the gamut from outstanding to terrible. You can check Amazon who has a textbook section as well as searching for children's books and judge for yourself.
http://www.amazon.com/
I attended Greek School here in America as a child and remeber the books being of poor quality. I presume thiswas just what was available in the U.S. at the time (1948-1956).
ChrisL
22 Nov 2008 — 2:27pm
I am downloading without problem from the site. You could try these two alternative sites:
(1)
http://pi-schools.thess.sch.gr/dimotiko/
http://pi-schools.thess.sch.gr/gymnasio/
(2)
http://pi-schools.ach.sch.gr/dimotiko/
http://pi-schools.ach.sch.gr/gymnasio/
I thought that every state has different books in the US. I will give a look at Amazon.com as well. My feeling is that schoolbooks are getting worse.
22 Nov 2008 — 3:10pm
Yes, every State has chosen their own books but often they choose the same books because publishers do not make many different ones. There are perhaps 5 to choose from per grade. Sometimes only 3 because the ones with greatest use are cheapest so schools pick the cheapest.
ChrisL