Assignments

This course will require you to be fairly independent. Actually interdependent is a more appropriate term. You'll be learning on your own but are encouraged to work with each other whenever suitable. Part of this course is exploring the ways in which we can use technology to bring us together in meaningful ways. As you can tell, many of these assignments are very open ended. That's intentional. Your ability to manage your time and attention will be a critical factor in your success and enjoyment of this course. 

I'm going to be trying to shift over to more self assessment in for this course.You'll be giving yourself a grade for each assignment as well as weighting them. Each assignment must be worth at least 15% but after that, it's up to you. I'll get a start at outlining what I think each of these should contain but your input is important as well.

 

Weekly Responses:

Each Monday we'll be having meeting live via Elluminate with various speakers. After each week I'll be asking each person to provide a response to the session. These responses could be in the form of a bit of writing, audio, video, images or other. They need not be elaborate or lengthy but simply your thoughts, questions and opinions on the session. I'll be looking for you to explore a variety of ways to respond. It's an opportunity for you to discover new ways to learn and interact with ideas.

Things to consider:

  • Regular postings. Offering at least one response a week, posted each week
  • Connection to personal experience or beliefs
  • Exploration of ideas including questions and links to other sources
  • Effective use of media...relevant video, compelling images
  • Various formats. Development of personal voice
  • Interaction with others. Response to at least one other person each week via comments. Also linking to their posts as a followup response. 

 

Teach Us Something

Each of you will be required to explore new ways to teach using technology. The topic should be the application of a tool or teaching strategy in the classroom. It should address a little of the "why" and "how" of an idea. You'll be asked to teach us something, anything in a 7-10 minute time period. This might be done synchrously using Elluminate. You could also comprise a teaching experience using asynchrounous tools like screencasting, youtube, wikis or a combination of tools, spaces and resources. The key is to use a variety of tools, instructional strategies and interaction. 

Things to consider:

  • Effective use of media and visuals
  • Confident voice
  • Opportunity for interaction
  • Provision of additional resources and supports

Virtual Internship

Each of you will be connected with one or two classrooms and teachers virtually. I posted a request for mentors here. At a minumum, you must teach 2 lessons (lessons can be 10-15 minutes....provide an assignment with followup) Can be done live via Skype or any other way. Here are the list of possible mentors.

Things to consider:

  • Opportunity to teach via distance. Skype is usually preferred but other tools can be used as well. If synchronous teaching is not an option, a recorded lesson posted online can substitute
  • Regular interaction with class. Usually this is done with comments but depending on the class this can occur in other spaces and forms as well.
  • Interactiom with teacher. A formal interview with them about their class setup and strategies. If appropriate, sharing and highlighting this on your blog
  • Use your blog to share your experience. Record and share any lessons if possible

Create Your Own Assignment (optional*)

Based on the form you completed on what you want to learn, we'll design and create together an assigment that is both meaningful to you and also explores some ideas I feel are germane to the course. The assignment might be related to another course you're taking. It also may be lumped in with the "Teach Us Something" assignment if you choose to develop an idea to create some type of resource. The assignment should leverage web technologies and explore the tenets of this course. This also may be done in partners. See what each other is hoping to learn, you might find a kindred spirit.  It also might be great to create custom lessons/screencasts for one another. 

*I've changed this to optional. For some of you the topic you choose in the survey will lend itself quite well to creating your own assignment. For others it might be difficult. I'd like you to have the freedom to take your learning into your own direction. I'm happy to work with you individually to establish parameters and guidelines. Depending on the potential workload, we can adjust weighting accordingly. This should be determined no later than mid February. 

 

Final Exam

Your final exam for this course will be a 5-7 minute presentation on what you learned in the course. This presentation will be a recorded artifact using any number of presentation formats: video, slides, animation, audio recording, voicethread or other tool. You'll decide how to best represent your learning and post it online.

Resources:

Taking your slide deck to the next level

Things to consider:

  • Did you cover a broad range of topics explored in class?
  • Did you delve deeper into a couple of ideas?
  • Did you effectively use visuals? (i.e. creative commons, remember, I hate bullets)
  • Did you keep within the time frame?