Monday, January 1, 2007

Conceptual Integrated Science


Suzanne Lyons had a vision of expanding Conceptual Physical Science to include biology: Conceptual Integrated Science.

On Hewitt's Conceptual Science team, I was the lab manual author, so I was asked to handle the lab manual for this title.

But I was a mere high school physics teacher with a full-time job teaching physics. I had more than enough physics lab ideas, but I was already using John Suchocki's chemistry labs and Leslie Abrams' earth science labs in the Conceptual Physical Science titles. Biology labs? Not a chance. I was in over my head.

Suzanne contributed great earth science labs, and we outsourced biology labs from Anne Coleman. My contribution was formatting them and giving them the kind of whimsical titles so they matched the style of the manual.

I probably should have been credited as the lab manual wrangler. But in the wild world of publishing, that made me author of record.

The second edition lab manual ran into production difficulties and was a bit delayed, but it eventually saw the light of day. Of all the lab manuals I produced, this is the one best aligned to its corresponding textbook. I'm proud of that. It also seems to have lost its place in the Pearson catalogue. The 3rd edition of the Conceptual Integrated Science textbook has since been published without a lab manual.