I'm writing this after experiencing some frustration that WIKI didn't want to play with me. I don't blame our students for their frustration level when things don't work right. It may be my fault, but it doesn't really matter. It still chaps my hide.
I'm interested in the photo story concept. I like that it is "easy." Our culture is very visual now. Very easy. But I have enough puritan spine to distrust "easy" and assume it is also less valuable than what is "hard." I think that we are going through a major cultural shift. Probably, one day I'll look back on my own childhood, youth, adulthood and realized I'm a fossil from a different age. "Why, back in my day we had to spell the whole word out. No "BFF" for us. And we liked it. We liked it fine!"
I found a lot of Beth's presentation very pertinent. It really jived with my experience, and Cheryl and I already talked about putting some of the policy and explanation into our English 0111 syllabus. Unfortunately, I couldn't open either document on my home computer.
Chaps. Hide. @#$%^%&$.
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Creating Thesis Statements
Thesis Statement Activity to be given by the third week of class. Assessment to take place in peer review and by instructor comments.
1) Read online information on creating thesis statements.
2) Take quiz on thesis statements until you make a 70 or better.
3) Create a discussion board posting, creating a thesis statement for the essay you are currently working on in English 1311.
a) First write a sentence about your topic.
b) Next, write down the focus you are stressing on your topic.
c) Incorporate the topic and focus into one thesis statement.
4) Respond to the thesis statements of at least two other students in class (do not choose someone who already has two responses as third responses won't count for credit). Answer these questions in your response:
a) Is it a complete sentence?
b) What is the topic?
c) What is the writer's focus (their attitude toward the topic, opinion of the topic, the
significance of the topic to them?)
d) Rewrite the student's thesis, incorporating at least one suggestion you have for
making it better.
1) Read online information on creating thesis statements.
2) Take quiz on thesis statements until you make a 70 or better.
3) Create a discussion board posting, creating a thesis statement for the essay you are currently working on in English 1311.
a) First write a sentence about your topic.
b) Next, write down the focus you are stressing on your topic.
c) Incorporate the topic and focus into one thesis statement.
4) Respond to the thesis statements of at least two other students in class (do not choose someone who already has two responses as third responses won't count for credit). Answer these questions in your response:
a) Is it a complete sentence?
b) What is the topic?
c) What is the writer's focus (their attitude toward the topic, opinion of the topic, the
significance of the topic to them?)
d) Rewrite the student's thesis, incorporating at least one suggestion you have for
making it better.
Five Principles
I've read the "Five Principles of Successful Course Redesign Before" -- and the hybrid format of English 0111 does attempt to meet all five criteria. We redesigned the entire course and even implemented the course redesign in all sections. Secondly, the modules are set up to be interactive, and active learning must take place to complete many of the assignments. Third, the hybrid format allows for individualized assistance where needed. Fourth, feedback is ongoing, and is automatic with all quizzes. Lastly, we can easily check student time on task for quizzes, and monitoring student progress, while not completely automatic, takes place weekly when logging in student performance.As for the day's activities: I enjoyed Harry's comments on syllabus design, and will use several of his suggestions in his feedback on our course syllabus. I heard several of the 1311 faculty mentioning his session helped them with their syllabus skills for other classes. Blogging was fun and easy, and I think we made some preliminary progress on identifying how we will reconstruct the syllabus.Thanks, ISS Team, for your usual patience and resilience!
Monday, January 7, 2008
Why the Tech Academy?
It was my original idea to take the English 0111 course hybrid, and I was heavily involved in the grant that funded the hybrid course. I am quite invested in making it a success, primarily because I believe this format will help students with important concepts in writing, both for their English 1311 course, as well as for any type of academic writing. I also want to help students with tech skills and time management skills, both of which develop nicely using WebCT. The English 0111 lab helps students, who otherwise would need to devote one or two semesters to developmental writing courses, to complete a college credit course. The hybrid format kills several birds with one stone.
Two Truths and A Lie
I am a mixture of Belgian and Scots, and our Scots family crest is a picture of a wild and crazy boar with a spike through its head. I post this on my office door to let my students know they'd better not f__k with me. I breed Alsatian bloodhounds as a hobby and sell them through the web. They are much prized for their ability to smell a fraud and to bark at grammatical errors.
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