Digital textbook platform Inkling announces today that it's secured a Series A round of funding led by Sequoia Capital. Inkling is available as an iPad app and hopes to demonstrate the ways in which the digital textbooks can do more than just offer electronic versions of a printed book.

Inkling uses multitouch interactivity to create engaging learning experiences, says Inkling founder and CEO Matt MacInnis. Rather than replicating a book on a screen, Inkling puts 3-D objects, video, quizzes, and even social interaction right at a student's fingertips inside the textbook. Students can make and share notes with Inkling and can see the notes of their teachers and peers.

You can purchase entire books or just chapters from within the Inkling store (the app itself is free). Although Inkling doesn't have a lot of titles yet, Vator News says the company has made partnerships with a number of major textbook publishers, including Cengage Learning, John Wiley & Sons, and McGraw-Hill.